Electicity Marketing

[Allan_L (Allan)]

Thanks Andrew for the Link, very informative.

[multiweb (Marc)]

Couldn't see WA/NT anywhere. Are they separate?

[AndrewJ]

Gday Marc

Couldn't see WA/NT anywhere. Are they separate?

I believe so, but i havent finished reading who does what.
Basically, Nemmco was set up as a new bureaucracy to oversee how the Eastern states power grids were all interlinked, ie to cover the transfer of electricity "between" the states that have an interlinked grid.
As WA and the NT are not linked in, they dont need to trade with other states.
That said, i still dont understand who makes the money on the high transmission lines. It all appears to be a sarah lee setup to me at present.

I gotta stop reading or ill have to start drinking before midday

Andrew

[Allan_L (Allan)]

Originally Posted by multiweb

Couldn't see WA/NT anywhere. Are they separate?

Western Australia has a distinctly different energy market which is not interconnected with the rest of Australia.
http://www.imowa.com.au/home/about-imo/history-of-imo

Not sure about NT.

[AndrewJ]

Gday Allan

Apologies for any erroneous content,

No probs at all.
One of the problems with the current systems are they they keep changing so fast, you no longer know who does what, hence cant really check stuff to see who is skimming off all the profits.

Andrew

[Allan_L (Allan)]

Originally Posted by AndrewJ

who is skimming off all the profits.

Can only comment on NSW, and until recently, (IMHO) it was the State Government for the most part. Which is OK if it is going to community services, but makes you laugh when they (with a straight face) launch an official enquiry into the price rises in electricity, when it was them that orchestrated it all.

I will probably have the boys in black suits after me for that one.

[multiweb (Marc)]

Originally Posted by Allan_L

Can only comment on NSW, and until recently, (IMHO) it was the State Government for the most part. Which is OK if it is going to community services, but makes you laugh when they (with a straight face) launch an official enquiry into the price rises in electricity, when it was them that orchestrated it all.

I will probably have the boys in black suits after me for that one.

MIB - . That's what pollies are like. Thick back and no shame, which either side. Oh well as you said. If some of the money falls back in community services it's not that bad.

[The_bluester (Paul)]

One thing I can offer up is a bit of perspective on "Gold plating" I can not comment outside of Victoria however the same accusation is made here. More than anything else when gold plating is mentioned I would suggest looking at our own consumption habits and attitude to outages. We moan and complain about power prices, but just listen to how shrill it gets when the dreaded "Load shedding" comes around in summer!

We can not have it both ways. We want a network which is resilient enough and with enough extra capacity that supply is more or less continuous on even the most extreme days, but then we complain about gold plated infrastructure which is underutilized much of the year as a result. I guess a lot of that comes back to other posts of Alexander's. We have to take some responsibility here for the very mess we are in, we expect to flick a switch and have whatever is connected to it work no matter what the conditions are, there are costs involved in having that occur which are wasted money most of the time. It is a bit like buying a large V8 engined car for towing a dozen times a year, commuting to work in it five times a week and then complaining that it uses lots of fuel doing so.

I think the smart meter rollout in Vic was a missed opportunity, more or less purely on a political basis. Unpalatable to sell to the public but why was load control not made a greater feature, sure there would have been greater costs in installing the meter as wiring rearrangement would have been required but how much better would it have been for ten percent of the states air conditioners to stop running during extreme peaks, then ten minutes later start up again while another ten percent stop. Hardly even enough time off line to be more than an inconvenience meanwhile, the fridge, freezer, standard fans, computers etc continue to hum happily away without interruption.

Some education would have been needed so that people understood what was happening and that the other option was complete outage as has been done in the past but that is about it. We are used to moaning about load shedding so it was easier to just let that be instead of getting us used to a new concept.

[AndrewJ]

Gday Paul

but then we complain about gold plated infrastructure which is underutilized much of the year

Yes and no.
My particular case did not require money to be spent changing my already "new" supply wire to a newer wire.
Whats more of a concern for me is they are doing quick simple stuff like this to make(claim) money, but are ignoring general maintenance.
When i first bought my house, the SEC regularly sent trucks around to inspect wiring/crossbars and wash insulators if reqd ( esp in summer )
Now if we get a hot day and some light rain, the poles start burning.
We also lost our power once because an insulators support bolt had slowly unscrewed over several years, till the local wires fell onto the tram supply lines.
That was good fun
A new transformer was reqd etc, but its still cheaper than preventing it i guess.

