AEMO releases final SA blackout report

The Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) has published its fourth and final incident report into the South Australian state-wide power outage that occurred on 28 September 2016, concluding that it was the result of control settings responding to multiple disturbances.

Specifically, the report found that the blackout came after transmission towers were blown over and incorrectly configured software was triggered. The unexpected operation of the control settings resulted in the sudden loss of generation from the wind farms, according to the report.

“Had the generation deficit not occurred, AEMO’s modelling indicates SA would have remained connected to Victoria and the black system would have been avoided,” the report said.

Of the 19 recommendations outlined in the report, three have already been implemented to address more rigorous weather warning monitoring and improvements in System Restart Ancillary Service testing. Work has now commenced on a further eight recommendations, with the remaining items due to be completed by December.

AEMO has used the report to reaffirm the need for a coordinated, national planning approach for energy transformation, enabling optimal solutions to be implemented in the long-term interest of National Electricity Market (NEM) consumers. The operator will continue its work to support the transition to a power system of the future, including working with stakeholders on the Future Power System Security (FPSS) program, and collaborative engagement with the Australian Energy Market Commission (AEMC) and the Finkel review.

The Greens have meanwhile responded to the report by calling on the Turnbull government to change the energy market rules to encourage greater battery and energy storage capacity into the market, better allowing the grid to deliver short bursts of stabilising power when it is needed.

“It is now clear that the SA blackout wasn’t caused by renewables but by the energy grid operator failing to ensure protective software on wind farms was correctly set up,” said the Greens’ energy and climate change spokesperson, Adam Bandt.

“The report confirms that had the software been correctly set up, the wind turbines would have kept spinning and the lights would have stayed on.

“If we get more batteries and storage into the system, for example by fixing the energy market’s 30-minute settlement rule and making it a 5-minute rule, we’d drive down electricity costs and improve grid stability.”

The report can be found here.