By Jo Nova
That was a hellfire price spike yesterday. It’s not so much the height, but the width of the spike is shocking. Prices lifted off in NSW at 4:45pm and didn’t come back down til 9pm. That’s a four hour nightmare at around $10,000 per MWh. I rarely, if ever, have seen so much area under the red line — so many dollars flowing under the bridge.
“We could have bought a whole new gas plant instead”
Hypothetically, there was around 11,000 megawatts of demand at $10,000 a megawatt hour for over 4 long hours which is a $450 million “price signal” (and that’s just NSW). In Victoria a similar spike consumed another $200 million*. The market — sick, injured and rigged, it seems, is beating us over the head. The average price for the whole 24 hour period in NSW, Victoria and South Australia was a red hot $2,000 per MWh. (A 24 hour average!)
This is not a free market, it’s a fixed market — designed to change the global climate and maybe also keep the lights on. A free market would fix itself, but the government banned the good options, so all we’re left with is outbreaks of electromania.
Even with all the subsidies and the rigging, the Renewables-Wonderland of South Australia was also hit by the exact same price smash as NSW and Victoria. All that wind, solar, synchronous condensers, batteries and renewable smuggery can’t save the state from the 6 o’clock bonfire. This is a message from the future to Victoria and NSW. If South Australia can’t save itself now, how will the big states manage when they turn themselves into South Australia?
All the savings of renewables are illusory.
AEMO
The wind stopped across the whole continent
The problem was a normal wintery cold blast from Antarctica combined with the collapse of wind generation across the entire east coast “national grid” — reduced to about 400MW out of 13 gigawatts of generators. The whole wind industry in Australia was working at a capacity factor of 3%. Or, as a cruel commentator might say, 97% useless.
Obviously, on a day like this, it doesn’t matter how many twenty billion dollar interstate transmission lines we build, the solution is reliable power plants. That, or stopping those damn high pressure cells.
Over to you Mr Bowen:
https://anero.id/energy/2025/june/26
Retailers will have hedging contracts to (sort of) cover these price spikes. However the price of future contracts will rise over the coming months. The people who cover the other side of those hedging contracts got burnt today and they will want to recover their costs. Thus events like this flow through to retail prices sooner or later.
Ironically, Paul McArdle of WattClarity notes that wind powered generation set a new record all time high on Monday this week, reaching 9,491 MW. It proves only that any money saved by wind power one day can be vaporized in an instant a few days later.
Batteries are starting to work so hard on the Victorian grid we can even see them on the daily chart (above in spiky pink). If people only knew how pathetically small their contribution is compared to fossil fuels.
And the forecast is looking similar for tomorrow:
https://aemo.com.au/en/energy-systems/electricity/national-electricity-market-nem/data-nem/data-dashboard-nem
Unless something changes, the bonfire begins again 5pm.
____________________
*In Victoria the spike averaged about 7,800W at a price of $9,000 MWh, for a bit over 3 hours — $210 million.
Ventusky and Nullschool can show wind velocity. I find the former a bit easier to use.
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I use windy.com and they predict the high even worse over Vic, if that’s possible, for tonight’s peak but some improvement for SA.
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As I have commented in the past, working in the Phillipines decades ago, in Manilla there would be rolling brown outs. The government would rotate the browned out areas around the city at certain times on certain days. This system allowed industries to plan when they would need to fire up their very large, on site, diesel generators to keep their plants running and to avoid grid collapse.
It appears the managers of this system where at least honest with their customers whereas in Australia we keep spouting the BS that “renewables” can supply 13 gigawatts of electricity and yet reality is some days they produce NOTHING.
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As has been previously pointed out by Jo, Australia too would have blackouts were it not being for large consumers of electricity like aluminium smelters receiving large amounts of taxpayer money to have their loads shed on demand when the sun goes down or the wind stops blowing if there is not sufficient supply.
