Lily D’Ambrosio ignored her own department’s advice on solar generation
Victoria’s Energy Minister ignored her department’s advice to approve an emergency backstop mechanism to stop rooftop solar generation overloading the state’s electricity grid.
Victoria’s Energy Minister ignored her department’s advice – and a national cabinet recommendation – to approve an emergency backstop mechanism to stop rooftop solar generation overloading the state’s electricity grid.
Departmental documents show Lily D’Ambrosio was briefed on the issue by the then Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning in October 2021 but chose not to take the immediate action recommended.
“On 5 October, 2021, DELWP briefed you on minimum system load and the related system risks associated with high penetration of DPV (distributed photovoltaic power),” state the briefing documents, obtained by the Victorian opposition under Freedom of Information laws.
“You did not approve the emergency backstop DPV curtailment capability proposal to manage system risks at that time. You instructed DELWP to continue to monitor minimum system load, undertake confidential stakeholder consultation and report back in quarter 4, 2022.”
As the documents detail, minimum system load typically occurs when demand from the grid is low and output from solar is very high, such as on mild, sunny weekends and public holidays. If not managed appropriately, the imbalance between supply and demand can cause the energy grid to black out.
The department warned that “system security challenges” posed by minimum load already existed at 2022 levels of solar generation. “They will continue to grow as Victoria’s updated renewable energy and climate change targets continue to drive a rapid transition away from synchronous coal and gas generation,” the documents state.
The documents also detail a national cabinet meeting that took place on October 1, 2021, four days before Ms D’Ambrosio received the departmental briefing, at which energy ministers endorsed a final package of reforms for the post-2025 national electricity market.
They state that one of the recommendations agreed upon was that energy ministers “adopt a jurisdictional ministerial lever for emergency backstop measures, as an immediate reform”.
The department warned that Victoria was “forecast to violate” the Australian Energy Market Operator’s upper threshold of the range of concern for minimum system load in summer 2024 “under the most likely modelled scenario”, and that in a “plausible scenario” of South Australia and Victoria being islanded together in the event of natural disaster or interconnector failure, there was a “very real risk of a system security emergency from summer 2022-23”.
In 2023, Ms D’Ambrosio finally took steps towards introducing a backstop mechanism for rooftop solar, conducting a public consultation process between June 21 and August 2, with plans to have the policy designed and implemented by April 2024.
The emergency backstop provisions are likely to involve the ability for the government to spontaneously cut off households’ rooftop solar generation to moderate system load, with the department warning of “risks associated with implementation”, such as discouraging consumers from purchasing rooftop solar “due to perceived meaningful loss of generation or autonomy”.
The negative side-effect of the rooftop solar revolution is becoming clear at a time when the Andrews-Allan government has spent years encouraging Victorians to take up rooftop solar, including through the provision of taxpayer-funded subsidies.
A spokeswoman for Ms D’Ambrosio said Victoria was “introducing an emergency backstop mechanism as more Victorians install solar.”
“This has been designed through thorough industry and public consultation to ensure a streamlined introduction that minimises cost and maximises benefits for all consumers,” the spokeswoman said.
“Because Victoria’s minimum system load was stable, it gave us more time to seek additional advice and undertake consultation to ensure the mechanism we installed was fit-for-purpose while giving businesses more time to implement the change.
“The emergency backstop will only be used as a last resort and at isolated positions along the network to mitigate the risk and return the system to a secure state – this means that not all solar systems will necessarily be impacted during emergencies.”
Opposition energy spokesman David Davis said Ms D’Ambrosio had placed Victoria’s electricity grid at risk by ignoring advice.
“Credible advice was repeatedly provided to D’Ambrosio which, ostrich like, she appears to have ignored,” Mr Davis said.
“The minister has a responsibility to ensure that Victorian electricity supplies are reliable and secure and that everything possible is done to avoid blackouts or widespread load shedding striking entire areas of the state.
“The fact is all of this was foreseeable and the unintended issues should have been dealt with in a timely way.
“This is more than incompetence, it is culpable. There would be less risk if the minister had acted earlier.
“Just as electricity and gas prices have surged massively under Labor, Victorians are also facing real issues of supply security of the minister’s own making.”
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