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Energy Prices Skyrocket in South Australia (yahoo.com)
Slashdot reader sycodon quotes an article from AFR:
Turmoil in South Australia's heavily wind-reliant electricity market has forced the state government to plead with the owner of a mothballed gas-fired power station to turn it back on. The emergency measures are needed to ease punishing costs for South Australian industry as National Electricity Market prices in the state have frequently surged above $1000 a megawatt hour this month and at one point on Tuesday hit the $14,000/MWh maximum price...
"A planned outage of the Heywood Interconnector to Victoria, coupled with higher than expected gas prices and severe weather conditions have contributed to large-scale price volatility in the energy spot market in recent days," said South Australia's energy minister, Tom Koutsantonis. The Australian Associated Press adds that "The state Labor government has invested heavily in wind and solar energy at the expense of baseload power, a move critics say has left the state exposed during poor weather. Mr. Koutsantonis has described the energy volatility as a failure of the national energy market because a lack of interconnection means South Australia often produces more renewable power than it can sell into the grid. But opposition spokesman Dan van Holst Pellekaan said the government had been too hasty to invest in renewables."
"A planned outage of the Heywood Interconnector to Victoria, coupled with higher than expected gas prices and severe weather conditions have contributed to large-scale price volatility in the energy spot market in recent days," said South Australia's energy minister, Tom Koutsantonis. The Australian Associated Press adds that "The state Labor government has invested heavily in wind and solar energy at the expense of baseload power, a move critics say has left the state exposed during poor weather. Mr. Koutsantonis has described the energy volatility as a failure of the national energy market because a lack of interconnection means South Australia often produces more renewable power than it can sell into the grid. But opposition spokesman Dan van Holst Pellekaan said the government had been too hasty to invest in renewables."
Doesn't need to be. I strongly support renewables, but one has to be realistic about the limitations of the technology that they're using. Any plan based around "Let's make a large portion of our power generation from intermittent sources over a very limited geographic area (little variation in production levels) with most of our peaking having very limited connections to us which can and will need to be taken down at points in the future" is just asking for problems. In fact, it's practically guaranteeing them.
Renewables and stability can come hand in hand (dramatic demand variability has been part of the market from day 1, so why not supply). But the higher the percentage of your power you want to come from intermittent sources, the more you need to do it right. And that means, 1) different types of intermittent sources (say, solar paired with wind), 2) geographic distribution of generation (so that drops aren't as extreme or as sudden), 3) sufficient storage OR peaking to fill the gaps, and 4) all elements of the above being linked in a manner that can effectively statistically guarantee constant supply uptime.
Hourglass says she knows a kid in Iowa who grows up to be president.
The conservative government of the time provided the transmission lessee a 99 year lease with a guaranteed return. Failures in the agreement have permitted the lessee to "gold plate the network" to their advantage/profit as the cost is recovered from consumers.
Electricity have since steadily increased to a level 2-3 times, where it's often cited as the most expensive in the world. Going off grid might work short term, but as that gains popularity, the burden of the transmission lease on the remaining few, will force the government to charge every property a supply charge.
The subsequent price increases, combined with the (national) RET scheme, have driven a massive adoption of solar in SA. The RET also fueled a massive increase in wind farm investment, but it's important to understand that scheme is a national scheme.
The third factor is the main interconnector to Victoria is being upgraded and presumably offline or running at reduced capacity.
The four factor is the recent shut down of the pt Augusta Coal plant that one served the majority of state. It was switched off last month.
Fifth factor is recent cold weather has increased demand.
It's important to appreciate the it's a combination of all these factors that have put the state in this predicament. Not just an abundance of renewable electricity.
Why it's only now made the news is because industry and retailers that normally get it wholesale for $50/MWh and lockin consumers at 30-40c at KWh [600-800% markup] are now losing money as these spikes get bigger and more common.
As the current treasurer pointed out, the markets are failing as there is no incentive to put on more transmission capacity and that has largely protected the remaining duopoly baseload generators who are cashing in.
SA just needs transmission capacity. Either interstate or to the northern geothermal sites.
Area51 - We are watching...