As you point out Sambar, a far more honest system would be scheduled blackouts like they have in other Third World countries like the Philippines, or South Africa or Nepal.
I have experienced the ones in Nepal. They were not such a big deal because there are typically no heavy use appliances like hot water heaters or air-conditioning or heating. And cooking was with wood, dung or bottled gas. All I needed electricity for was to charge my phone and flashlights. For those I carried battery packs which I charged when electricity was available. But in countries like Australia, we like to have our air-conditioning and heating and cooking appliances etc..
Aa I have said before solar and wind will give you access to basic stuff like a computer-type device to receive government propaganda and for them to monitor you, basic lighting, a few minutes of electricity to heat your state-mandated ration of insects, but no “luxuries” like heating or air-conditioning for non-Elites.
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I know of a chlorine plant in melb (high power user) that also gets paid by the govt to NOT RUN at various times when the system is on the brink. When I say govt, I of course mean the poor taxpayer, who is also footing the $20 million daily interest bill on the govts debt…To be expected whenever socialists take control of anything – when will the voters ever wake up?
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“To be expected whenever socialists take control of anything – when will the voters ever wake up?”
Most of them don’t know, the rest don’t care, it’s mainly about ‘what’s there for me’.
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The spin masters call it demand management…it doesn’t sound anywhere near as bad as a blackout. Having aluminium smelters and the like shutup shop is still a blackout to me.
The difference being that instead of affecting 10’s of 1,000’s of consumers we are affecting a large industrial end user. This is not the answer to our energy shortfalls.
I would love for Bowen to have to come up with a figure for how much GWH of battery storage he thinks is needed to cover for the unreliables inevitable everyday failures.
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Well, NSW is usually short of 1000MW in the evening, so a million KW. If each household is pulling say 3.300KW, they would need to black out 30,000 houses today. Knock out the next coal station and it will be a lot more voters affected.
I’d say the lack of hot water would be the most noticeable thing, washing dishes in cold water, only cold showers, every time you washed your hands it would take heat out of your body.
I wonder which electorates they will concentrate their blackouts on?
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As usual the greater% of the population are totally uninformed of the costs but more likely are totally uninterested in the path to economic suicide, until, one day we get slammed with an energy outage which lasts for days at a time. All the handiwork of the ALP/LNP Uniparty.
I suppose it’ll be the fault of Ukraine, Israel or Trump!. Perhaps they’ll find the fault in the nearest mirror!
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Years ago I watched an “electrician” in the Philippines connecting wires to a large machine in a factory and when he connected the last wire the machine started up.
No need to disconnect the power supply, apparently
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Safeworking, was he wearing HV electrical thongs as well.
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Yeah, flip-flops, or as we call them – Chinese work boots.
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And as pointed out by TdeF on the previous thread “Friday” Victoriastan has imposed even more insane and unachievable ruinable energy targets than it had previously.
This is insane.
It’s hard attributing all this madness to mere incompetence. Well, it might be incompetence and stupidity at the lower levels but not at the higher levels of Government. They know exactly what they’re doing.
This is specifically intended to be economy and civilisation-destroying stuff.
TRUMP understood that and put a stop to it
Australia has no worthy leader with any chance of getting elected that can do anything about it. And certainly not Susssssan Ley.
Just remember how Venezuala was also once a rich, Western-style country and now it is a miserable and dangerous socialist military dictatorship “paradise”.
Don’t think it can’t happen to Australia.
Stop the bus, I want to get off.
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One of the head public servants at DEECA ( that’s the Victorian Department of Energy, Environment and Climate Action) resigned this week. He’s had enough and resigned before Jacinta Allan ( our dear Premier) could sack him. Apparently he disagreed big time with their crazy net zero / emissions target. So, maybe there are still some sensible people in the public service, after all.
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I think you used the wrong words here: “… maybe there are still some sensible people…”.
Should read : “… at least was one sensible person…”
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The fact that the opposition can’t make a case shows they are ‘captured’ as well, Vicdanistan.. you are truly screwed.
