The Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) today published an updated record of existing and proposed generation and storage projects in the National Electricity Market (NEM).
Developed with industry, the Generation Information file provides an overview of existing capacity in the power system, along with proposed projects in the pipeline and expected retirements. It is complimented by the Transmission Augmentation Information file, which has newly been produced by AEMO to provide an overview of the proposed transmission projects in the pipeline.
AEMO Executive General Manager – System Design, Merryn York, said the January update continues to highlight the rapid transformation of Australia’s power system.
“Our latest survey of market participants reflects that developers are progressing with developing the strong pipeline of large-scale solar, wind and battery projects, to offset coal and gas generation that is expected to retire in the coming decade,” Ms York said.
“The file includes newly committed projects and some project delays, which will be modelled in an update to the 2022 Electricity Statement of Opportunities report in February.
“These changes highlight the importance of close collaboration between governments, market bodies and industry to manage any likely reliability and security risks as the power system transitions,” she said.
Changes of note that will be included in the February Update to the ESOO include the Waratah Super Battery Network Augmentations and System Integrity Protection Scheme (SIPS) in New South Wales. This project provides a virtual transmission solution that unlocks latent capacity in the existing transmission system, allowing electricity consumers in the Sydney, Newcastle and Wollongong demand centres to access more energy from existing generators.
In addition, the Bolivar power station in South Australia also progressed to the committed phase with known commissioning dates, adding another 123M W of generation capacity to the power system. AEMO has also been informed of potential delays of 12 months to the Snowy Hydro 2.0 project from December 2026 to December 2027 and the Kurri Kurri gas generator project from December 2023 to December 2024.
AEMO considers this new information meets the need to update the Electricity Statement of Opportunities (ESOO) and provide an updated reliability assessment.
The 2022 ESOO highlighted the urgent need to progress generation, storage and transmission developments to maintain a secure, reliable and affordable supply of electricity to homes and businesses.
AEMO is also facilitating a Reliability Forecasting Guidelines and Methodology Consultation, which seeks to review processes used for projecting supply adequacy and increase the consistency of commitment criteria. The draft reports will be published in late January.