Draft 2020 Integrated System Plan

PIAC responded to the Australian Energy Market Operator’s (AEMO) consultation on the draft 2020 Integrated System Plan (ISP).

PIAC strongly supports the 2020 ISP and future ISPs including a managed trajectory of accelerated emissions reductions as a factor in its consideration of optimal development paths. PIAC highlights that consumers will be vulnerable to avoidable cost increases if the ISP does not economically optimise growth in renewable generation with firming and balancing sources and demand response.

PIAC recommends AEMO consider certain factors, including the increased proportion of DER and the decreased availability of large, thermal generation during extreme weather in developing its final ISP.

We note AEMO used a different approach to last year’s ISP to determine the optimal development path. We request further discussion of the new approach – called a least-regrets framework – for developing the optimal development path, including whether the new approach would have produced a different optimal path.