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I just wish the train wreck would speed up.
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Imagine being in Tassie, they also had to front up the large dollars. The strange thing is, they were supplying the mainland and were hit by the same bug.
How long before the government of Tassie state that they will not allow the prices to rise due to the shortfalls of the mainland. They could easily limit their production to hydro and cheap gas only. Never allowing the diesels to kick in.
Such simple rules could have saved Tassie from the $10k/MWHr and had a more sensible limit of say $100/WMHr. How long before the supplying states say enough is enough, no more damage at home due to the actions of the other states.
It’s surely only a few letters to the editor away from reality. Politicians are feeble, some would say thick. They could fold for something as simple as an industry threatening to leave/collapse.
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It appears that QLD with its coal based power will be the backstop. Intimations are that QLD will hedge if required state-wise.
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Its interesting how the disease gets exported to places where they should be enjoying lower costs.
A similar scenario is going on now between Norway and Germany. Norwegian bill payers are less than impressed.
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It’s a slow motion train wreck.
The anology is the frog in the water that is slowly coming to the boil. Eventually it is ‘Crash and Burn’ and then there is a reaction.
OMG, what have they done to us? Too late mate.
Then we have to start all over again. What a waste.
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No it cant speed up yet I am still trying to get off.
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The “Ponzi Scheme” that is the electricity system in Australia at the moment
is working as they expected with all East Coast States connected.
Lock open ALL the inter-connectors and let the states
have power prices that their governments need them to have,
not what power companies reckon they can filch from the gullible people.
The population has been conned.
The reasons stated for the inter-connectors was just waffle.
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Day light robbery except it’s a 24/7 result of subsidising solar/wind generation
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At 8.10 pm last night on the East Coast, Wind Power Production
was 987 MW, or 3.22% of the power need of 30,633 MW.
Just as well Queensland lead the way with 659 MW as Tassie
could only manage 19 MW and the other states somewhere in between.
Yeah, nothing quite like having continuous, reliable and consistent
“ruinable” power supply.
And this isn’t the worst.
On the 13th of June 2024 wind power production (at the same time)
was 380 MW for 1.29% of what was needed.
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You can always find interesting snap shots
When I looked around 6PM thi evening there was a North South divide. Over a GW going to NSW from QLD , nothing going South from NSW and SA/VIC/TAS in a balancing act down South.
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Qld. has been making out like bandits, consistently exporting over 1gW.
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In a normal Aussie year wind supplies about 3.6 months of electricity and solar only about 1.8 months.
IOW they have capacity factors of 30% for W and 15% for S and we’re now told this horrendous unreliability will cost us 7 to 9 TRILLION $.
Does anyone really believe that this is a great deal for the Aussie taxpayer?
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Great explanation, Neville—clear and accessible. I’ve been reading Jo’s blog for over a decade, with many insightful articles like this by Jo or her team, yet I still don’t fully grasp how AEMO/NEM works. I suspect most Australians—probably 99%—feel the same. Many assume it’s a true “market” where the cheapest, most reliable supplier wins contracts. With constant claims that wind and solar are the cheapest because nature provides them for “free,” people likely believe these sources dominate electricity generation. Those massive wind turbines and slick ads reinforce that idea. But consumers don’t directly feel the impact of high power bid spikes—it’s not like a lettuce shortage at the supermarket. The pain comes later with higher power bills, often months down the line, with no clear feedback loop. It’s a flawed system.
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What do the maggots at Renew Economy say about this major failure.
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The spot price market is working as intended. The winners and losers of a price spike are the large generators and retailers. Most small consumers are on fixed price contracts or hedges and are unaffected. You need to consider the periods of low and negative prices as well as the price spikes when estimating electricity price futures.
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With expensive electricity generated by unreliable wind and solar when it could be generated by inexpensive and reliable coal, gas or nuclear power or real hydro (not SH2) EVERYBODY is a loser.
