It’s been a big week for news stories and headlines about potential blackouts – as the media takes the alarmist bits out from some comprehensive reports from the Australian Energy Market Operator and the Victoria auditor-general and takes them to the extreme.
So perhaps it’s time to change the conversation.
The general assumption – from the NSW premier on down – is that Australia’s fleet of coal fired power generators will have to stay online for as long as it takes to build enough wind and solar, and find enough spinning machines – known as synchronous condensers – to maintain the heartbeat of the grid.
But what if we looked at this another way. What if we decided instead that the coal fired generators should be kept online until AEMO and the big transmission companies have enough data and experience to run the grid with a minimum amount of synchronous generation, or even none at all – in effect, engines off.
It might not be as far away as people think.
We know that some states can run well above 100 per cent renewables (as a share of local demand) and even big isolated grids like Western Australia’s are showing they can do the same.
But these milestones are being achieved with at least some sychronous generation in the background – as little as 42 megawatts in the case of South Australia – and that state will be allowed to run with “engines off” once the new transmission link to NSW is completed.
The big question for the market operator, and those responsible for keeping the lights on, is whether the heartbeat of the grid – what is often referred to as grid services or more specifically “system strength” – can be maintained in a large grid, like W.A.’s or the National Electricity Market, with no spinning machines.
Small remote grids like those serving mines such as Bellevue Gold are demonstrating this is possible, and AEMO has already announced trials and is tendering for new contracts to test that scenario – for the first time in the world – on an islanded grid with more than 100 MW of demand. That should occur some time next year.
It is one of a number of new initiatives that AEMO is rolling out over the next 12 months – all with a goal to test in real life the assumption that the grid can – as many claim – be run without synchronous generation, or spinning machines.
There are trials on the ability for inverter based technologies to deliver “black starts” for the grid in the event of a blackout, and to do so at a time of high distributed PV – the rooftop solar that has collectively become the biggest component of Australia’s modern grid.
There are also trials also to deal with minimum system load – another consequence of the high levels of penetration of rooftop PV. And there is a trial also for Grid Forming Inverter Protection Quality Fault Current.
This may seem peak engineering nerdiness, but it is perhaps the most critical of all.
The main barrier stopping AEMO right now from dropping its demand for expensive and hard to get synchronous generators – massive machines featuring technology more than half a century old – and using cheaper and more readily available grid forming inverters is the question over fault current.
This trial is as much about defining standards and protocols as it is about seeing the technology in action. It goes to the heart of one of the biggest challenges of the transition from a synchronous system to an inverter based system – changing the engines while the plane is still in the air.
This issue is discussed in detail in the latest episode of Renew Economy’s Energy Insiders episode, which features two great interview, one with PSC Consulting’s Bruce Miller, and another with independent MP Helen Haines.
See: Energy Insiders Podcast: No spin needed for renewable gold rush
We asked Miller, one of the country’s foremost power engineers, what he made of AEMO’s comprehensive Transition Plan to System Security report, and the reaction to it.
“AEMO tend to tend to err on the side of conservatism, which is fair enough (given) that they’re the system operator. But it’s a little bit like if you don’t steer the car, it’s gonna crash,” Miller says.
“We don’t need spinning machines,” he says. “I don’t think there’s any deal breaker (in basing a grid around inverters and power electronics). The electrons don’t know whether they are coming from a spinning machine or from an inverter.”
But Miller suggests that there are split views within AEMO and the broader industry.
“You’ll find that … there is a sort of inherent conservatism that people are used to rotating machines,” Miller says. “They know they work, and they believe that’s the direction that we should head down. But I think we should also be considering the other options on the table as well, one of which is using grid forming inverters.”
Can the success of small grids like Bellevue Gold, which has run more than 100 hours with “engine off” and relying solely on wind, solar and battery storage – be replicated on the wider grid more than thousand times bigger?
“As things get switched on and switched off, as you go to a larger and larger grid, it becomes more and more complicated to model,” Miller says.
“So you can’t model everything and be sure that it’s right, and the more complicated your model is, the more likely it is to be wrong. That, I think, is one of the issues.
“But having said that also, the larger the system is, the more resilient it becomes, because if you trip something off in proportion to the size of the system, it’s much smaller than for the smaller grids. So so large, larger grids are actually easier to control overall normal system.”
The makers of grid forming inverters have no doubt that their technology can deliver what is required. Tesla, for instance, has released a number of white papers and has been lobbying intensively behind the scenes. It has the support of many in the industry, including those who have deployed the technology at their projects.
As coal-fired power stations retire and renewable energy ramps up, Australia’s electricity grid faces new stability challenges. SMA Australia has welcomed the release of AEMO’s 2025 Transition Plan for System Security, which outlines a clear, staged roadmap to address these challenges and secure the grid’s future.
SMA Australia joined that conversation this week, underlying its support for the AEMO trials, and the role that grid-forming solutions can play in providing critical system security services, including synthetic inertia, fast frequency response and system strength.
John Alexander, SMA’s head of large scale solutions in Australia says Australia is navigating a “once-in-a-generation” energy transition.
“We support AEMO’s phased and collaborative approach and stand ready to help deliver the system strength, inertia and flexibility our grid needs – now and into the future,” he says.
“These processes are essential to ensuring that system security services from inverter-based resources can be safely and confidently scaled, and we’re committed to contributing.”
Alexander says that while grid-forming inverters are now well understood in terms of inertia, further testing is needed before AEMO and transmission companies can have the confidence to fully rely upon for system strength.
“This is a technically complex transition, but also a solvable one,” Alexander said. “Australia’s success will depend on forward planning, proven technology and close industry collaboration, and we’re here to play our part.”
System security is one thing, but if Australia is going to be able ditch the biggest and most polluting of its spinning machines, the coal and gas-fired generators, it is going to have to build enough bulk energy in the form of wind and solar.
To do that, of course, relies on the ability to be able to build projects in regional areas, and in some cases boost energy infrastructure such as new transmission lines and substations.
In the second half of this week’s Energy Insider’s podcast we talk with Indi MP Helen Haines, probably the only regional MP that is openly supportive of the renewables transition, despite polling that she says shows majority support for the transition in regional communities.
She says towns like Armidale, Dubbo and Hay have created intergenerational prosperity by embracing the transition and making sure they secure strong agreements on financial and community benefits. But that is not the case everywhere.
Too often, she says, farmers, landowners and concerned community members have been disappointed with the type of information and inadequate consultation by renewable energy companies. She says that is the case in her own electorate of Indi, where there are more than 20 different wind, solar and battery projects.
“I am seeking improvements in how those big companies, the proponents of energy projects, interact with regional Australians,” Haines says in the podcast.
“And I’m here to say regional Australians, we need to be at the table and we need to negotiate to ensure that the benefits that flow from this inevitable transition actually set us up for intergenerational wealth, that set us up for regional development.
“And I use the comparison with the gold rush, when we look at major public infrastructure, extraordinary town halls, art centers, telecommunications, roads and bridges that were funded through the Gold Rush period, I want to see a legacy that sets us up like that with this transition to renewables.”
You can hear both interview with Bruce Miller and Helen Haines, and a roundup of the latest news, in the most recent episode of the Energy Insiders podcast here:
See: Energy Insiders Podcast: No spin needed for renewable gold rush
