The ABC, the Australian and the Financial Review are all reporting that BHP’s Olympic Dam – one of largest mines and electricity loads in South Australia – has lost power, after last night’s thunderstorm and strong winds damaged parts of the region’s transmission network. The state’s energy minister has reportedly said that the mine could be disconnected from the grid for up to a week.
The outage is likely to cause a headache for system operators and the AEMO this weekend – where demand in the region was already forecast to go negative on Saturday and Sunday.
Via LinkedIn, Josh Stabler of Energy Edge has drawn attention to changes in demand forecasts in South Australia. The latest STPASA run projects market demand going as low as -219 MW on Sunday. Demand in the region has drifted slightly negative in some isolated incidences over the past two years, particularly in Spring when temperatures are milder.
The screenshot below has been taken from our Forecast Convergence widget in ez2view and shows the outlook for market demand (a.k.a total demand) in the region in the coming days.
The current STPASA run forecasts -216MW of market demand in SA for the 13:00 dispatch interval on Sunday
Source: ez2view’s Forecast Convergence widget
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