Andrew

[casstony]

Originally Posted by The_bluester

. We moan and complain about power prices, but just listen to how shrill it gets when the dreaded "Load shedding" comes around in summer!
.

Rooftop solar should eliminate any need for load shedding in Summer and solar power allows us to have a less robust distribution network. Solar works at it's best when demand is highest and is taking away the Summer afternoon generation peak and price peak which generators once enjoyed.

At first incumbent electricity businesses mocked solar but now they are actively fighting to slow the rollout of solar panels and even exclude home owners from exporting to the grid in order to protect their business model.

[The_bluester (Paul)]

I don't argue with any of that Tony, though ironically on the hottest days, solar PV is less efficient as the panels performance falls off with heat. I think from recent reports that Queensland is leading the push to make rooftop PV harder to deal with. We have looked closely at rooftop PV a couple of times but it is difficult to make a proper decision. Without the distortion of the ridiculous feed in tariffs which used to be paid it is much harder to make it stack up. We are probably in a best case scenario for making it work. I think the focus needs to shift from making money off it to negating your own usage. We might be able to make it stack up as there are a couple of people home full time, doing relatively energy intensive things. If we can cover off that usage then there is a chance of it paying for itself. Throw in battery storage if that becomes viable and it suddenly works much better.

I think time of use tariffs will be a big part of the future and the peak period will be poorly covered by solar PV without storage to get you over the peak. Essentially you would become an exporter of power while it is cheap and an importer while it is expensive. In our case we have electric cooking (Bottled gas being even more expensive) and shifting the consumption away from what will be the peak time is difficult as dinner time is dinner time, particularly with children. Storage that can float you over that peak would be a real asset.




Andrew, pretty hard to comment on any particular instance of any particular fault, but certainly things like insulator washing have gone by the wayside. As for a bolt slowly unscrewing, that sort of failure is bound to happen even with a high maintenance regime. Could you imagine the cost of having dozens of crews in bucket trucks roaming the suburbs full time, washing insulators and checking the torque on bolts? We would have to pay for that too.

Some areas you would think it would be worthwhile doing insulator cleaning though, bayside suburbs where salty air would make the problem worse.

[casstony]

Originally Posted by The_bluester

though ironically on the hottest days, solar PV is less efficient as the panels performance falls off with heat.
.

That's true but in practice it's not an issue. Our 3.5 KW system rarely generates 3.5 KW since we rarely experience ideal conditions (cool, sunny weather with the sun at a good angle). I think of it as a 2.5 KW system which is enough to cover afternoon air conditioner use and it has approximately halved our electricity consumption. I go to some lengths to shift usage to take advantage of our own generation (dishwasher, washing machine). We are not on the higher feed in tariffs and the system cost $4800.

I am looking forward to affordable storage and I like the idea of getting energy directly from it's original source.

[AndrewJ]

Gday Paul

Could you imagine the cost of having dozens of crews in bucket trucks roaming the suburbs full time

Well we used to have it, and it worked.
Part of me also thinks that having that critical mass of skilled workers also allowed the system to take on and train apprentices in a coherent manner. No 457 visas reqd.

Also, I didn't note my bills dropping as a result of privatisation.
I suspect that what has happened is that substantially more money is now being spent on management structures, IT and marketing depts and profit margins, so the end cost to the user is still high, but the grunts at the coalface are reduced accordingly.
In fact, I always wonder how much the real cost of computerising a lot of this down to the nth degree is going to cost us in the long run ( to remove people ), relative to the returns ( other than a bit of convenience in paying a bill )

Andrew

[The_bluester (Paul)]

Originally Posted by AndrewJ

Gday Paul


Well we used to have it, and it worked.
Part of me also thinks that having that critical mass of skilled workers also allowed the system to take on and train apprentices in a coherent manner. No 457 visas reqd.

Also, I didn't note my bills dropping as a result of privatisation.
I suspect that what has happened is that substantially more money is now being spent on management structures, IT and marketing depts and profit margins, so the end cost to the user is still high, but the grunts at the coalface are reduced accordingly.
In fact, I always wonder how much the real cost of computerising a lot of this down to the nth degree is going to cost us in the long run ( to remove people ), relative to the returns ( other than a bit of convenience in paying a bill )

Andrew

I actually work for a distribution business, though in a non power related area. I would agree that power bills never fell as a result of privatisation. If they have risen more than they otherwise would have, I can't answer that.

