Premier Jay Weatherill won’t buy Pelican Point power station, despite push by senior advisers
PREMIER Jay Weatherill says he is not planning to use taxpayers’ money to buy the Pelican Point gas-fired power station, despite being urged to do so by his most senior economic advisers.
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PREMIER Jay Weatherill says he is not planning to use taxpayers’ money to buy the Pelican Point gas-fired power station, despite being urged to do so by his most senior economic advisers.
Future operations of two of the state’s biggest power stations, AGL’s Torrens Island and Engie’s Pelican Point, were both thrown into doubt yesterday amid a push to reform the network.
In one parliamentary inquiry, AGL warned that the ageing Torrens Island power station could no longer run at full output and was now comparable to someone “sitting in a retirement home”.
In another hearing, SA Economic Development Board member Goran Roos revealed he and his colleagues had advised the State Government to buy a gas-fired power station at Pelican Point.
Mr Weatherill is promising a dramatic reform of the energy market, a move first mooted a month ago after the most recent forced blackout hit 90,000 homes, but is yet to give details or a timeline.
Professor Roos said buying Pelican Point could prevent future blackouts.
“In the medium term, which is one to two years, the SA Government should consider direct control of electrical generation facilities either through acquisition or leasing arrangements coupled with long-term, back-to-back take-or-pay contracts with end users,” he said.
“A suitable facility could be the second 160MW Pelican Point gas turbine.”
Prof Roos said the turbine was being made uneconomic by subsidised wind power, which may mean it could be bought cheaply, adding that it sat idle on high-demand days when SA needed it to run.
AGL had previously planned to mothball part of its Torrens Island power station, the biggest in SA. The company’s wholesale markets general manager Richard Wrightson yesterday told an inquiry that the station had not run at full capacity for more than a year and never would again.
He predicted a gas shortfall this winter, which could lead to blackouts.
“(It) is a very old station and its reliability is poor because it’s very much getting to the end of life,” Mr Wrightson said. “We did try and get the (full) eight units on for this summer period and we’ve had problems with that asset just because of age. That’s not going to change, no matter how much money gets thrown at it, because it is a 50-year-old plant.”
Mr Weatherill said the Pelican Point purchase plan was “just part of the input that’s been given to our process”. “You’ll see how we respond when we actually release our plan,” he said.
Asked if the plan was buying into Pelican Point, Mr Weatherill said “no”, before clarifying he that wasn’t going to comment. “Suffice to say that that input does not represent our plan,” he said.
Meanwhile, the Australian Energy Market Operator is warning that the SA system is being closely monitored amid fears of another possible outage at Pelican Point and Torrens Island. The stations are near each other at Port Adelaide, and went out after a fire last week.
AEMO has warned that a risk of repeat outages remains, until further notice. As a safeguard, it reduced the power SA takes from Victoria to encourage other local generators to fire up.
AEMO has also warned of tight power reserves in SA this afternoon.