Category: Media Reference

Seeking to understand the multi-region islanding event on Saturday 25th August

On Saturday 25th August 2018, the NEM experienced what has been called by others a “near miss” event, with both Queensland and South Australia being islanded from the rest of the NEM as a result of the tripping of QNI and Heywood interconnectors (respectively).

I saw this happened on the day, so had time to post an initial brief article “Both QLD and SA islanded from the rest of the NEM on Saturday 25th August 2018”.  The following Monday, i was able to follow up with “Taking a look at Saturday’s islanding event through 4 second SCADA data”, also on WattClarity.

With some assistance from a couple of external Analysts, today we’ve posted “Further analysis of the (very rare) double-islanding events of Saturday 25th August 2018” via WattClarity, by drawing heavily on our ez2view software.

In response, we saw a range of activity ourselves, including:

(1)  One-on-one questions with clients

Our prime focus is (and always has been) on continually enhancing how we serve our diverse and growing range of clients, who use our software (and other products) to help them understand what’s going on in the energy market.

As such, it was not really a surprise that we fielded a number of questions about what was going on.  We appreciate these questions – as they stretch our capability to understand, and explain clearly, complex events such as what happened on 25th August.

(2)  On social media

As would be expected, there was plenty of coverage (and much speculation) about the event via social media (I only participate in Twitter and LinkedIn).  Here’s one particular exchange, noting that there were many:

(3)  In the traditional media

As a result of all of the above, and what we have done in the past, it was also not really a surprise to find ourselves referenced and quoted in the more traditional media over that week, and in the discussion that followed.  Here are some of the references we noted:

Monday 27th August

First off the blocks (as far as we know) Giles Parkinson utilised the early information published in our WattClarity article on Saturday to write “On first day as PM, Morrison learns difference between Big Battery and Big Banana” here.

We, in turn, grabbed two of the images in Giles’ post to update the deeper analysis we had coincidentally posted on the same day.

Tuesday 28th August

We noted a reference to WattClarity in Andrew White and Perry Williams’ article “Brace for more blackouts without a clear energy policy, Spark CEO warns” in the Australian.

Saturday 1st September

On Saturday, we noted that Ben Potter and Angela Macdonald-Smith utilised the 2 articles on WattClarity in putting together their online article “How the NSW energy grid almost went dark last week”.  The print edition (titled “Bolt from the blue bodes ill”, and included below) also included an artist’s reproduction of the NEMwatch snapshot originally included in the WattClarity post on the day of the islanding.

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A tight supply/demand balance in NSW over the week (4th June to 8th June 2018) triggers various activity

Over the prior week (Monday 4th June to Friday 8th June 2018), the NSW region – and, to a lesser extent, the broader NEM – experienced a tight supply/demand balance.

In response to what was happening during the week, we saw a range of activity ourselves, including:

(1)  One-on-one questions with clients

Our prime focus is (and always has been) on continually enhancing how we serve our diverse and growing range of clients, who use our software (and other products) to help them understand what’s going on in the energy market.

Given that the events of that week were so complex (and coincidentally that I had pre-arranged commitments in NSW with a number of clients & others) it was not really a surprise that we fielded a number of questions (some described here) about what was going on.  We appreciate these questions – as they stretch our capability to understand, and explain clearly, complex events such as what happened last week.

(2)  On social media

On the evening of Thursday 7th June, I had a brief amount of time to post this snapshot of the NEM from NEM-Watch v10 on social media (LinkedIn, and Twitter) – which led to some discussions on social media, and elsewhere:

Over the weekend that followed, I was able to grab a few hours to take a more measured look at what had occurred through the week, as a result of which I could post the article “Recapping a shaky week for the supply-demand balance in the NSW region last week” on WattClarity on Monday 11th June.

(3)  In the traditional media

As a result of all of the above, and what we have done in the past, it was also not really a surprise to find ourselves referenced and quoted in the more traditional media over that week, and in the discussion that followed.  Here are some of the references we noted:

Saturday 9th June

As noted on the NEMwatch portal, we found our (RenewEconomy-sponsored) NEMwatch Live Supply & Demand widget referenced in the Newcastle Herald.

Journalist Andrew White from the Australian asked our CEO (Paul McArdle) a few questions before publishing an article on Saturday 9th June “Outages see power prices hit the roof” – including this paragraph:

The founder of Global-Roam consultancy Paul McArdle said only 6000MW of NSW coal ­capacity was available yesterday, which was an improvement on Thursday, but about 2000MW less than at the same time last week.
(though note that we’re a software company, not a consultancy)

Interested readers can see the chart (generated with our NEMreview v7 historical analysis tool) provided to Andrew on Friday 8th June here:

Mon 11th June

Drawing on the more detailed analysis published on Wattclarity on Monday morning, Andrew White from the Australian was able to publish an article on Monday 11th June “Paul McArdle of WattClarity: NSW power outages ‘threat to industry’” .

Tue 12th June

On Tuesday, Ben Potter from the AFR included some references to the WattClarity article in his article “Big power resists AEMO ‘strategic reserve’ push after NSW squeeze” .

