November in the NEM (a review of 10 years of history)
One of 12 articles on the months past in the NEM – investigating the trends and significant events in the National Electricity Market during November.
interconnector constraint
January in the NEM (a review of 10 years of history)
One of 12 articles on the months past in the NEM. For January we revisit events such as the fires at Moomba in 2004 (which curtailed gas supplies from central Australia); and the blackout on 16th January 2007 which drove the price to VOLL in Victoria.
NEMMCO Report: Unplanned Outages of HWTS-LYPS line on 23 July 2008
On 13th November, NEMMCO released the final version of its report into the Power System Incident “Unplanned Outages of HWTS-LYPS line on 23 July 2008”
VOLL Pricing on 23rd July 2008
It appears that we spoke too soon when we mentioned on the 22nd July that winter 2008 had been relatively uneventful.
Just over 24 hours from making these comments, we saw prices jump sky-high in the mainland regions, and go the other way (to the negative price cap) in Tasmania.
Our review of the heat wave in South Australia
With demand soaring, and interconnectors constrained, generators in South Australia and Victoria took what opportunity they had to force the price high. So successful were the South Australian generators that the Cumulative Price Threshold was reached in South Australia and, under NEM Rules, an Administered Price Cap was applied for a period of time.
Analysis of price volatility in the QLD region over summer 2007-08
Our Managing Director was asked to speak at the “Queensland Energy” conference in Brisbane on Wednesday 12th March – specifically addressing the topic of price volatility in the NEM.
To provide the basis of discussion during the conference, we focused our analysis solely on Queensland region (to make the topic more manageable).
In our review of volatility in the Queensland region, we focused specifically on 3 core attributes of the market: Queensland dispatch prices; NEM-Wide Instantaneous Reserve Plant Margin; and the concept of “Economic Islands”.
22nd and 23rd February 2008 – a rare hot spell in Queensland
In Queensland we experienced one of the mildest summers I can remember. As a result of this, demand levels were subdued for most of summer. However, for a couple of days in late February, summer finally arrived, and struck with a vengeance.
7th December 2005 – high demand in Queensland and NSW
For several days in early December, temperatures reaching 40 degrees in Queensland and New South Wales cause airconditioning load (and hence total demand) to soar in both regions.
The high demands resulted in very high prices being experienced in both QLD and NSW (and also the SNOWY region). Both VIC and SA were insulated from the high prices because (at least in part) of the fact that transfers over the SNOVIC interconnector were constrained to minimise negative inter-regional surplus
21st November 2006 – demand spike in NSW
There was a temperature-driven spike in demand in NSW on Tuesday 21st November 2006.
These sweltering temperatures combined with bushfires to cause localised blackouts in the Sydney city area, as reported in the Sydney Morning Herald in the article “Power jitters as heat bites”.
2nd February 2006 – price spike in NSW and Queensland
This week saw a new record demand in NSW of 13,292MW on Thursday 2nd February. Correspondingly, average prices were above $100/MWh in both NSW and Queensland – but the price spikes did not transfer to the southern regions.
24th February 2006 – price spikes in Victoria
Demand in Victoria peaked again, bringing with it high prices in Victoria and (to a lesser extent) South Australia.
Indeed, the demand experienced in Victoria (on Friday 24th February) exceeded the previous high level of 8,552MW for summer, set in January 2006.
Our analysis looked at generator behaviour on the occasions of these price spikes.
Weekly summary of events in Summer 2005-2006
Summer 2005-06 saw Australians sweltering in temperatures 40 degrees and above.
In the National Electricity Market, this led to new peaks in demand and (given the tight supply/demand balance) delivered high (and volatile) spot market pricing.
Here we have compiled a weekly summary of events in the NEM over summer 2005-06.
3rd January 2006 – Outages force QLD price to VOLL
The week started with commotion in Queensland, when the VOLL price ceiling was reached.
Further analysis revealed that this was due to transmission system events and the trip of several generation units within Queensland.