Commodity Demand — NSW1: Thursday 26 March 2026

NSW spot sits at **$87.43/MWh** with demand at **8,092 MW** as of 06:30 AEST — well into the evening ramp and tracking the textbook late-autumn demand recovery pattern seen across today's data. The day's floor came during the solar-supported midday period, with demand troughing near 6,350–6,400 MW between 02:00–04:00 AEST (16:00–18:00 UTC) and prices compressing to the high $30s. The morning peak reached 9,784 MW at approximately 17:50 AEST, where prices touched $106/MWh, illustrating the 16–17% demand swing that drove a near-trebling of the spot price from its midday lows.

The price-to-demand relationship today has been tight and predictable: below 7,000 MW, prices hold in the $37–$65/MWh band anchored by black coal's marginal cost; above 8,500 MW, the stack steepens sharply with prices repeatedly breaching $100–$143/MWh as peaking plant is called. The current 8,092 MW reading sits in an intermediate zone where price is responsive to small demand shifts — the $79–$98/MWh readings between 06:10–06:20 AEST confirm that. Generation is dominated by black coal at 5,772 MW, with wind contributing 325 MW and solar a residual 148 MW in this evening window. Renewable penetration is just 7.59% at present, leaving the marginal price firmly coal-determined.

Forward forecasts peg the next interval target at **$65.51/MWh**, implying AEMO expects demand to ease from the current level as the evening ramp plateaus. Load window analysis confirms the post-midnight period (09:00–10:00 AEST) as today's optimal demand window, with forecast prices dropping to the low single digits — as cheap as $3.49–$6.08/MWh — consistent with the overnight valley seen in last night's data where prices fell to $22.20/MWh. The Friday demand profile supports this: being end-of-week, commercial load drops away faster than on weekdays, and there is no meaningful heating-driven residential spike with the current 13.5°C temperature and zero cooling demand.

One demand-side network factor worth noting: the Bannaby–Mt Piper 500 kV N-2 contingency invoked at 11:54 AEST due to lightning constrained the NSW1-QLD1 and VIC1-NSW1 interconnectors for several hours before being cancelled at 17:59 AEST. That constraint would have reduced NSW's import headroom during the morning peak, putting additional marginal pressure on local plant and contributing to the $100+ price spikes observed between 14:20–15:55 AEST (04:20–05:55 UTC). With that constraint cleared, interconnector capacity is fully available for the remainder of the day, providing a modest price buffer if demand surprises to the upside tonight.