Wed 13th June

After we’d both attended the launch of the Victorian Energy Policy Center in Melbourne on Wednesday 13th June, Ben Potter from the AFR also included reference to the WattClarity review of the prior week in his article “Energy expert to Tomago Aluminium: Buy cheap wind and solar power” .

 

 

 

“The Australian” used NEM-watch Live Generation widget to illustrate fuel mix

In his article “Rush to renewables as coal cools” in the Australian on Thursday 7th September, Andrew White used a reproduction of the RenewEconomy-sponsored NEM-Watch Fuel Type Widget to help his readers understand the fuel mix that was occurring for one 5-minute period (the 16:30 “dispatch interval”) the previous day.  The widget also has been designed to help those not so familiar with – part of our effort to help with Energy Literacy in more general terms.

For those who did not see it, here’s the image (with a few clarifications, to help with the understandability):

(click HERE for a higher resolution view)

We appreciate every opportunity to help people understand what’s happening in Australia’s energy sector (particularly the “National Electricity Market”), and would invite readers to visit the live copy of the NEM-Watch Widget to watch as the fuel mix changes through each and every day.

No charge, if you want to embed this on your website – thanks to the widget’s sponsor, RenewEconomy!  Just click the <EMBED> button on the widget and follow the instructions.

The Advertiser uses the NEM-watch Widget in explanation

Monday 31st July 2017 was a day (one of an increasing number in recent years) when dispatch prices for energy in South Australia dropped below $0/MWh – and, in this case, down to the Market Floor of -$1,000/MWh for the 13:30 dispatch interval.

We posted two images from NEM-Watch v10 on WattClarity here, to help to illustrate that there was more going on than just “energy” market considerations.

We also noticed that the Advertiser (in this article here) referenced our NEM-Watch Widget in their story about strong winds, and a transmission outage causing export limitations, contributing to negative prices in the region.  Here’s a snapshot of some of the article:

Given we intend all of our products to “make complexity more understandable, so people can make better decisions” it’s always good to see people acknowledge that we deliver on that mission, in this way.

References to WattClarity “astonishing Q2 prices” article referenced in various locations

References to WattClarity “astonishing Q2 prices” article referenced in various locations

On Thursday 6th July 2017, I posted this analysis on WattClarity ® about some “off the chart” movements in average prices, and pricing patterns, across all 5 regions of the NEM – but most pronounced in VIC, TAS and SA.  This analysis was performed using NEMreview v6.

Following from this, we saw the analysis referenced in a range of locations, some of which will be progressively added below:

in the Australian Financial Review

On Friday 7th July we saw the analysis referenced:

in the ABC

Various commentaries were made by others* on ABC Radio referencing the analysis, and I noticed that:

*  note that we don’t, ourselves, speak on TV or Radio, as it takes our time away from directly serving our client base.

across Social Media

various comments were made across social media (LinkedIn and Twitter are the ones I mostly use).

 

 

References to Wattclarity “wind drought” article in newspaper reports

References to Wattclarity “wind drought” article in newspaper reports

On Friday 30th June 2017, I posted this analysis on WattClarity ® about the low levels of aggregate wind production seen across the NEM through June 2017.

Matt Chambers, resources reporter at The Australian picked up this article and added additional comments in his article “Lack of wind blows out South Australia power costs” on Tuesday 4th July (subscriber access required):

 

 

NEM-Review used on the ABC’s 7.30 report to explain how electricity prices have changed over summer

Hugh Saddler from the Australian National University, has used NEM-Review to help explain the state of the electricity market on the ABC’s 7.30 report which was broadcast on the the 13th of February 2017. In the report, several industry experts provide insights on the multi-state energy crisis over the summer that had been developing for several months.

Various media outlets look to Global-Roam for clarity during heat wave

In early February, numerous news websites including the Adelaide Advertiser and the Sydney Morning Herald embedded our NEM-Watch Live Generation Widget (as seen on RenewEconomy) to help explain the generation mix of each state of Australia during the recent heat waves affecting the South Australian and New South Wales electricity network. In addition to the situational awareness that the widget provided, Allan O’Neil made several posts on WattClarity during the week including this initial analysis attempting to explain the root causes of the blackouts experienced in South Australia.

 

About media quote on solar panels being “mostly useless” late in the day

During the national heatwave of February 2016, we fielded many calls from journalists and saw an increasing number of parties use (or embed) a variety of our bite-sized widgets, all focused at making some aspects of complexity more understandable.

One of the conversations I had with a journalist let to being quoted over the weekend saying that solar PV was “mostly useless” late in the day.  Hence, over the weekend I added this note of clarification on WattClarity for those who are interested in more than just soundbites.

Providing insights to The Australian about the situation in South Australia

National Business Correspondent for The Australian, Annabel Hepworth published an article which details the concerns of big energy users in South Australia over high electricity prices after the recent turmoil in the state. Attempting to extend understanding on the situation Paul McArdle provided insights for the article, stating that blackout had “just put a two-week stop” to commercial concerns about the market “but the concerns continue”.

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