Interim boost to wind and solar in South Australia from ElectraNet’s new Synchronous Condensers

From 10:00 today (Friday 10th September 2021), ElectraNet’s new synchronous condensers (which have been under testing) will be deliver a boost to Semi-Scheduled units in South Australia.

This was noted yesterday by AEMO in Market Notice 90305:

_______________________________________________________________________________________________

Notice ID 90305

Notice Type ID New/Modified Constraints

Notice Type Description MARKET

Issue Date Thursday, 9 September 2021

External Reference Update to non-synchronous limits in South Australia

________________________________________________________________________________________________

AEMO MARKET NOTICE

Refer to market notice 89336

As a part of the transition to new limits for the synchronous condensers in South Australia AEMO will increase the non-synchronous limit to 1900 MW. This limit will apply only under system normal conditions only – the current limit will apply for Davenport synchronous condenser or 275kV line outages.

No changes to the SA generator combinations will be made at this stage.

The revision to the limits will be implemented at 1000 hrs on Friday 10th September 2021 with the following changes:

The following constraint equation will be updated:

S_NIL_STRENGTH_1

and the following removed:

S_NIL_STRENGTH_2

Outage constraints will also be updated.

For more information refer to: https://www.aemo.com.au/energy-systems/electricity/national-electricity-market-nem/system-operations/congestion-information-resource/related-resources/operation-of-davenport-and-robertstown-synchronous-condensers and the limits advice: https://www.aemo.com.au/energy-systems/electricity/national-electricity-market-nem/system-operations/congestion-information-resource/limits-advice

For further details on this change please contact ben.blake@aemo.com.au

Ben Blake

AEMO Operations

________________________________________________________________________________________________

 

For some context, readers might like to refer back to Allan’s article from 9th February about these ‘New Sources of Strength’.

Worth also noting that this (changed ‘S_NIL_STRENGTH_1’) is not the final form of the system strength constraints for South Australia (I believe) – my understanding is that the AEMO will modify them further in the weeks/months ahead.

Seems fairly certain that this record for ‘maximum wind output’ from Sunday 25th July 2021 won’t last too much longer as a result…

Incidentally, for clients who have access to NEMreview v7 , we’re in the process of updating this v7 Help Guide using that particular query as an example of how to use the software.

These instructions would also apply to licensed ez2view users, who can access a larger version of the Trends Engine platform in the ‘Trends Editor’ widget.


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.

6 Comments on "Interim boost to wind and solar in South Australia from ElectraNet’s new Synchronous Condensers"

  1. On the wind output record, that might require some pretty high demand to turn up – otherwise output will be limited by local demand + export capacity less required synchronous generation, as well as wind self-curtailing on negative spot prices. So the record may last a few months yet.

  2. will be interesting to see to what extent directions on GPG reduce. I’m interested to note that “no changes to the SA generator combinations will be made at this stage”. This implies that there won’t be a significant reduction at this point, or have i misunderstood?
    And if so, is this just because AEMO/electranet are in testing phase and changes will be made in due course when testing is complete?
    Because otherwise the syncons don’t seem like great value…

    • The plan as announced is to allow the network to run with the machines for several weeks to monitor, then make adjustments to constraints (you are here) and monitor performance for a couple of weeks then repeat until fully commissioned. Updating the minimum synchronous generation constraints is the final stage of the plan.

    • AEMO’s program (here) is to reduce the minimum synchronous requirements (to 2 x TIPS B or equivalent) about 6-12 weeks after commissioning of the first two syncons, which occurred a couple of weeks ago. So all going well in this interim period, we’ll see reduced gas directions in around 4-8 weeks.

  3. This change is Stage 2 of a 3 stage process which is described in AEMO Market Notice 89336. Generator combinations will be changed in Stage 3.

  4. An easy-to-miss rider in the AEMO notice: the current limit will apply for Davenport synchronous condenser or 275kV line outages – there’s one such line outage running until the evening of Sep 14 so the old limit effectively remains in place until then.

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