There is no relief in the face of Australia’s energy crisis, as the country’s largest energy producer has revealed that several of its coal-fired power units will be out of production for a while.
Key points:
- AGL has revealed that a Victorian coal generator will be out of operation for an additional two months
- About a quarter of the country’s coal-fired power plants are offline amid a cold season
- This week a crisis meeting of energy ministers met to speed up the transition to renewables
AGL Energy Limited confirmed today that its Loy Yang A 2 unit in Victoria’s Latrobe Valley, which was disconnected in April, will not be repaired until “the second half of September”.
The company blamed “global supply chain problems and the availability of specialized materials” for the extension of the outage.
The AGL statement said the unit initially broke down after a power failure in the generator, but now the generator rotor has failed by extending the repair time by at least two months.
Nearly a quarter of Australia’s coal energy capacity is offline, which includes about half of AGL’s coal units in Victoria and New South Wales, just as a cold pot hits the east coast.
The interruptions that contribute to the crisis
Three units of the AGL Bayswater Power Plant in Hunter Valley are also out of production. (Getty Images)
At its Bayswater plant in Hunter Valley, New South Wales, AGL confirmed that two units have been disconnected to troubleshoot, while another remains out due to scheduled maintenance and will be reconnected in July.
A company spokesman said Bayswater Unit 2 was shut down on Wednesday “to repair a pipe leak and is expected to be out of service for up to 10 days”.
“Yesterday, a maintenance problem in the ash conveyor of the Bayswater Unit 4 boiler forced the unit to be taken out of service for a few days,” the company said.
Energy and Climate Change Minister Chris Bowen has called a meeting this week to discuss the energy crisis. (ABC News)
Consumers have been hit by higher electricity prices and gas shortages, and the new Labor government has convened a meeting of state and federal energy ministers this week to discuss the issue.
This meeting led to a plan to safeguard the system and will also give the market operator more responsibility for supply.
And news of outages comes when Snowy Hydro’s new development has been hit by construction delays, meaning it won’t produce electricity until the end of the decade.
“The most unreliable power plant”
Australian Institute of Climate and Energy program director Richie Merzian said he was not surprised that Loy Yang A’s disruption was being extended.
He described the plant as “the most unreliable plant in the entire network” and said AGL should do more to phase out its coal-fired power generation and switch to renewables.
“Coal-fired power plants break down regularly. We know this causes prices to rise,” he said.
“This has hurt people, especially Victoria, who has suffered a cold and everyone has relied on her warmth to keep her warm.”
Greenpeace spokesman Glenn Walker said Australia’s transition to renewables needs to be accelerated.
“Well, let no one ever say again that coal is reliable,” he said.
“The sooner we get clean, cheap and renewable energy in the battery-powered system, the better it will be for the climate, the better it will be for Australian households.”
Merzian said he was encouraging this week’s meeting of energy ministers also resolved to speed up the transition to net zero carbon emissions.
“They agreed to return in July and study a plan on how to decarbonise the electricity sector,” he said.
“So finally, for the first time, we’re going to have that kind of thinking [to] Make sure there are the right people in the room and we support the communities during this trip. “
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