APA Group’s Rob Wheals says the present upheaval provides a chance for Australia to plan for when even more coal-fired generation is removed from our energy mix.
There’s just a hint of wearied frustration in the voice of APA Group chief executive Rob Wheals.sees a mess that has been years in the making
“We’ve actually got a bit of a window into what our electricity market looks like without a third of capacity during the winter. That’s exactly what we’ve got right now – and we’ve seen the mess.”The 30 per cent reduction in coal-fired power generation that has been caused by a combination of plant outages and coal supply disruptions isn’t a one-off, Wheals says, but a preview of a future where, in 15 years or less, we need coal removed from the energy mix.
“If we don’t have a plan, we’ll have supply shocks, price shocks, and then we’ll lose the mandate for this transition that we’re all very much focused on achieving.”Wheals is talking his own book here – it’s in his interests to keep gas flowing for as long as possible. “Twice as much energy was moving through the gas system as through the electricity system – twice as much. And yet you’ve got governments that are not being supportive of developing new gas reserves,” Wheals says.
In the very near term, APA has also ramped up production from its Orbost Gas Processing Plant, which processes gas from Cooper Energy’s nearby Sole field, off the coast of Victoria. While the plant continues to struggle to operate at nameplate capacity, gas processing leapt 36 per cent from April to May.
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