Heatwave to drive QLD Sunday evening demand to a record?

South-East Queensland has turned on its best behaviour for the G20 delegates this weekend, registering a hot Saturday and what feels like an even hotter Sunday.

I was startled a little earlier to see a massive scheduled demand of almost 8,100MW forecast by AEMO for this evening – after the moderating effect of solar PV has gone away.  This was shown in the NEM-Watch snapshot below I took at 13:20 NEM time:

Sweltering temperatures in South-East Queensland forecast to drive Sunday evening demand sky-high

To gain some context to the question, “how exceptional would this be for a Sunday?” I powered up NEM-Review and generated this trended comparison of maximum, average and minimum Scheduled Demand:

Trended history of Scheduled electricity demand in Queensland

As we can see, a half-hour scheduled demand above 8,000MW would indeed be a record for Sunday especially for a “spring” November!

For some context, refer here, here and here for background on that “wacky weekend” for Queensland in summer 2012-13.

I note that (in later predispatch forecasts) the AEMO has moderated the forecast demand somewhat (now peaking just below 8000MW at 17:00, with a slightly smaller peak later at 19:00).  We’ll have to see what eventuates, whilst staying somewhere cool.


About the Author

Paul McArdle
One of three founders of Global-Roam back in 2000, Paul has been CEO of the company since that time. As an author on WattClarity, Paul's focus has been to help make the electricity market more understandable.

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