And how do you think it doesn’t affect consumers on fixed price contracts?
The expected high prices at peak times are already built into the retail price.
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Sure Simon — lets consider the periods of negative pricing. Where does that money come from?
The only reason any generator would pay to generate is if they are already covered — meaning the taxpayer subsidized them to the point of oversupply. So we are already paying for those negative prices too. They don’t show on the electricity bill but they do show in our Quality Of Life.
The Spot Market is rigged to the brink of dysfunction. It is not designed to provide the cheapest electricity we could to Australians.
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Yeah but did you forget that small consumers (customers) are on fixed price contract ‘for a period’.
Next period they will suddenly complain about bill shock when their renewal ups that price by about 50%.
Retailer’s wholesale hedging is going to get very tight as we run out of reliable counter parties.
Profitable segments of the curve will shrink when the cheap FF plant slowly deteriorates.
Someone has to pay for this madness …
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Labor Blackout Bowen and the Sydney Moaning Herald keep telling us Renewables are cheaper
Final determination on 2025–26 safety net prices for NSW, SA and SE QLD – AER NSW 278,868 (8.0% increase)
https://www.energy.gov.au/news/australian-energy-regulator-releases-new-default-electricity-prices
Just Received New Charges from Red Energy due from 8 July 2025
Previously Time of Day TOD – Offpeak/Shoulder/Peak
Now only Off Peak/Peak – Shoulder has gone
Off peak has gone from inc GST 18.28c per KWh to 28.75c per KWh = 57.75% Increase
Peak has gone from inc GST 38.43c per KWh to 49.96c per KWh = 30% increase
Daily Supply Charge inc GST has gone from 95.41c to 102.87c = 7.8% Increase just under set increaseby AER for NSW
Off to https://www.energymadeeasy.gov.au/ on 8 July 2025 to change plan yet again
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Nice. Swallow the complete BS and then regurgitate it here. One of the most brainless post amongst a litany of your imbecilic interjections. You really have outdone yourself with this one.
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Yes no affect on consumers at all Simon. After all its all just magic money and totally disconnected from consumer bills. That kind of thinking has landed us where we are, living way beyond our means, without a care in the world.
Stay in the govt job, the real world would be too shocking for you.
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The market might be working as intended. The electrical generation isn’t and this is what causes the wild fluctuations. Why build billions of dollars of assets and infrastructure that doesn’t produce electricity for extended periods?
The solar has just spent 15 hrs producing nothing and this happens every day. The wind has been almost non-existent for the similar period and coinciding. A generation system that is made up of feast and famine means you have to over capitalise on the assets. That’s why renewables is cheaper is a fallacy.
When did we hit a -$10,000 price? If we did, was it for a sustained period?
Note Jo’s comment.
Sure. Most small consumers are on fixed price contracts. But they always pay in the end. If it’s not this contract it’ll be the next. The winners and losers are not the generators and retailers. It’s the consumers. To get a glut of power to create the cheap price we consumers have to pay for the extra infrastructure.
Generators/retailers are like liquidators. They always get paid. The consumers are being liquidated.
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It has to be a bot,
If I manufacture a product I would expect to be able to sell that product to the market above the cost of manufacture if I sold that product at a cost less than the cost of manufacture I would operate at a loss and would therefore go broke and shut down production any human would surely understand this concept.
The bot claims “You need to consider the periods of low and negative prices as well as the price spikes when estimating electricity price futures”, ergo I would be forced by the market to sell my product at a loss when the market dictates and sell my product at an over inflated profit when the market dictates. I think any human would understand any market that operates by these rules is destine to fail and then collapse.
As we continue to lose non wind and solar generation and the amount of wind and solar generation reaching saturation point and beyond the price fluctuations will be even greater, at this point we will go through several boom and bust cycles with prices being driven positively beyond the reach of the people and then negatively to a point where the generators can no longer generate a profit. It is Inevitable the grid will collapse but not due to physical (electrical) reasons as many have predicted but will collapse due to economic reasons first.
