The Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) has warned extreme weather forecast for summer will reduce the reliability of power supply across Australia in the coming months, but the surge in solar installations in the past 12 months will lessen the risks.
“The Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) is forecasting both warmer than average and extreme temperatures this summer, and an ongoing and significant risk of bushfires with drier than usual conditions,” AEMO chief executive Audrey Zibelman said in a statement accompanying the authority’s Summer 2019/20 Readiness Plan.
“These risks add to the deteriorating reliability of some of the older coal generation plants,” Ms Zibelman added.
In August, AEMO said in a worst-case scenario up to two million Victorian and New South Wales households could be without power on extreme weather days if supply was not improved and major generators were not repaired.
AEMO has said that risk remained.
However, the operator said a boom in rooftop and grid-scale solar generation in the past year had created the bulk of an extra 3700 megawatts of generation in the national energy market.
The AEMO summer readiness plan, released today, warns that all states run the risk of unplanned blackouts because of increased heatwaves and bushfires.
“In any region, the actual occurrence of load shedding (planned power outage) could be higher than forecast given particular combinations of weather events, plant outages, or bushfires,” the report said.
The plan showed that Victoria remained the state at the highest risk of power outages due to faults at a coal plant in the Latrobe Valley and a gas plant in the west of the state.
The operator also warned that increased dust storms from the drought in New South Wales and Queensland was a risk to solar panels.
In Victoria’s east, a coal unit at Loy Yang in Gippsland is still not fixed, but AGL said it would be back online by mid-December.
Meanwhile, a gas plant in the west of the state is not due to be operational until the end of the year.
In an effort to reduce risk, AEMO and Victoria have secured 125 megawatts of extra reserves.
However, Lily D’Ambrosio, the state Labor government’s Energy Minister, said it might not be enough to prevent a blackout.
“I don’t think it’s a sound position for anyone to give guarantees about power when effectively the Victorian government doesn’t own any of these generators,” she said.
“The private owners have an obligation and responsibility to make sure that they’re maintained to the highest levels and that they are available when Victorians need it.”
The spread of rooftop solar had boosted capacity and meant that the peak for demand on hot days was occurring later in the day once the sun sets, the report said.
“The trend of maximum demand shifting later in the day is also expected to continue, as consumers generate more of their own energy supply from rooftop PV during daylight hours, before drawing on grid supply into the evening,” the AEMO report said.
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