North Island National Grid at near Capacity

Forums › Off topic › North Island National Grid at near Capacity

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | ... | 12

6530 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#2757539 9-Aug-2021 21:26

ezbee:

Could it be we don't lack generation as much as spot pricing is spiking so much companies are lothe to buy it ?

I wonder that you've hit the nail on the head. Why is it that only a couple of distributors have put blackouts in place?

Sony Xperia XA2 running Sailfish OS. https://sailfishos.org The true independent open source mobile OS
Samsung Galaxy Tab S6
Dell Inspiron 14z i5

Scott3

3972 posts

Uber Geek

Lifetime subscriber

#2757541 9-Aug-2021 21:26

Stu1: Fire up that coal plant with the foreign coal she’ll be right , it’s been a mild winter really are the lakes empty?

Only coal plant we have is Huntly units 1,2 & 4 (3 was decommissioned in late 2014). They are 250MW each. so 750MW total. They have been running flat out for much of the winter, but a few weeks ago output dropped to 500MW. (and it's at 500MW now). I assume one unit is out of service for maintenance or repair.

Issue is that we are facing a double black swan event. A dry year (although there was some good inflows in the south island in recent weeks), combined with natural gas production issues.

Lake storage isn't too bad with South Island storage at 72% of full and North Island storage at 37% of full.

I don't have access to detailed info here, but I assume record demand (cold snap combined with NZ having a lot of people in it at the moment due to returning expat's, and nobody taking overseas holidays, and with industry running hard), combined with the following supply side stuff have caused this:

250MW of huntly coal offline
Some Gas peckers unable to run due to gas production issues
Relatively low wind generation.
Low lake levels in the north island may be restricting peak north island hydro output.
Transmission constraints to get south island generation to the north.

This is a big deal. I have had a strong interest in the industry for 15+ years, and can't recall a situation where we have needed to have rolling blackouts that wasn't related to a major equipment failure. Very bad look for the power sector in a first world country.

Scott3

3972 posts

Uber Geek

Lifetime subscriber

#2757546 9-Aug-2021 21:35

Technofreak:
sbiddle:

Current generation capacity

So, we're not at capacity or demand has dropped significantly very recently.

The "Capacity" on that chart is just nameplate capacity. Don't mean it is actually available to be dispatched.

As an example, wind power always runs at the max it can, but if winds are light (or there is no wind) in some area's, you won't get nameplate output. In this case north island wind is about 1/3rd of nameplate output. (This is just part of the game of wind generation)

With regards to the Coal/Gas, this is refering to huntly units 1,2 & 4. They are 250MW each. the combined output is 470MW, Just under the nameplate capacity of two units, suggesting that one unit is offline for some reason.

Capacity in south island hydro isn't much use if the HVDC link is close to maxed out, and other transmission constraints exist.

Gas can't run flat out at the moment due to gas production issues (would drain the pipes if two many power stations were turned on).

sbiddle

30853 posts

Uber Geek

Retired Mod

Trusted

Biddle Corp

Lifetime subscriber

#2757547 9-Aug-2021 21:36

Unison posted that it was a new record tonight for NZ power consumption.

Technofreak

6530 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#2757548 9-Aug-2021 21:36

Scott3:

This is a big deal. I have had a strong interest in the industry for 15+ years, and can't recall a situation where we have needed to have rolling blackouts that wasn't related to a major equipment failure. Very bad look for the power sector in a first world country.

It is a big deal. I'll give you one possible reason why.

Once upon a time engineers and technical people made the calls on how infrastructure like this was configured and managed. We had a belts and braces system, which was expensive but it was very resilient. We now have this sort of stuff run by money people and risk managers with costs cut to a minimum. The pendulum has swung completely the other way and there is no resilience. We need to find the middle ground.

Sony Xperia XA2 running Sailfish OS. https://sailfishos.org The true independent open source mobile OS
Samsung Galaxy Tab S6
Dell Inspiron 14z i5

MaxineN

Max
1772 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified

Trusted

Subscriber

#2757550 9-Aug-2021 21:40

Ignorant South Island bystander here watching this as it unfolds and I have some questions.

Did we actually see this coming?

Doesn't this mean we need to actually prepare/do something about this?

Are we actually paying to improve the infrastructure?

Ramblings from a mysterious lady who's into tech. Warning I may often create zingers.

Technofreak

6530 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

#2757551 9-Aug-2021 21:40

Scott3:

The "Capacity" on that chart is just nameplate capacity. Don't mean it is actually available to be dispatched.