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It gets worse, by holding back on energy supply (and if you look at the demand curve in the graphs, you can calculate how much energy is required. The fact that, as the graph shows, that there was a shortfall, means that the coal based generators were making out like bandits spiking the energy price for the 4 hour period. If you do some research you would find that everyone gets paid the spot price, so there is a strong incentive to hold supply back until the spot price goes through the roof.
But let’s hide the facts that grubby capitalism and bias in the markets and blame Wind instead (note, wind could not, on current production figures, be entirely responsible for the supply failure).
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How delusional can you be to ignore the obvious. The market is set up at every turn to favour the so-called “renewable ” suppliers and push reliable generation like coal out. Yet here we are.
All it does is demonstrate solar and wind is not fit for purpose. Yet here you are flailing about ranting about bandits and capitalism when its your sides system from to to bottom. Good grief.
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Peter, if only you read this site you’d know I’ve explained the spot market, and criticized the predatory capitalism of Gentailers and Multinational (often Chinese) corporations that own multiple types of generators and profit from shutting down cheap coal.
The problem is not grubby capitalism, but the stupid corrupt socialists who allow one company to own competing generators, so they can sabotage the cheapest (the coal) and earn more from their subsidized wind power.
I’ve been writing about this for years: The year after Hazelwood closed AGL profits launched up from $539 million to $1,600 million
Vale Liddell coal: given away for nothing and destroyed by predatory capitalism and a screwed Green market
I don’t hide anything, in fact I even publish rude ignorant critics. If you can find a friend who can read, send ’em over, OK?
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The generators have a legal obligation to provide supply. So when you talk about holding back supply you’re not actually talking about a lack of supply. You’re just talking about not having an excess over supply. It’s not capitalism’s fault. It’s the Green-ism fault. You’re creating a glut of power in ideal weather conditions and a potential deficit of supply when those systems cut out. The sun isn’t always shining and the wind isn’t always blowing.
The reliable generators have to cut their production when the “renewables” actually work. This means instead of being able to recoup their costs/overheads over a 24 hr period, with very predictable demand, they have to respond to the unpredictability of “renewables”. Their ability to pay for their costs gets narrowed but their fixed costs don’t reduce.
We’re paying for two systems because only one of the systems is reliable and the “feel good” system takes a sicky every night and many other times.
Capitalism is not to blame. The energy market is not a capitalism system due to all the govt interference. Greed is an influence but greed and capitalism are not mutual and it’s not limited to capitalists. Greed exists throughout the socialist and green system.
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“We’re paying for two systems because only one of the systems is reliable and the “feel good” system takes a sicky every night and many other times.”
It’s like running a business, one employee leaves early every day, the other rings in sick any old time without any notice.
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Bravo Zulu Strop
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Peter Fitzroy writes this
Hmm! Just wondering here. How DO you hold supply back, and, umm, doesn’t supply follow demand, both having to be exactly equal.
And to completely shred what you say, you only need look at an actual load curve for that time to see that not one single coal fired plant, nor any power plant anywhere at all is holding back on power delivery.
And, here, refer to my comment 11 just a little down from here.
Remember I’ve always said that no matter how much I try to make electrical power generation understandable for the average person, it’s something that can’t be done. Well, this comment from this person sorta shows you exactly what I mean.
Tony.
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Its just a bot program Tony, dont take its ignorance of physics to heart. Ignore it like the rest of us and move on 🙂
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Seems to me that during the price spike, wind and solar were the ones “holding back supply” and if everyone got paid the same spot price then it would be logical to blame whoever has the lowest capacity factor … wouldn’t it?
Thing is, they don’t all get paid the same …. because wind and solar get to scoop up the LRET payments which are paid for indirectly by the coal generators.
