Today’s LiveWire Spotlight evaluates the the findings of the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO) investigating the 8+ hour loss of electrical service affecting 850,000 customers in South Australia last September. They concluded that an ongoing large-scale transition from fossil-fuel to wind-powered generation changed the system dynamic in ways that were not fully understood.
NERC is reviewing the lessons learned from the South Australia outage to determine if an Alert on the topic should be issued. Preliminary indications are that the same scenario could occur in Regions with heavy concentrations of renewables.