This report is a summary of the presentation and key points from the Webinar held on Wednesday 17 June 2020.
Report extract
Sharing knowledge effectively to fast track industry development is central to ARENA’s mandate. Guided by this, we held a webinar to share lessons learned from the unplanned islanding of South Australia and part of Victoria’s electricity grid in January and February 2020.
To summarise the islanding event:
- On 31 January 2020 the South Australian (SA) grid was separated from the Victorian grid when extreme weather resulted in a convective downburst which caused the collapse of a number of steel transmission towers on the Moorabool – Mortlake and Moorabool – Haunted Gully 500 kV lines.
- Immediately after the incident the Mortlake Power Station generating units and the Alcoa Portland aluminium smelter remained connected to the South Australia region but disconnected from the rest of Victoria.
- The islanding event lasted 17 days and a combination of factors kept the SA grid stable throughout the period.
ARENA would like to thank the presenters and panelists for sharing valuable insights, and the audience for their enthusiastic participation.