Queensland residents again warned to prepare for power blackouts

There is enough electricity supply to avoid blackouts for the “foreseeable future”, according to Energy Minister Chris Bowen, although he warned there would be a “bumpy winter ahead”. It comes as Anthony Albanese lashed out over the current crisis.

There is enough electricity supply to avoid blackouts for the “foreseeable future” unless there are unexpected coal-fired power station outages, according to Energy Minister Chris Bowen, although he warned there would be a “bumpy winter ahead”.

He said there was enough capacity in the system to keep producing the power needed to meet supply and residents should not have to “turn off any power that they need for their comfort or safety”.

The Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) has enforced price caps on wholesale energy prices which reached a seven-day threshold and have stayed there.

The caps led to generators reducing the amount of electricity supply they were pumping into the system leading to the risk of blackouts on Monday and Tuesday night, forcing AEMO to direct them to produce enough power to meet demand.

Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Martin Ollman

But Mr Bowen admitted he could not predict when the skyrocketing wholesale prices, causing the current energy crisis, would normalise.

“I’m not going to predict when the cap ceases to be operative, because that’s something that’s up to the market to play out,” he said Tuesday afternoon.

“As long as the cap is operative, I’d expect AEMO to continue to require generators to bid in.”

Mr Bowen said after speaking with AEMO, he was confident that blackouts could be avoided as long as there were no unexpected outages at coal-fired power stations.

“I do not believe there is a likely outcome at this point that there will be any requirement for load shedding or indeed, as I said, for blackouts,” he said.

“There is enough supply to avoid those ... in the foreseeable future subject to unexpected closures.”

Mr Bowen said Australians should expect the current energy crises to continue throughout this “particularly cold winter”.

“We’ve had both expected and unexpected coal-fired power station outages.

“We had floods in coal mines, for example.

“This has put pressure on the system, as has the geopolitical situation.”

He also put generators on notice, saying the energy regulator would be watching closely to make sure they were not gaming the system.

Generators directed to increase supply to the system can seek compensation from the regulator at a later date.

Mr Bowen also said while people should turn off any unnecessary devices, like pool heaters, or external lighting, there was no need to switch off items they were using.

“Nobody should turn off any power usage that they need, that they are using for their comfort or their safety,” he said.

State Energy Minister Mick de Brenni said there were nine electricity generator units currently offline in Queensland, but he, too, was confident blackouts would be avoided.

He said it was five public and four private generator units out of 107 that were offline, including Callide C4 from the explosion last year, Callide B2 offline for maintenance, as well as Swanbank E gas plant and a hydro station in north Queensland.

“I have every confidence that our generators have access to enough coal reserves and enough gas reserves to make sure that the lights stay on tonight,” Mr de Brenni said.

“I want to reassure all Queenslanders that the system is operating. We don’t expect there to be wide-spread outages.”

Premier Annastacia Palasczuk said she would be raising the issue with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese at national cabinet on Friday.

Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, pictured in Carseldine, Brisbane, has blamed the former Coalition government for the country’s current energy crisis. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Dan Peled

EARLIER: Albo lashes out amid new warning to brace for blackouts

Anthony Albanese said all options are on the table to deal with Australia’s energy crisis, as he laid blame for the issue at the feet of the former government while not specifying what precisely could be done at a federal level now to ease the price sting short-term.

Mr Albanese is in Queensland for the first time since winning the election last month, and is due to head to the state’s electricity generation hub of Gladstone for a regional meeting of his cabinet on Wednesday.

His visit comes after Queenslanders were Tuesday morning warned to brace for blackouts. The Australian Energy Market Operator warned of possible power outages Tuesday night between 5pm and 9pm as the market regulator keeps price caps on generators to prevent runaway wholesale price surges.

Blackouts were averted on Monday night after the regulator took the rare step of directing power generators to increase their supply to meet consumer demand.

Mr Albanese said everything was “on the table” to deal with the crisis - which includes skyrocketing prices amid generation shortfall and the threat of rolling blackouts in NSW and Queensland.

His comments come after Energy Minister Chris Bowen on Tuesday morning said there was no quick fix to the crisis and warned the government didn’t have a “legislative basis” to put in place short term reforms.

Mr Albanese laid blame for the crisis at the feet of the nearly decade old former Coalition government and the lack of good energy policy from them, saying a combination of end-of-term coal-fired power stations, flooding and a grid “not fit for purpose” were driving the crisis.

“It is not acceptable that we have had a government in the previous term with 22 different energy policies and didn’t land one,” he said.

AEMO had issued market notices to generators in both NSW and Queensland to encourage more generation at these times and warned them it would take further action if needed to avoid supply shortfalls.

One of four units were taken offline at Callide Power Station on Friday. File picture

It is the third day in a row AEMO has been forced to cap wholesale prices, which has seen some generators reduce the amount of power supply they are putting into the system because they are making less money.

There are also some physical supply issues due to “generation units being offline for planned maintenance and repairs”, but the AEMO says there is enough physical capacity for generators to meet demand.

Wholesale prices had been an average of $674/MWh for seven days, triggering the price cap of $300/MWh about 7pm on Monday.

That is compared to more normal prices of $50-100/MWh.

There are a range of factors driving the high prices, including the early cold snap driving up usage, global gas prices having been driven to extremes due to the war in Europe, some coal power has come offline due to a range of factors, anomalous weather including flooding, as well as some coal mines which supply the power stations flooding.

Queensland's power generation fuel mix as of 12.20pm Tuesday. Picture: AEMO

The price cap will be reviewed again at 4am on Wednesday morning, but there are expected to be challenging days ahead for the electricity system.

AEMO’s website shows that as of 12.20pm Tuesday, 73 per cent of Queensland’s electricity was being generated via coal, while 22 per cent was from solar.

A third of Queensland’s coal-fired power capabilities are currently offline including the unplanned loss of a unit that had recently undergone maintenance amid ongoing supply shortages in the state.

State-owned CS Energy late on Monday afternoon confirmed one of its four units at the Callide Power Station – Callide C3 – had been taken offline on Friday to “fix an inverter issue”.

CS Energy chief executive Andrew Bills said C3, which has the capacity to produce 420MW of energy, was due to come online later this week.

But the loss of C3, which had undergone a planned overhaul from the end of March to the end of April, means only one of Callide’s four units are currently up and running following the explosion of C4 last year and B2 undergoing planned maintenance until later this week.

The total budget to overhaul C3 and B2 was $34m according to CS Energy.

There is about 8200MW of coal-fired power capability in Queensland across its power stations but only an estimated 5000MW of it is currently operational based on analysis of OpenNEM data.

One of the two units at Millmerran coal-fired power station was due to come back online this month after a planned overhaul but the maintenance had been delayed slightly by inclement weather.

Two of the six units at Gladstone coal-fired power station – units 3 and 4 – have been offline since May and June respectively.

Kogan Creek, Tarong and Tarong North have been operating at capacity.

Stanwell had been operating at about two-thirds capacity for the last week except a few hours on Monday night when it fired up to capacity.