NEM Mainland Frequency wandering (somewhat more than ‘normal’) on Thursday afternoon 13th February 2025
A quick note with snapshot taken at ~15:11 on Thursday 13th February 2025 looking back at the past 6 hours of NEM Mainland Frequency.
Articles by Paul McArdle
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.
An initial walk through contributions in South Australia on Wednesday 12th February 2025 (i.e. Part 1)
If I had time, we'd explore three separate questions we have about what happened in South Australia on Wednesday 12th February 2025. In this article we take a first pass at one of those...
Spare capacity in South Australia drops below 100MW on Wednesday evening 12th February 2025
A follow-on article focused on the 19:00 dispatch interval on Wednesday 12th February 2025 in South Australia (a very tight period for supply-demand balance).
‘Market Demand’ soars in South Australia on Wednesday evening 12th February 2025
Tuesday 12th February 2025 is seeing very high levels of 'Market Demand' into the evening in South Australia.
Whiplash abated … market oscillations stopped on Wednesday afternoon 12th February 2025
Following an earlier article (on Wednesday morning 12th February 2024) we note the end of oscillations related to the newly composed ‘N-BU_330_TX_ONE’ constraint set for an outage related to Project Energy Connect.
A trend of daily peak SA ‘Market Demand’– from 1st January 2008 to 11th February 2025
With respect to forecasts for peak South Australian ‘Market Demand’ in summer 2024-25 (and particularly with expectations of high demand on Wed 12th Feb 2025) we've provided this article as some context.
Whiplash from yo-yo-ing prices (and hence targets etc) on Wednesday morning 12th February 2025
Wednesday morning 12th February 2024 sees rapid and large oscillations in prices across all regions - which results from (and/or leads to) oscillations in output of many units. One of the contributing factors is...
Evening volatility in South Australia, with high demand, on Tuesday 11th February 2025
With warnings that tomorrow could see high (higher!) demand in South Australia, we take a quick look at high demand experienced on Tuesday 11th February 2025.
Wednesday 12th February 2025 could be a big day for ‘Market Demand’ in South Australia
DTN (a.k.a. Weatherzone) says tomorrow South Australia might see 'hottest day in 5 years'. Well, correlated with that, AEMO forecasts show it might see highest 'Market Demand' in 11 years!
Large jump in ‘Market Demand’ in NSW on Friday afternoon 7th February 2025
A short record of a large (i.e. >400MW) change in ‘Market Demand’ in the NSW region for the 17:15 dispatch interval (NEM time) on Friday 7th February 2025, alerted via ez2view.
Berrybank 2 Wind Farm recommences operations, (a little later) on Friday 7th February 2025
No sooner had I published this article about ‘Berrybank 1 Wind Farm recommences operations, on Friday morning 7th February 2025’ than I received an ez2view alert on the restart of neighbouring Berrybank 2 Wind...
Berrybank 1 Wind Farm recommences operations, on Friday morning 7th February 2025
Third article in a series, following the turbine failure at one of the Berrybank Wind Farms (was it Berrybank 2?) ... to note that Berrybank 1 has restarted on Friday 7th February 2025.
Stubborn forecast LOR2 for NSW on Friday afternoon/evening 7th February 2025
At 10:42 (NEM time) this morning the AEMO published MN124235 pertaining to tomorrow (Friday 7th February 2024) for forecast LOR2 in NSW. So we take a quick look...
The GSD2024 (Generator Statistical Digest 2024) is released
It's Wednesday 5th February 2025, and we* are pleased to release the GSD2024 … following a focused effort across both teams over the period since the changeover from 2024 into 2025. Some details here,...
AER announces $9M fine for Callide Power Trading (with respect to 25th May 2021 explosion/incident)
A short note following the AER announcement (Tue 4th Feb 2025) that ‘Callide Power Trading penalised $9 million for not meeting performance standards’.
Berrybank 1 and Berrybank 2 Wind Farms offline since Tuesday morning 4th February following wind turbine collapse
Prompted by a reader (and an ABC article) we take a look at Berrybank 1 & 2 Wind Farm following the turbine tower collapse on Tuesday 4th February 2025.
Four units at Gladstone still running … was it (is it) partly a game of bluff?
A fourth update in what's visible in the market data about Industrial Action at Gladstone Power Station
Last Friday’s large and (mysterious) apparent drop in NSW ‘Market Demand’ (part 3) … what helped restrain frequency?
Friday 31st January 2025 (appeared to) experienced a very large drop in demand in NSW in a single dispatch interval - but we're now suspecting some form of data/operational glitch. However we wonder, if...
Afternoon volatility in NSW on Tuesday 4th February 2025
A short record of spot price volatility in NSW on Tuesday afternoon 4th February 2025.
AEMO notes ‘Update to system strength requirements in North Queensland’ to cater for 0 x Gladstone units online
With all 6 x Gladstone units expected to be offline by the end of the day due to Industrial Action, very timely that AEMO MN124047 notifies the market that 'The system normal equations have...