As NEM wind power plants progressively work towards implementing FCAS, the criticality of ensuring that the power system either a) takes account of the variability in the wind...
Understanding the difference between blackouts, generator trips and intermittent generation and how these events are managed.
Upgrading our existing coal thermal fleet to increase efficiency and flexibility could provide a cost-effective opportunity to add dispatchable capacity and lower the overall carbon intensity of our...
Our guest author, Allan O'Neil, poses a number of questions about the recently proposed "National Energy Guarantee" (NEG)
Our guest author, Rob Davis, looks at what might emerge for summer 2017-18 given the La Nina outlook, and prior distributions of Cooling Degree Days for Victoria and...
Following from my August update, here's two developments we have seen in relation to retail & networks regulation.
Some initial analysis by our guest author, Allan O'Neil, about what AEMO's Statement of Opportunities 2017 is saying in terms of this coming summer 2017-18
A brief explainer of what "Unserved Energy" (or USE) actually means, in the context of the AEMO "Electricity Statement of Opportunities 2017" (ESOO) released this week.
Some thoughts from guest author, Connor James, about "what's next" in response to energy user concerns about high and escalating prices.
Following Wednesday's article by Paul McArdle on WattClarity, we've reviewed the (very cloudy) weather patterns for Friday 19th May 2017, and the accuracy of Solcast's predictions of a...
Our guest author, Allan O'Neil, posts an overview of the strengths and weaknesses of an increasingly popular metric - the LCOE (or Levellised Cost of Energy)
The energy supply industry is now a case study of major disruption and this is causing chaos. We are now witnessing the simultaneous high prices in electricity and...
A closer look at AEMO’s actions during a period of high windfarm output in SA last week
The South Australian Blackout of 28th September 2016 is not as simple as it looks.
Tight import limits on the Heywood interconnector and a lull in wind output saw price volatility return to South Australia earlier this week
Generators used to consider the Australian National Electricity Market (NEM) FCAS causers pays factors (CPF), used to allocate FCAS regulation costs across the market, as an obscure and...
The National Electricity Market (NEM) is designed to operate at 50 Hz. Frequency deviation occurs when generation and load are mismatched. It is important in a lightly meshed...
Ancillary Services Matter! No longer just realm of electrical engineer or energy trading boffins, ancillary services (and particularly Frequency Control Ancillary Services or FCAS which will concentrate on...
When markets operate normally, a sharp rise in the price of any commodity triggers a boom in exploration, development and new supply. But this is not seeming to...
Last Friday’s events took South Australia much closer to the brink of another Black System event than many seem to have realised