Whilst working through the AER’s Wholesale Markets Quarterly with my mind thinking back to Q2 2022 the SMS alerts have been keeping me informed of some volatility today in South Australia:
Here’s a snapshot from NEMwatch at the 13:00 dispatch interval with the spot price up quite close to the $15,500/MWh Market Price Cap:
Paul was one of the founders of Global-Roam in February 2000. He is currently the CEO of the company and the principal author of WattClarity. Writing for WattClarity has become a natural extension of his work in understanding the electricity market, enabling him to lead the team in developing better software for clients.
Before co-founding the company, Paul worked as a Mechanical Engineer for the Queensland Electricity Commission in the early 1990s. He also gained international experience in Japan, the United States, Canada, the UK, and Argentina as part of his ES Cornwall Memorial Scholarship.
Worth recording this other ez2view ‘Notification’ widget alert received at 14:11 (NEM time) on Thursday 6th November 2025 to mark a large-size drop in ‘Market Demand’ in South Australia.
Both the QNI and the Heywood interconnectors tripped around the same time on Saturday 25th August 2018 (not apparent at this time which one was first, and why), leading to both QLD and SA regions being separately islanded from the rest of the mainland NEM. This also contributed to over 1,000MW of load shedding in NSW and VIC, and presumably some frequency excursions in QLD and SA.
1 Commenton "There’s plenty of wind, but the SA price is still spiking today (Wed 7th Sept 2022)"
A number of factors were probably contributing. Murraylink has been offline for several days and Heywood was severely constrained at the time of your snapshot. Pelican Point has had only one GT running for about a week but was completely offline since 0130. Solar was depressed late morning because of a weather front which has led to transmission line warning market notices for SA. Many of the gas peakers were called on during the day.
A number of factors were probably contributing. Murraylink has been offline for several days and Heywood was severely constrained at the time of your snapshot. Pelican Point has had only one GT running for about a week but was completely offline since 0130. Solar was depressed late morning because of a weather front which has led to transmission line warning market notices for SA. Many of the gas peakers were called on during the day.