AEMC grants ‘urgent’ Rule Change Request for Port Lincoln and Snuggery as out-of-market reserve

The coming week will be another busy one, but worth noting in this weekend article that on Wednesday (noting that 15th January was already notable to us) the AEMC decided to make a temporary rule change, which will come into effect from 23 January 2025, to help secure South Australia’s power supply for this summer.

… The detailed determination will be published this coming Thursday 23rd January 2025 (and will presumably be listed here on the AEMC Page for ERC0407).

In this case, it might be worth reading the 6-page Rule Change Request from the Minister of Energy in SA … in particular what ‘the ask’ was about:

‘… the urgent rule change seeks to give AEMO the ability to negotiate with Engie to procure the services of the Port Lincoln and Snuggery generators as an ‘”out-of-market reserve” for a period of no longer than two years’

Currently on the AEMC’s website here, they note:

‘Advance notice on jurisdictional derogation to support summer reliability in SA

On 15 January 2025, the Australian Energy Market Commission (AEMC) decided to make a temporary rule change, which will come into effect from 23 January 2025, to help secure South Australia’s power supply for this summer.
Once made, the rule change will provide the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) with the option to consider using two additional power stations – Snuggery and Port Lincoln – as emergency backup power sources if needed.
This follows an urgent rule change request for a jurisdictional derogation submitted by Hon Tom Koutsantonis MP, Minister for Energy and Mining in South Australia (the Minister) late last year.
While our detailed determination will be published on 23 January, we are advising the market of our decision now for planning purposes. This reflects our commitment to transparency while working within our statutory requirements.
Technical note: This change will be made through a jurisdictional derogation from clauses 3.20.3 (g) and (h) of the National Electricity Rules for the ENGIE units for interim reliability reserves (IRR). ’

(A) Notes in Media, and Social Media

At this point we have noted this ruling was noted as follows:

1)  Earlier on WattClarity …

(a)  On 7th February 2024, Linton had noted ‘Engie announces early closure of two dispatchable South Australian power stations’, again noting an article by Angela MacDonald-Smith in the AFR.

(b)  On 5th December 2024, Linton had written ‘Mothballed diesel generators might be brought back in SA’, and in doing so had noted an article in the AFR about this…

… at the end of that article, Linton had referenced several other articles elsewhere about the urgent rule change request.

2)  But in terms of the ruling itself:

(a)  The early notice of ruling was noted in the Endgame ‘weekly dispatch’ noted this on Friday 17th January.

(b)  At this point (on Sun 19th Jan) we’d not seen anything else elswhere.

Where we come across references to this (and have time, and remember to do so) we’ll note this in here