If the Fitzroy logic was real … explain why it doesn’t hit huge spot prices every day? I mean the incentive is always there, so why only on cold nights when demand is high?
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“The spot price market is working as intended.”
Too bad the unreliables aren’t working as intended.
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Read and understand!
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Most of us know what budgie smugglers are and some of us even have a pair or two. But now it seems we have to get used to a new term: budget jugglers. Now many of us have had to don the budget jugglers in order to protect our income modesty against the purv-asive vision of Chris Bowen’s insane green energy shock troops.
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Fancy my getting to comment directly after Simon here, without actually replying to Simon.
I was going to say that if Joanne’s Post here didn’t make you cry, the irony is that you’d be laughing out loud really.
First up, look closely at the image at this link, and here, I’d just love to be able to actually attach the image to this comment. I’ve lost count of the number of times I’ve tried to explain this image which is the AEMO bid stack price structure.
The grey along the bottom is the base, where everything that hums along all day every day gets supplied from. That’s basically ALL coal fired power, and here, keep in mind the ABSOLUTE minimum power consumption across the AEMO is (a year round average) of around 18,500MW to 19,000MW, and for Winter, like this day in question, the low point for the day was just under 22,000MW. That Base Load is more than three quarters of average daily power consumption ….. and it NEVER goes lower than this, and ABSOLUTE requirement.
So, the grey area on this image is coal fired power (and hey, the need to supply that absolute minimum all day every day is WHY coal fired power needs to be running all the time, eh!) and here, that’s the lowest cost electricity …… ALL DAY EVERY DAY THE LOWEST. As more power is required, then more plants come on line, and the AEMO always accepts the lowest bids first, as power consumption rises according to this bid structure.
And as more and more power is required, then more and more plants come on line.
Now back to this particular day ….. (hey, remember that?) It got to the stage where so much power was required that they were looking around for plants that rarely even were thought of. To exacerbate all of this, there was no solar, there was no rooftop power, and there was virtually no wind. Hence the need for plants rarely even considered because they are so costly.
So, it was all hands on deck from plants everywhere whose costs were so high the average went up over a grand and more per MWH. So many of these baby little tiddlers were required in the panic of excess consumption, the wholesale price skyrocketed to what Joanne so eloquently showed with her images.
Now here, I have to leave a very large space to allow this next bit to sink in, so here, you’ll need to imagine that very large space.
The kicker in all of this is that ….. EVERY plant that is online during that time of excess consumption and over the top cost per MWH …..EVERY PLANT (have you got that yet?) gets paid the same average cost for every MWH they deliver to the grid.
Sooo, and now imagine another long space for this to sink in.
During that same time of excess consumption and over the top cost, every coal fired plant also received that same amount of money. So, even though their bid price was the usual (perhaps) $30/MWH (that grey area on the bid structure, because all Units are already operating and delivering power) to actually generate, they were receiving that inflated over $10000/MWH. That doesn’t mean they were making out like bandits ….. THAT’S how that bid structure actually works day in day out ever since forever.
So, and again, imagine another long space here.
During those same four hours of that immense power cost spike, all the operational coal fired Units delivering power actually delivered an average of, umm, 15,750MW.
So (another space) 15750MW X $1100 X 4 = umm, ….. $693 MILLION. For four hours of power delivery.
And THAT’S how the bid structure works. Everyone gets to play by the same rules.
Oh incidentally, total power consumption during the evening Peak was 32,000MW, and just coal fired power alone delivered 17,500MW of that.
Thank heavens for those ancient stranded asset dinosaur, totally unreliable coal fired power plants.
Umm, in the olden days, rolling reserve coal fired Units filled up the slack, usually at that base grey price. Oh the irony.
Tony.
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Any physics/chemistry student should know that CO2 is a simple molecule and molecules do not generate heat in isolation, so CO2 gas cannot warm anything. Molecules reflect or absorb heat and re-radiate heat according to their temperature. Molecules are matter, heat is energy, an entirely different entity.
