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Generators Data

The data we have on electricity generating infrastructure in Australia derives from the Australian Government DEWHA (Geoscience Australia) website (see links below). We convert the downloaded CSV files into an easily readable text format, bringing across only the fields of interest, and standardising the Total Capacity values into whole numbers of MW. These data were downloaded and processed on the 28th June 2010.

Note that the 'fossil' listings are only for plant of 20 MW and greater, while there appears to be no such limit on renewables; we apply a lower cutoff of 500 kW to the renewables (which rounds to 1 MW). Note also that the "operating" category encompasses some plant that is "under construction".

The base data files (CSV format) are given here in this 120 kB zip file; they were dowloaded on the 28th June 2010 from:
http://www.ga.gov.au/fossil_fuel/gmaps/operating.html
http://www.ga.gov.au/fossil_fuel/gmaps/proposed.html
http://www.ga.gov.au/renewable/gmaps/operating.html
http://www.ga.gov.au/renewable/gmaps/proposed.html

The Operating Plant from the above lists can be viewed graphically here on The OzEA Map.


Data Summary and Characterisation

Following tables give a summary of generating capacity by state and type (coal, gas, hydro and wind) -- operating and proposed. 

    Operational Capacity (MW) by State		       Proposed Capacity (MW) by State		   		
    	    Coal    Gas     Hydro   Wind		       Coal    Gas     Hydro Wind 
    VIC     6661    2961    708     450 	       VIC     3320    1870    102     4664
    NSW     11730   1946    4277    149 	       NSW     6532    5429    54      3392
    TAS     -	    555     2284    144 	       TAS     -       40      1       321
    QLD     8988    3071    659     13  	       QLD     6695    5816    30      1140
    WA      2565    4532    32      203 	       WA      2200    5343    32      1620
    ACT     -	    -	    1	    -		       ACT     -       400     5       -
    SA      878     2797    4	    1039	       SA      2050    1600    -       3218
    NT      -	    700     -	    0		       NT      -       1865    -       -
    Total   30822   16561   7965    1997	       Total   20797   22363   224     14355

And corresponding commission date for this infrastructure: 

	
    Operational Capacity (MW) by Year
    		    Coal    Gas     Hydro   Wind
    1920-1940	    -	    -	    143     -
    1940-1960	    268     -	    1115    -
    1960-1980	    13518   3045    5051    0.2
    1980-2000	    13601   3544    1413    22
    >2000	    3435    9635    205     1975
    Unknown 	    -	    337     38      0.4
    Total Opp	    30822   16561   7965    1997
    Proposed	    20797   22363   224     14355

Also, the 'under construction' capacity: 

    Under construction
                    % of current 
            MW      operational total
-------------------------------------
    Coal	950	    3.1%
    Gas	       4565	   27.6%
    Hydro	146	    1.8%
    Wind	294	   14.7%

Also of particular interest is the installed capacity of wind farms, and for South Australia in particular. The 'operating_renewables' data above was interrogated to give the following: 

                             SA wind farms -- installed capacity

Year            2003    2004    2005    2006    2007    2008    2009    2010
Installed MW      34      80     318     388     581     740     811     811

Following are some comments and observations on the individual generator groupings. We still have lots of questions to follow up, and will appreciate your comments and contributions.

Coal

Coal breaks down into Black, Black/Gas combined, and Brown.

Black Coal: Of the coal stations in Australia, 28 are powered by black coal with a combined total of 23.2 GW. There are a further 17 GWs proposed for installation.

Black Coal/Gas: Australia currently harbors 2 black coal/Gas hybrid with 1 GW of installed capacity.

Brown Coal: There is an operational capacity 6.6 GW of brown coal in Australia, which is exclusively burnt in Victoria. There are a further 3.8 GWs mostly planned for Victoria, with a 300 MW plant planned for SA and 500 MW planed for WA.

Gas

Gas is burnt in various ways to make electricity; in particular open and combined cycle turbines (we will have some description of these shortly). Australia has a overall total of 16 GW of operational gas fired power, with a further 22.3 GW planned. Of the current installed gas fired power 62% has been implemented from the year 2000.

Hydro

In Australia we have very close to 8GW of Hydro power (if it all ran at the same time), with another 220 MW proposed, according to this data. What we have not so far ascertained is the total hydro storage (i.e. total GWh; i.e. 8 GW is great, but how long does it go for?)

In terms of Pumped Storage Hydro (PSH), we are grateful to Peter Lang (see first comment below) for sharing his expertise in this area. In short, Australia has around 20 GWh total of PSH capacity and can add around ~2 GW of power into the grid. Up to 5 GWh can be stored per day.

