Callide Power Station explosions cut power to hundreds of thousands across Queensland, northern NSW

Rolling blackouts have been cancelled for Queensland after a mammoth power outage that affected hundreds of thousands but repairs to the station involved could take years.

A hydrogen leak could be behind the explosion that led to the catastrophic failure at the Callide power station today, a union heavyweight has said.

CFMMEU Mining and Energy Vice President Shane Brunker said “reports on the ground” pointed to a mechanical failure of a turbine or generator, and the ensuing leak of the highly combustible hydrogen that’s used to cool the generator.

Mr Brunker said the repairs to the unit at Callide C would take “months if not years” to repair, but it would not render the entire system useless.

Mr Brunker said the money needed for the repairs would “probably buy a couple of houses on the Gold Coast”.

“It will be millions,” he said.

Mr Brunker said the post mortem of what went wrong at Callide C would involve going through the sequence of events as recorded by the station’s sophisticated computer system.

He estimated the investigation could take a few months.

BLACKOUTS

A warning about continued blackouts was cancelled this evening after an earlier plea for residents to conserve electricity in the wake of the power station fire that affected hundreds of thousands.

The Australian Energy Market Operator cancelled the warning, with residents no longer required to conserve power.

A total of 477,000 homes and businesses across the states were impacted after multiple explosions were reported at Callide Power Station in central Queensland around 2pm, with most of the outages lasting until about 4pm.

The Australian Energy Market Operator initially said there was not enough power to meet demand following the incident.

A 550m exclusion zone is in place at Callide Power Station after fire in one of its turbines.

Queensland’s Energy Minister Mick de Brenni also warned Queenslanders to conserve power and prepare for further power outages.

“I’m thankful no one was injured in this incident and we’re working hard to resolve these unprecedented issues as quickly as we can,” he said.

“Essential services such as hospitals, transport networks, ports, airports and other key infrastructure will stay online.

“The best way to ensure this is done as quickly as possible is to conserve energy use.

“If you and your family are in a position to, please consider conserving energy by turning off appliances, heaters and reverse-cycle airconditioning.”

Mr de Brenni said the outages would likely affect traffic lights, and urged people to “stay off roads unless absolutely necessary”.

Shopping at Coles in the dark a little weird @9NewsQueenslandpic.twitter.com/3JKj2ro6BX

— Professor Gary Mortimer 🛒🛒🛒 (@ProfRetail) May 25, 2021

ON SCENE

More than 200 people were evacuated from the power station and an exclusion zone of 550m was established. Firefighters remained on scene on Tuesday night battling the blaze.

Queensland Fire and Emergency Services also warned that the incident was “expected to be a prolonged event”.

“Residents and community members are asked to avoid the area.”

Deputy Commissioner Mark Roche said that there were positive reports coming from the crews on site and that he was confident the situation would be under control.

Mr Roche also confirmed there were no reported injuries, that staff and employees

had been evacuated, and all persons had been accounted for.

“We still have an active job, there are around four crews already on site, and several other crews responding to the incident,” Mr Roche said.

Firefighters are still battling a blaze at CS Energy's Callide Power Station.

The Commissioner said that crews could not identify the cause of the fire but that later investigations will provide clarity once the situation is more stable.

“What I can say is that the power is off at the site, all gas and chemicals have been removed or disconnected, and the hydrogen supply has been isolated,” Mr Roche said.

There have been multiple explosions at Callide Power Station in central Queensland.

OUTAGES

According to an Energex spokeswoman, 387,000 homes in the southeast pocket had been left without power, while Ergon Energy located 90,000 outages from regional and far north Queensland.

Electricity was cut to more than 93,000 properties in the Brisbane area, 41,400 on the Gold Coast, 31,100 in Logan, 39,000 in Moreton Bay, 3,900 in Ipswich, 8,500 at Redlands, 1,000 in the Scenic Rim and 1,100 in the Somerset region.

CS Energy released a statement about 3pm saying it had ‘immediately acted’ following the incident.

“At approximately 1.45pm today, a fire occurred in one of the turbine halls at the power station,” a CS Energy spokesperson said.

“As a result, the three units that were generating at the time went offline.

“We immediately evacuated the power station and called emergency services to attend site. At this stage, there are no reported injuries.

“We are investigating the incident and will provide further updates as they become available.”

Energy Minister Mick de Brenni told parliament this afternoon that a fire affected units three and four at the Callide power station – with all workers evacuated without injuries.

He warned families returning home tonight could find traffic signals down, and insisted that every effort was being made to restore power to those still without it.

“The sudden loss of two thousand megawatts of generated electricity has caused outages across the state,” Mr de Brenni said.

“As many as 400,000 customers initially lost power.

“But a short time ago, supplies to 300,000 of those had already been restored with more being restored as we speak.

“There is a process in place to gradually and safely increase supply from other power stations. These scenarios are planned for and our recovery plan is already in place.”

State Opposition leader David Crisafulli said while it was good news that no one had been injured, he questioned the failure of “another essential service” under the Palaszczuk government.

“This shows what can happen when reliable base load power isn’t available in the system,” he said.

Workers gathered outside the exclusion zone at Callide Power Station near Biloela.

