TRANSCRIPT
Australia is in the midst of an energy transition.
62 per cent of the nation's operating coal-fire power generators are forecast to close over the next ten years, to be replaced to renewable energy.
But today - a reminder from Australian Energy Market Operator - of the growing pains.
Here's CEO Dan Westerman.
"Without urgent and sustained investment in the electricity system, reliability risks do exist. But plans do exist as well."
Its new report suggests South Australia and Victoria are at heightened risk of blackouts this summer.
The Energy Market’s Reliability Standards requires just over 99.9 per cent of customer demand to be met each year.
AEMO forecasts those states will fail to meet that standard from as soon as November.
This summer, El Nino is forecast to inflict hot and dry weather and low wind, creating higher power demand.
Coal-fire power plants providing baseload supply are becoming increasingly unreliable and prone to outages.
But AEMO warns their clean energy replacements - are not coming online fast enough.
Shadow Energy Minister Ted O'Brien views that as a failure of the government's energy policy.
"Australia, lights out - that's the risk, we now face. Nobody is saying these challenges are easy, however you do not apply an ideological approach to fixing them."
Energy Minister Chris Bowen responded to those concerns.
Q: “Can you guarantee then there won't be blackouts on the east coast this summer?”
Bowen: “What I guarantee is that all governments are working together with AEMO, to make sure as our grid is as stable as it possibly can be, going into what will be a very hot summer.”
New South Wales is estimated to face reliability issues from 2025, Queensland from 2029.
But AEMO stresses its forecasts are conservative - and don't account for planned renewable projects in the pipeline.
But many of those projects are facing delays, as Climate Council Energy Expert Andrew Stock explains.
"So we've made good progress, but the pace has really slowed over the past year or two, we need to put our foot on the accelerator. We got to have governments, communities and the industry working together to remove the roadblocks to investment. We've got to do that because the weather extremes from climate change are coming fast, and we need to make sure our grid is fit for purpose for this century."
