Interconnector Watch

The most significant dynamic at 06:30 AEST is NSW1-QLD1 (QNI) binding hard at its import limit of -564.25 MW — meaning Queensland is exporting at full constrained capacity into New South Wales. This is the only binding interconnector on the NEM right now, and it is creating a clear price wedge: Queensland sits at $57.53/MWh while NSW clears at $65.51/MWh, an $8/MWh spread that reflects the constraint preventing further cheap Queensland generation from entering NSW and equalising prices. No active constraint notices are published against this limit, but the binding status is unambiguous in the data.

On the southern interconnectors, Heywood (V-SA) carries 277.53 MW from Victoria into South Australia against an export limit of 533.36 MW — roughly 52% utilised with comfortable headroom. Victoria clears at $60.06/MWh and SA at $63.33/MWh; the $3.27/MWh spread is consistent with transmission losses and moderate but non-binding utilisation. Murraylink (V-S-MNSP1) adds a further 27 MW westward into SA, sitting at just 28% of its 98 MW export capacity. Both SA links are well within limits and not shaping prices materially beyond the loss-adjusted differential.

Basslink (T-V-MNSP1) is at zero flow, contributing nothing to the Tasmania–Victoria exchange despite Tasmania carrying the highest regional price on the NEM at $96.24/MWh against Victoria's $60.06/MWh — a $36/MWh spread that would ordinarily incentivise southbound export. Whether this reflects a planned outage, a unit constraint, or a dispatch decision is not indicated in the current data, but the flat Basslink flow against that price divergence is the standout anomaly this morning. VIC1-NSW1 (the VIC-NSW interconnector) flows 303.52 MW northward from Victoria into NSW at roughly 41% of its 743.75 MW export capacity, providing a secondary southerly supply source into the constrained NSW market alongside the capped QNI flow.