Worth a short note this weekend that, on Thursday 28th May we’d noticed this short notice from the AER alerting NEM participants and others to the request they’d received from the COAG Energy Council* to develop rule change proposals each focused on some perceived challenges with the operations of Semi-Scheduled generators:
* worth also asking, with the ‘National Cabinet’ taking on a permanent role in preference to COAG, what’s to happen with the COAG Energy Council moving forwards?
Rule Change Proposal #1 = Continuous disclosure
The AER note does not say anything other than:
Require a semi-scheduled plant to continually inform the Australian Energy Market Operator of any restrictions on their available capacity due to physical factors, such as weather conditions and their market intentions.
There have clearly been occasions in the past where AEMO has felt it has not been sufficiently informed of limitations on capability of some semi-scheduled capacity (such as when they published this extraordinary Market Notice on 23rd December 2020).
However it had been my understanding that the Semi-Scheduled generators had already been required to inform the AEMO – just perhaps not aware of the requirement, or aware of how to do this (given the way in which AWEFS and ASEFS had been added onto the prior operations of NEMDE).
Rule Change Proposal #2 = Following dispatch targets
The AER note does not say anything other than:
Require a semi-scheduled generator to follow their dispatch targets, in a manner similar to scheduled generators.
Frequent readers will recall that I’ve previously posted analysis of ‘Raw Off-Target’ performance of – such as on 13th May with respect to ‘all Wind’ through 2019 using data derived initially to prepare the Generator Statistical Digest 2019.
I’ve questioned before whether the way in which the Semi-Scheduled currently operates is scalable or sustainable (i.e. whether it will help us get to where we need to be in this energy transition). Though not much detail was provided on the AER notice, perhaps this is where this rule change is headed?
Given that this follows on from the release of a broader discussion paper on how to move to a proper Two-Sided Market, there is a clear risk of different reviews tripping over each other.
When time permits, will post more focused thoughts.
Hi Paul, regarding your question about national cabinet, the AEMA and NER vests the authority with energy ministers, rather than first ministers. So if COAG EC were to be supplanted, I presume it would have to be a sub committee of the national cabinet. I doubt first Minister’s would want to be saddled with all the responsibilities of being an energy minister (energy management, derogations etc.). Cheers, Jon