⚠️⚠️⚠️ A widespread outage from the Gold Coast to Caboolture is affecting 375k Energex customers. Cause & duration unknown. When we know more, we'll update this page. Pls assist by only contacting us for life-threatening issues as our teams have no additional details to provide.

— Energex (@Energex) May 25, 2021

Almost half a million homes and businesses in Queensland and northern NSW lost power after a fire at Callide Power Station on Tuesday afternoon.

WITNESSES

A witness posted on Facebook: “Please stay away a lot of emergency vehicles heading towards that direction there has been multiple explosions on site no 4 a generator has caught fire is starting to affect some power in places,” a witness posted on Facebook.”

One Biloela local told The Courier Mail she didn’t hear the explosion but had heard the sirens of emergency services vehicles heading to the power station.

“We heard there’s been multiple explosions,” she said.

“We heard all of the emergency services heading out there.”

Power was out to most of the Gold Coast, Logan, Redlands, Moreton and large parts of Brisbane including Graceville, Salisbury, Coorparoo, Beenleigh, Fig Tree Pocket, Boondall, Nundah, Northgate, Ascot, Hendra, Zillmere, Sherwood, St Lucia, Oxley, Narangba, Forest Lake, Clayfield and Acacia Ridge.

⚠️⚠️⚠️ UPDATE (3.15pm): 250k Qlders affected by today's mass outage are now restored. We’re advised the outage is due to a loss of generation at a power station. We're working with agencies & station operators to restore supply to our network as soon as power is available.

— Energex (@Energex) May 25, 2021

Parts of regional Queensland were also out including Fraser Coast and Dalby, Kingaroy,

Power outages are also impacting Townsville, Ingham and even up to the Cape have reported widespread outages.

There were also reports of outages as far south as Pottsville in New South Wales.

The Courier-Mail understands Energy Minister Mick de Brenni was due to go into a briefing on the issue at about 3.30pm.

There were reports of people trapped in high-rise lifts in Surfers Paradise.

TRAFFIC CHAOS

Drivers across Brisbane were told to use caution on the roads until the power is restored.

Lights at one of Brisbane’s busiest intersections, the Indooroopilly roundabout, were down along with traffic lights on nearby Coonan Rd, outside McDonald’s.

Lights were also out on Oxley Rd, Corinda.

There were also reports the University of Queensland’s St Lucia campus lost power.

Shopping centres and schools across the state were impacted by the outages, with Brookside Shopping Centre in Mitchelton warning customers to hold off on their shopping trip.

“The Centre has lost all power meaning all retailers are unable to trade,” they wrote on social media.

“ It appears to be a Brisbane wide outage and we are waiting on further advice from Energex. Please do not come to the Centre until advised.”

Up to 30 Woolworth’s stores were without power across Queensland but all stores are now back operating.

Power out at Toombul and Ascot @9NewsQueenslandpic.twitter.com/m7FZ6J9r7u

— Professor Gary Mortimer 🛒🛒🛒 (@ProfRetail) May 25, 2021

A Coles spokeswoman said supermarkets were back online after the power outage.

“After a short disruption due to a major power outage in Queensland this afternoon we’re pleased to confirm all Coles supermarkets are now trading,” she said.

A Queensland Department of Education spokeswoman said 59 schools were offline as at 3.15pm.

Brisbane Airport was only minimally impacted as systems went down for 15 minutes at 2.15pm.

A spokeswoman said only the international terminal was impacted until about 2.30pm but everything is now completely back up on full power, not a generator.

The Gold Coast University Hospital and Coast theme parks were plunged into chaos before emergency generators kicked in.

A Village Roadshow Theme Parks spokesman said power had now been restored at parks including Movie World and Sea World.

INVESTIGATION

The incident is being investigated by the Australian Energy Market Operator, Energy Minister Angus Taylor has confirmed.

Speaking in parliament, Mr Taylor said the government was working with the AEMO to determine the impact and cause of the outage and to restore power as quickly as possible.

“Of course our thoughts at this time, first and foremost are with the safety and the livelihoods of workers both at the Callide Power Station – 260 workers at the Callide Power Station – and the many customers who rely on that power for their livelihoods,” he said.

Callide Power Station at Biloela was evacuated after multiple explosions.

State MP for Callide Colin Boyce said he has been in contact with CS Energy general manager Brett Smith, who is rushing back from Tarong Power Station in the South Burnett region.

“He has told me he would let me know the details as soon as he finds out,” Mr Boyce said.

“I sincerely hope there has been no loss of life or serious injury, but that is unknown at this stage.

“I’ve been told there has been a generator failure and they are evacuating the power station.

“There have most definitely been power outages up and down the coast.

“My office staff have told me there is no power in our Biloela office.”

CS Energy has immediately acted following an incident at Callide Power Station near Biloela in Central Queensland today. At approximately 1.45pm today, a fire occurred in one of the turbine halls at the power station.

— CS Energy (@CSEnergyQld) May 25, 2021

Mr Boyce said, if indeed there had been a “catastrophic generator fire”, it would have reverberating effects on Queensland’s energy supply.

“If that’s the case, I would imagine Callide would not be repaired and it would be shut down a lot quicker than what has been flagged in 2028,” he said.

“That’s my assumption.”