Adelaide back in dark ages amid heatwave
SA was plunged into a new power crisis last night when more than 40,000 homes across Adelaide had their power cut.
South Australia was plunged into a new power crisis last night when more than 40,000 homes across Adelaide had their electricity cut in heatwave conditions as distributor SA Power Networks imposed load-shedding on the city.
As the temperature passed 40C, power was cut under orders from the Australian Energy Market Operator “due to lack of available generation supply”, according to SA Power Networks.
Last night’s blackouts were the latest in a series of outages over five months that have cost businesses millions of dollars and infuriated South Australians.
Liberal frontbencher Simon Birmingham, a South Australia senator, said it was further proof that the Weatherill Labor government “can’t keep the lights on” since last September’s statewide blackout.
“It’s a chronic failing that can only hurt investment confidence in the state,” Senator Birmingham told Adelaide’s The Advertiser last night.
“It’s a demonstration that ad-hoc state-based renewable energy targets have gone too far — when reliability can’t be maintained on a day the likes of which South Australia faces numerous times every single summer.”
Live energy production data sources last night showed wind power was negligible in the state, which has shut its coal-fired power station and is aiming to reach 50 per cent renewable energy production by 2025.
Social media was flooded with complaints soon after 7pm (South Australian time), with the power distributor telling customers the forced rolling cuts were ordered by AEMO.
Appearing live on Facebook for a question-and-answer session, Premier Jay Weatherill blamed the National Energy Market for the outages, saying a gas-powered generation plant in South Australia had not been required to come online.
“The rules of the energy market are broken,” he said. “We’ll be asking for changes.”
Mr Weatherill had blamed previous blackouts on storms that hit the state. There were no storms yesterday before the blackouts.
Energy Minister Tom Koutsantonis said 3000MW of thermal generation remained idle in the state due to low availability of gas and higher prices.
The temperature in much of South Australia is expected to soar above 40C until Saturday, raising fears of further blackouts.
Northern areas of the state are well into a second week of the heatwave, with gas production site Moomba enduring heat above 45C for the sixth consecutive day. Ceduna, Port Augusta, Roxby Downs and Woomera topped 46C. Despite the heat, bushfire risk across the state did not reach severe levels, though the risk was elevated in three districts, including the Riverland and the northeast pastoral.
SA Health chief medical officer Paddy Phillips said the state’s public hospitals had put special measures in place to deal with extra heat-related problems, which were likely later in the week:“ Generally the stresses that people feel come on after two or three days.”
Additional reporting: AAP
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