There are hundreds of time series data files freely available on the Internet from right across the globe and they all show that the atmospheric CO2 concentration varies with the seasons. That means that it is the climate change between the seasons that causes the CO2 concentration change NOT the reverse. We can be quite sure that the seasonal changes are due to the annual orbit of the Earth around the Sun and not due to CO2 gas in the atmosphere.
Furthermore the latest data from the Mauna Loa Observatory reveals that the CO2 concentration has been constantly increasing over the 67 years of measurements and at an ever increasing rate. For the past 5 years the concentration has increased at a rate of 4 times greater that for the earliest 5 years showing that ‘Net zero’ has achieved nothing. Nature determines the CO2 concentration with mankind’s contribution being insignificant.
Net Zero is nothing but a Communist hoax whose purpose is to collapse the free-world economy to their benefit.
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‘Net Zero is nothing but a Communist hoax …’
Not really, millenarian madness is a European invention and China took commercial advantage.
The Keeling curve is a worry, when compared to Antarctic ice cores there is a mismatch and they shouldn’t have spliced them together.
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There are many things that the Klimate Mob should not have done.
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We had a blackout yesterday afternoon for 3 hrs, but we were back in time to do our bit for the early evening bonfire. Got to use the the new generator which is a great leap forward in all departments over old faithfull, apart from reliability which is to be determined.
Given the way things are trending, setting up the place to be more easily move to backup power seems money well spent. We will probably get it just right at the time we want to downsize.
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Having back up power might improve the value of your home when you need to move…
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A strong blocking high pressure, centred in the Bight, is out of place for this time of year.
http://www.bom.gov.au/fwo/IDY65100.pdf
A positive Southern Annular Mode illustrates the problem for the wind industry.
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“… out of place …”
Now that’s funny — a government agency telling the atmosphere what it should be doing. 😂
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Clearly they all had their heads in the sand, a positive AAO means less wind.
https://weather.plus/aao-index.html
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Positive SAM? The last info I saw here indicated that the SAM had suddenly returned to neutral, with neutral IOD and neutral ENSO.
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The trend is positive and occasionally it goes negative, that is the low pressure filling the gap between two enormous high pressures. This belt is also known as the subtropical ridge and for the past 15 years its been hanging out in the Southern Ocean.
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“A strong blocking high pressure, centred in the Bight, is out of place for this time of year.”
Pfft!.. We moved to Aussie for exactly this weather, ‘frost then sunny’ for a week at a time in winter, and we bought a house to take full advantage of it. BOM really does come up with some rubbish!
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So without coal and gas we were cooked !!
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cooked? as in dinner?
But will the zoning and seasonal burning laws permit you to have a wood cooker in the back yard?
And the resident of the “desirable” tenth floor unit wonders – “What is a back yard?”
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Hard to Wok in China Towns without gas.
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Answer – those blocks of land developers and councils supported by state governments want to grab to build more high-rise box towers.
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I dislike seeing ‘Battery’ on an “Energy Production” graph.
Batteries do not produce energy, but merely time shift earlier production, and that with energy loss.
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The good news is that it shows how little they do in terms of bulk supply, which is where the average persons mind is at.
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And never mentioned more recharging time required than hours of discharge provided, and electricity grid to recharge from.
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It is a bit confusing but the batteries are on the energy demand graph as well.
If you think if the graph as only representing each five minute interval, then for that brief period the battery is a supplier from the perspective of the system as a whole. During a different five minute period, the same battery might become part of the demand side.
00
I’ll bet the Victorian folks with gas hotwater, heat and cooking weren’t troubled too much last night.
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Sadly nobody was troubled as enough band aids were available. The real shock is yet to come and I see nothing in train that will move it from inevitable to probable
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Or tonight.
