Australian Daily Wind Power Generation Data – Sunday 21 February 2021 – Plus Weekly Update

Posted on Mon 02/22/2021 by

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By Anton Lang ~

This Post details the daily wind power generation data for the AEMO coverage area in Australia. For the background information, refer to the Introductory Post at this link.

Each image is shown here at a smaller size to fit on the page alongside the data for that day. If you click on each image, it will open on a new page and at a larger size so you can better see the detail.

Note also that on some days, there will be a scale change for the main wind power image, and that even though images may look similar in shape for the power generation black line on the graph when compared to other days, that scale (the total power shown on the left hand vertical axis) has been changed to show the graph at a larger size to better fit the image for that graph.

Sunday 21 February 2021

Total Wind Power Generation

This image shows the total power generated across the whole day by every wind plant in this vast AEMO coverage area for Australia.

The total Nameplate for all these wind plants changes as each new wind plant comes on line delivering power to the grid. That current Nameplate is 8132MW, and this is from the current total of 67 wind plants.

Note that the shape of this wind power load curve does not follow the shape of the main load curve for total power generation, and that is seen in the image below, the solid black line across the top of the image for that graph. Wind power generates its power only when the wind is blowing, hence it does not follow the actual power generation Load Curve, which is also the the exact same shaped curve as for actual power consumption.

For this data, I have added the times for the daily minimum, and the daily maximum, to show how they do not correlate with the actual times of minimum power consumption (around 4AM each day) and maximum power consumption, the evening Peak. (at around 6.40PM in Winter and earlier during the Summer Months.)

Daily Minimum – 780MW (9.10AM)

Daily Maximum – 2918MW (6.10PM)

Average Wind Generation – 1591MW

Total Generated Power – 38.18GWH

Percentage Supplied By Wind Power At The Low Point For The Day – 3.3%

Percentage Supplied By Wind Power At Peak Power For The Day – 1876MW of 26600MW – 3.45PM – 7.05%

Average Percentage Of Overall Total Power Generation – 7.0%

Daily Operational Capacity Factor – 19.56%

Wind Power Generation Versus Total Power Generation

This image shows the total power generated from all the wind plants in this AEMO coverage area, and compares it to the overall total generated power from every source of power generation, which is the black line at the top of the graph. Wind power is the green coloured area, along the bottom of this graph.

While the green colour in this image looks to be a different shape to the graph above, keep in mind here that the scale is completely different, and that green coloured Wind total is the same as for the image shown above, only with the scale changed so it can fit onto the graph.

Notes

  1. Finding Wind Power Average – On the graph, there are 25 hourly time points, starting with midnight and finishing with midnight. I have added the total at each of those hourly time points together, and divided the resultant total by 25 to give an average in MegaWatts. (MW)
  2. For total power in GWH, multiply the average daily power by 24, and then divide by 1000.
  3. For the Capacity Factor, that is calculated by dividing the average wind generation by the current Nameplate and then multiplying that by 100 to give a percentage.

Weekly UPDATE

Generated wind power total as a Percentage of overall total generated power from every source for this last week – 10.2%

Generated wind power total as a Percentage of overall total generated power from every source for the last year (52 weeks) – 10.1%

Capacity Factor for wind power generation for the last week (7 days) – 30.37%

Capacity Factor for wind power generation for the last year (52 weeks) – 29.84%

Capacity Factor for wind power generation for the longer term (125 weeks) – 29.85%

Comments For This Day

Wind generation was a little higher than it was on the day before, mainly thanks to it going high later in the evening as overall power consumption fell away for the day. As it was, wind generation averaged a little under 1000MW right up until 1PM, so it was really low when needed the most. That average of 1591MW gave wind generation a daily operational Capacity Factor of 19.6%, ten percent lower than the year round average. Note that, now as usual, wind was around its low for the day as overall power consumption was rising to its peak for the day, and at that low point, wind generation was only delivering 3.3% of all the generated power.

When it came to the weekly Update, you would think that with two days of really high generation for wind, then that would give us a higher than usual weekly average, but the operational Capacity Factor for the week was just 30.4%, barely half of one percent higher than the year round average. And when that was factored into the long term average for that Capacity Factor, there was barely the slightest change at all, but one thing has happened is that both long term averages are now almost identical, and there has been a gap between these two sometimes as high as one full percent, so they are now pretty much stable.

What is really interesting here is that nearly every wind plant always quotes a Capacity Factor figure of 38% when the plant is opened up for delivery of power after the construction, and that is the original ‘modelled’ figure from more than a decade ago, and after so many years of doing all this wind generation research, now more than thirteen years, at no stage has the Capacity Figure ever approached that figure of 38%, and what I have of around 30%, that figure is virtually the same for the best places all over the World. In fact, 30% is at the top ebd of that Capacity Figure.

The sole purpose of actually beginning this research of daily recording of wind data, now well more than two years along, was to definitively work out that Capacity Factor, because for so long, I just used the figure of 30%, and when everyone else told me I was quoting it as too low, it has now proved to be completely accurate.

*****

Anton Lang uses the screen name of TonyfromOz, and he writes at this site, PA Pundits International on topics related to electrical power generation, from all sources, concentrating mainly on Renewable Power, and how the two most favoured methods of renewable power generation, Wind Power and all versions of Solar Power, fail comprehensively to deliver levels of power required to replace traditional power generation. His Bio is at this link.

OzWindPowerGenerationTFO

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Posted in: Australia, Climate Change, Electrical Power Generation, Renewable Energy, Wind Power