Rising Power bills in Australia

Hugh Saddler writes an article I put in Around the Traps on Friday entitled rising-power-bills-signal-the-end-of-an-era-for-australias-electricity-grid.

I merely note his last comments.

"For most of this period, average wholesale prices in this oversupplied market have been well below the cost of new power stations. They are now expected to move gradually up towards that replacement cost level, when it will be economic to add more power stations to the market.

It is ironic that conservative voices who blame the RET for forcing coal-fired power stations to close are often the same voices who claim that higher electricity prices are forcing businesses to close and contributing to the cessation of demand growth.

If they had their way and there was no wind generation, and the Kurri Kurri and Point Henry aluminium smelters had not closed, then demand would have outstripped supply some years ago.

This would allow higher-cost power stations to be competitive, and wholesale prices would have already been at or above the levels projected by the AEMC in this report.

And what would have been the lowest-cost generation technology available (which hasn’t been competitive in the over-supplied market until now)? Based on the most recent data, probably wind."