Australia’s main grid hits new peak of 41 per cent wind and solar

The share of wind and solar power in the energy mix on Australia’s main grid hit a new peak on Saturday – a share of 40.9 per cent, and also reached a new record for the share of all renewables, including hydro.

The new level was reached between 11am and 12pm on Saturday, at which point a total of 9,696MW of rooftop solar, utility scale solar and wind was contributing to the grid, a 40.9 per cent share of generation. It might have been even higher but for some curtailment of solar farms at the time.

At the time (12pm) wind and solar were contributing 111 per cent of South Australia’s demand, with the excess being exported to Victoria, where wind and solar were providing 34 per cent of its needs.

Solar was providing 43 per cent of Queensland’s demand, with wind also contributing just under 1 per cent. Tasmania was at 100 per cent renewables, as it usually is, with just 12.7 per cent coming from wind and solar, the rest from hydro.

Graphs below courtesy of the Climate and Energy College and its OpenNem resource.  The top one shows the share of renewables, including hydro, and the bottom one the aggregate output of wind and solar.