As an example, wind power always runs at the max it can, but if winds are light (or there is no wind) in some area's, you won't get nameplate output. In this case north island wind is about 1/3rd of nameplate output. (This is just part of the game of wind generation)

With regards to the Coal/Gas, this is refering to huntly units 1,2 & 4. They are 250MW each. the combined output is 470MW, Just under the nameplate capacity of two units, suggesting that one unit is offline for some reason.

Capacity in south island hydro isn't much use if the HVDC link is close to maxed out, and other transmission constraints exist.

Gas can't run flat out at the moment due to gas production issues (would drain the pipes if two many power stations were turned on).

Ahh, OK that make sense. I originally saw that graphic as showing available capacity not as you've explained the design capacity.

Sony Xperia XA2 running Sailfish OS. https://sailfishos.org The true independent open source mobile OS
Samsung Galaxy Tab S6
Dell Inspiron 14z i5

martyyn

1971 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified

#2757555 9-Aug-2021 21:51

Turns out our second outage is due to a fire and Electra have advised everyone to treat all lines as live and there is no eta to it being fixed.

Going to be a cold night.

msukiwi

2418 posts

Uber Geek

Lifetime subscriber

#2757557 9-Aug-2021 21:54

MaxineN:

Did we actually see this coming?

Doesn't this mean we need to actually prepare/do something about this?

Are we actually paying to improve the infrastructure?

My guess is: YES / YES / NO (We are paying for Profits & Dividends!)

cokemaster

Exited
4929 posts

Uber Geek

Retired Mod

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#2757558 9-Aug-2021 21:58

ezbee:

...

Bring back ripple control.

...

Ripple control is still very much a thing on many power connections.

webhosting

Loose lips may sink ships - Be smart - Don't post internal/commercially sensitive or confidential information!

gmball

568 posts

Ultimate Geek

#2757562 9-Aug-2021 22:02

And how exactly are we supposed to charge all of these electric vehicles we are now being encouraged to purchase?
Or perhaps next winter is the idea just to park them up and walk during the colder months?

Handle9

11394 posts

Uber Geek

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#2757563 9-Aug-2021 22:06

Technofreak:

Scott3:

This is a big deal. I have had a strong interest in the industry for 15+ years, and can't recall a situation where we have needed to have rolling blackouts that wasn't related to a major equipment failure. Very bad look for the power sector in a first world country.

It is a big deal. I'll give you one possible reason why.

Once upon a time engineers and technical people made the calls on how infrastructure like this was configured and managed. We had a belts and braces system, which was expensive but it was very resilient. We now have this sort of stuff run by money people and risk managers with costs cut to a minimum. The pendulum has swung completely the other way and there is no resilience. We need to find the middle ground.

The "market" will provide the solution (artificially inflated prices exacerbated by market manipulation).

JPNZ

1548 posts

Uber Geek

#2757565 9-Aug-2021 22:06

@Scott3 I also heard from a friend that contracts at Huntly there is some current maintenance on the HVDC inter island cable so max power may not have been able to transfer to the North.

Goes to show how frail our system is.

Panasonic 65GZ1000, Onkyo RZ730, Atmos 5.1.2, AppleTV 4K, Nest Mini's, PS5, PS3, MacbookPro, iPad Pro, Apple watch SE2, iPhone 15+

cokemaster

Exited
4929 posts

Uber Geek

Retired Mod

Trusted

Lifetime subscriber

#2757572 9-Aug-2021 22:09

gmball: And how exactly are we supposed to charge all of these electric vehicles we are now being encouraged to purchase?
Or perhaps next winter is the idea just to park them up and walk during the colder months?

EV owners are given incentives to charge during offpeak period (in the form of cheaper kWh charges)- eg. after 9PM.

It would be less than ideal for them to charge during peak periods such as this.

webhosting

Loose lips may sink ships - Be smart - Don't post internal/commercially sensitive or confidential information!

DjShadow

4088 posts

Uber Geek

ID Verified

Trusted

#2757577 9-Aug-2021 22:14

cokemaster:

gmball: And how exactly are we supposed to charge all of these electric vehicles we are now being encouraged to purchase?
Or perhaps next winter is the idea just to park them up and walk during the colder months?

EV owners are given incentives to charge during offpeak period (in the form of cheaper kWh charges)- eg. after 9PM.

It would be less than ideal for them to charge during peak periods such as this.

That is exactly what we do, I've got a heavy duty timer on our plug that switches on at 9pm.

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | ... | 12