How Retailers Use Contracts to Hedge Customers
Guest author, Warwick Forster, provides an explanation of some of the common ways that retailers hedge their risk exposure in the National Electricity Market
Guest Author
More on those negative prices – how do contracts affect bidding behaviour?
Guest author Allan O'Neil provides this handy explainer on how generators’ contract positions affect their bidding decisions and can make negative spot prices pay off, at least in the short term. Very useful for...
Who’s responsible for those negative prices?
Rapidly growing solar PV output has been widely tagged as the cause of low and even negative prices in Queensland. But in any market it’s the behaviour of ALL participants that determines price outcomes....
ESOO Unboxing
Without resiling from last week’s criticism of how the headlines from AEMO’s 2019 Electricity Statement of Opportunities (ESOO) were communicated, it’d be churlish for me to fault the depth of disclosure and data sitting...
ConfUSEd by the ESOO? You’re not alone.
I’d rather not add to the number of conspiracy theories in circulation, but I wonder if there’s a conspiracy to make understanding our electricity system in general, and its reliability in particular, as difficult...
War of Losses
Some thoughts from Derek Chapman, from Adani Renewables, in conjunction with two rule change requests at the AEMC relating to Marginal Loss Factors.
Some very preliminary details of the possible causes of the Argentinian Blackout
Some very preliminary information (based on an internet search) about factors that might have contributed to the blackout in Argentina and neighbouring parts of South America this week.
The Network Investment Paradox
Guest author, Drew Donnelly, compares case studies of Argentine and Australia to highlight risks in under and over-investment in network infrastructure
NEM spot prices remained stubbornly high in 2018 – what were the drivers?
The surge in NEM spot prices since 2015, and related impacts on contract and retail prices, have been extensively discussed and analysed in many forums, from ACCC inquiries to Twitter. The underlying reasons for...
NEM Summer Outlook 2018/19 – what is AEMO saying?
Following on from Paul’s article on Queensland, this post examines the summer outlook for the other mainland NEM regions, drawing from some key AEMO publications and datasources, namely: the Electricity Statement of Opportunities (ESOO) published...
How To Reduce Electricity Costs – Part 4
In Michael's fourth article of the series, he looks at the power of analysing electricity usage data to understand where and when users consume electricity so that they can identify cost saving opportunities.
Large Solar in the NEM mainland regions
The growth of Large Solar in the NEM has been phenomenal, and a sign that things are changing quickly in the Australian energy industry. The chart attached is the maximum output of each region...
Too much solar? For whom exactly?
Recently there have been a number of media reports of energy industry people talking about too much solar. One of our guest authors takes a look.
How To Reduce Electricity Costs – Part 3
In our guest author's third article, Michael Williams comments on the growing trend for corporate energy buyers to contract directly with certain wind and/or solar plant for renewable energy supply over a longer-term time...
Retail Energy, not so easy
It is curious that despite of the findings of the recent ACCC enquiries and the on-going regulatory uncertainty (at both a state and federal level), anyone would be willing to set-up an electricity retailer....
How To Reduce Electricity Costs – Part 2
In the previous article on reducing electricity costs we looked at energy efficiency and the fact that the cheapest electricity is the electricity that you don’t consume. In this article we will look at...
How To Reduce Electricity Costs – Part 1
We all know that electricity prices have escalated dramatically over the last couple of years. But did you know that it is possible to offset these increases and even achieve cost reductions in the...
Lessons from the trenches – 10 tips for new entrant generation developers
Through our consulting business, Greenview Strategic Consulting, we have had the pleasure of working with a variety of new entrants and NEM-veteran organisations alike in the generation sector of the NEM over the past...
How do New Entrant Retailers manage wholesale market risk?
Guest author, Drew Donnelly at Compliance Quarter, uses the review of hedge practices in the wholesale market included in the recent ACCC report as an opportunity to reflect on what approaches they have seen...
High SA Prices on Monday 9 July–Business as Usual?
One of our guest authors, Allan O'Neil, takes a closer look at what happened in the South Australian region of the NEM on Monday 9th July 2018