Australian PSH infrastructure consists of the following:

    Station (year commissioned)     Rated Power     Capacity  
    Tumut Three     (1973)  	    1,500 MW	    10,295 MWh
    Wivenhoe	    (1984)  	     ~500 MW	     5,200 MWh
    Kangaroo Valley (1977)	      160 MW	       ?      
    Bendeela	    (1977)  	       80 MW	       ?

The ~2 GW of PSH is around one quarter of the Hydro power total.

Wind

2000 MW of wind power currently installed in Australia. Of this, SA has 1040 MW (over 50%). There are further proposed Wind Farms to a national total of 14.4GW, but it is not clear from the data what proposals have been approved.

Other Commenmts

Data includes generator location in latitude and longitude to three decimal places. The location of the power station is not accurate and locations may be around 10 km from the actual site.


DISCUSSION: (on the generators data)

2

OzEA_DG0002

Peter Lang
Subject: Australia's Pumped-hydro energy storage capacity
Date: 2010-05-22 (at 17:24:07)

Australia's Pumped Hydro Energy Storage Capacity


What is the total energy storage capacity (in GWh) of Australia's existing Pumped-Hydro facilities?

The short answer is roughly 5 GWh can be stored per day and 20 GWh total.

Points to note:
1. The energy storage capacity is determined by:


2. Australia's pumped hydro storage facilities are designed to be powered by reliable constant power as is provided by base-load power stations. The existing pumped hydro storage facilities are not suitable as energy storage facilities for intermittent renewable energy generators.

I do not have the detailed engineering data needed to accurately calculate the energy storage capacity of the two smaller pumped hydro facilities. However, I'll show here how I derived the total figure provided above.

Wivenhoe

Wivenhoe is Australia's only 'pure' pumped hydro facility.
Power: 500 MW nominal rated power, 625 MW maximum
Average daily operating hours:
     pumping = 5 h/d
     generating = 7 h/d
     standby and spinning reserve = 12 h/d

Energy stored per day in average pumping hours: 1,640 MWh
Total energy storage capacity in upper (smaller) reservoir: 5,171 MWh

Tumut 3

Tumut 3 is mainly a run-of-river hydro scheme with some pumping capacity. The generating capacity is 1,500 MW from six turbines. There are three pumps with a total pumping capacity of 297 m3/s

The lower reservoir is the smaller. It would fill from empty in 6.8 hours if the Tumut 3 power stations was generating at full power (1,500MW). After that time the water would spill over the spillway and could not be pumped back up. It would be lost from the energy storage system. It would take the pumps 26 hours to empty the lower reservoir (by pumping the water up to the upper reservoir).

Energy stored per day in 6 h of pumping: 2,378 MWh
Total energy storage capacity in lower (smaller) reservoir: 10,295 MWh

Kangaroo Valley and Bendeela

The rated generating capacity of Kangaroo Valley is 160MW and Bendeela is 80 MW. I do not have access to the engineering data for these to facilities so I make the assumption that the ratio of pumping capacity to generating capacity is the same as for Wivenhoe, i.e. 66%. On that basis, the energy stored per 6 hour day is: Kangaroo = 630 MWh and Bendeela = 315 MWh.

Total Energy Storage Capacity

The estimate total energy storage capacity per 6 hour day is:
     Wivenhoe = 1,968 MWh (1,640 MWh for 5 h average pumping per day)
     Tumut 3 = 2,378 MWh
     Kangaroo Valley = 630 MWh
     Bundeela = 315 MWh
     Total = 5,290 MWh

The estimate total energy storage capacity of the smaller reservoir is:
     Wivenhoe = 5,171 MWh
     Tumut 3 = 10,295 MWh
     Kangaroo Valley = ?? MWh
     Bundeela = ?? MWh
     Total = 15,466 MWh + guess for 5,000 MWh = say 20,000 MWh

References

1. Engineering Features of the Snowy Mountains Scheme, 2nd Edition, 1982, ISBN 0 642 89182 6
2. http://www.tarongenergy.com.au/Portals/0/docs/factSheets/Factsheet%20-%20Wivenhoe%20Power%20Station%2024%20June%202008.pdf
3. http://www.sca.nsw.gov.au/dams-and-water/major-sca-dams/shoalhaven-system/hydro-electric-power-generation

4

OzEA_DG0004

Tom Stacy
Subject: can run of river during depletion count as storage?
Date: 2010-12-10 (at 04:24:58)

If the intended use of the term "storage" is intended to mean "maximum contribution of hydro (at smallest head)to the system for as long as possible", then you could count expected (or minimum historical) run of river (ROR) contribution for that maximum time hydro is producing at maximum (minimum head) capacity.

If ROR is already counted toward base load contribution, then this is not useful, but if the goal is to calculate how long hydro could contribute as its maximum (minimum head) generating capacity, then the ROR should be added in from the time the maximum generation begins, until the beginning of the (steep)decay to ROR.

This is a test post which does not necessitate a response. Thank you.

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