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Sydney City recently decided to outlaw any new gas appliances in buildings … total buffoons but what can you do?
https://7news.com.au/news/city-of-sydney-bans-gas-appliances-for-all-new-homes-with-claims-homeowners-will-save-an-extra-626-per-year–c-19134134
And the reason in because Save the Children from a perceived whiff of CO2 which is odourless anyhow. There’s gotta be something wrong with those people.
00
Small typo with units in the article Jo.
“Hypothetically, there was around 11,000 watts of demand at $10,000 a megawatt hour for over 4 long hours which is a $450 million “price signal”
[Oops. Thanks. Megawatts of course! – Jo]
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Flinders Is at 14:30 is mostly diesel and a little solar, which will go to bed soon, and all across Victoria the wind at 6pm will be between 0 and 3 kmh.
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QLD just upped its export via interconnectors to 1.1GW, all the windmills in Vic and Nsw are producing almost nothing.
It’s only going to take a wobble or a trip or a tube leak and it’s blackout time.
90
Have people forgotten or have they lost count of the businesses Australia has lost since Labor legislated for Renewable Energy Target of 32% during the Rudd-Gillard Labor government terms 2007 to 2013?
Aluminium smelters, cement plants, steel mills, oil refineries, many other industrial and other businesses closed down and many moved to other countries.
The loss at each of jobs and taxes, add jobs and taxes via suppliers, and other economic damage to national prosperity is substantial already.
Add the crazy lock up of access to minerals and energy deposits and unrealised royalties and taxes being missed.
110
If we are to turn the downturn away from deeper recession, we need to see a lot more private sector (real economy) jobs soon.
20
If you were planning to invest in a manufacturing business Australia would not be your best choice, this country becomes less competitive for manufacturing by the year.
One option is India where, and based on personal investment, there is an educated workforce, system of government based like here on UK Westminster System, land to purchase or to rent with building/s is far cheaper than Australia and electricity in industrial areas affordable and reliable.
And cost of employment much lower.
No Labor industrial relations laws and unions.
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Net zero emissions means zero economic prosperity
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The bonfire, if it is going to happen, is almost due to start.
Spectators can watch here:
https://aemo.com.au/en/energy-systems/electricity/national-electricity-market-nem/data-nem/data-dashboard-nem
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Thanks Joanne, and here, if you don’t mind if I add to this.
Here, you can see exactly what is going on, and here, I mean right now, as this also, just like the Actual generation is updated every five minutes, so here I’m looking at 1730. (5.30PM)
It ‘looks like’ (as you are actually viewing it) Queensland is covering the Southern States, but, believe me here, power cannot actually travel that far.
What is actually happening is this Queensland is delivering power into Northern NSW.
Southern NSW is delivering into Victoria.
SouthAus is delivering into Victoria.
Tasmania is delivering into Victoria.
As Victoria freezes its, umm, ‘walnuts’ off, all those really expensive and rarely called upon plants in Southern NSW, SouthAus, and Tasmania are adding to those really expensive rarely called upon plants in Victoria to cover the demand.
Hence, power in every State bar Queensland is expensive at the moment and here, you can watch in real time as that cost oscillates.
Wait until 6PM and it will really head off into the heights.
At the OpenNEM site you can see who’s delivering what, and here look at OCGT, some of those fast to come on line plants rarely called upon and with higher costs to actually deliver their power.
Tony.
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Daily average wholesale ($ / MWh)
Date--------NSW RRP----PEAK RRP---QLD RRP----PEAK RRP---SA RRP-----PEAK RRP---TAS RRP----PEAK RRP---VIC RRP----PEAK RRP
2025/06/12--$1,693.97--$2,577.36--$1,546.60--$2,347.37--$1,636.06--$2,496.59--$1,388.55--$2,087.62--$1,786.27--$2,724.56
2025/06/26--$1,950.53--$3,009.37--$156.53----$168.97----$1,970.23--$2,976.96--$914.65----$1,300.91--$2,048.91--$3,110.31
Who ends up paying, remind me?
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