I do know that there are a hell of a lot of OH&S requirements now that never existed before privatization and they skew the issue. Many many jobs are now done in bucket trucks which a decade ago would be a man with a ladder, it basically means that "They used to do it before" is not really an argument that holds as much water is it once would have. The costs of doing what used to be done have risen significantly.

[AndrewJ]

Gday Paul

I agree that OH@S has put up the costs, but when i saw them washing insulators etc in those days, it was always in a bucket truck.
Mind you, the bloke normally stayed in the bucket at height as it went down the road and used to swing it sideways a bit whilst moving if reqd to avoid the trees

Andrew

[Allan_L (Allan)]

Upon regionalisation (dividing the stations etc into self managed units in preparation for privatisation), a local power station went from 1,200 employees to 400 overnight.

When I enquired as to how this could be possible, I was told that the local power station was considered an adjunct to the local CES. So rather than pay someone to be unemployed at home, they paid them to push a broom (etc) around a power station. That kept dole payments down and employment up. Not to mention maintenance was always spot on (if not overkill).

Now we have profitable Public Trading Enterprises, that look more attractive to a potential private buyer, higher power bills, and higher unemployment. And until sold, sending higher dividend and tax payments to the Government (shareholder). And, some would say, less maintenance to vital infrastructure assets.

I know what I would have preferred.

Re: OHS: YES, The safety of staff used to be a joke, now it is paramount.
This is a winner for all. Dads get to go home. Workers compensation suits are minimised.

[casstony]

Originally Posted by Allan_L

Upon regionalisation (dividing the stations etc into self managed units in preparation for privatisation), a local power station went from 1,200 employees to 400 overnight.

When I enquired as to how this could be possible, I was told that the local power station was considered an adjunct to the local CES. So rather than pay someone to be unemployed at home, they paid them to push a broom (etc) around a power station. That kept dole payments down and employment up. Not to mention maintenance was always spot on (if not overkill)..

I worked in Victorian power stations for 20 years right through the privatization process and what you outlined is not too far from the truth, but it wasn't just excess people pushing brooms. The power stations were a training ground for a variety of skilled jobs and once trained people could move on to other employers (who aren't prepared to train) with their trade or engineering certificate.

Employee numbers were also reduced by contracting out work that was formerly done by power station employees.

The government owned SEC was more socially responsible and the system could be run more efficiently as a whole entity than as competing businesses. (eg. boiler/turbine/generator units could be shut down for maintenance without penalty with the slack being taken up at other power stations).

[The_bluester (Paul)]

Originally Posted by Allan_L

Re: OHS: YES, The safety of staff used to be a joke, now it is paramount.
This is a winner for all. Dads get to go home. Workers compensation suits are minimised.

And that is the statement of the day. I may be a non power worker but I am an ex technician and systems I maintained operated at high voltages (60 to 80KV) so I have a good understanding of the risks involved in the work. About as good as a non power line worker could have. The OH&S push is unarguable and even from the consumer side of things I don't argue with any cost related to that.

[Hagar (Doug)]

Hi Paul. I've worked in the electricity industry in Victoria for 40+ years and have actually noticed a reduction in OH&S since the privatisation process if anything. My career has been to say the least quite varied extending from Electrician through to Shift Manager of about 30 Power stations and trading wholesale electricity. The old SEC were very pro active when it came to safety even to the extreme. They ran a very good system of investigation and examination then a very proactive approach to ensuring it never happened again. The Old SECV had procedures by the score and all were the result of some form of investigation but with privatisation electrical safety was reduced to the lowest common point which was the old Victorian Blue Book. It was the minimum standard and still forms the basis of OHS in electricity sector. I do think the reduction in staffing, the need to train staff quickly and get staff authorised is almost putting the horse before the cart. I spent much of my career training and authorising High Voltage Operators and ensuring that the procedures were in place and correct for the work to be done.

I have now retired but still do a little consulting work and still think the dollar is the main concern with senior management and safety is becoming much more a shop floor responsibility.

The electricity industry is heavily regulated and as such it is still one of the safer industries to work in but I do fear we are letting to much slip by to the keeper.

Good description of the Electricity Market Allan. Voll is now $12500 / MWHr.

NT is not involved in the National Market at this stage either. I would hate to work at AEMO and manage the system these days with Wind Farms and domestic Solar to contend with while still maintaining a spinning reserve at a cost we can afford. I know a few of the system engineers and they have some horrific days at work.