Commodity Demand — SA1: Wednesday 13 May 2026

South Australia's spot price sits at $84.61/MWh at 06:35 AEST with demand at 1,394 MW and rising. That combination marks the beginning of the morning demand build, with the price trajectory tracking demand closely — the region moved from a trough of around 711 MW and sub-$15/MWh pricing in the early hours through to current levels as the morning ramp gathered pace. The demand-price relationship through this morning's build has been tight: each step up in load from roughly 06:30 AEST has corresponded with a step up in price, with the 06:30–07:30 AEST window seeing demand lift from ~1,115 MW to over 1,550 MW and prices moving from $70–$88/MWh through to the $100–$102/MWh range at peak morning demand. Today's earlier overnight trough saw price volatility despite low absolute demand, with a spike to $227/MWh at around 09:40 AEST UTC+10 — a characteristic of SA's thin overnight liquidity where small imbalances produce outsized price movements.

The generation mix is supporting current prices at the $84.61/MWh level: wind is producing 1,068 MW, gas OCGT 188 MW, gas CCGT 62 MW, and battery 8 MW, with solar contributing zero at this hour. The grid stress score of 89.6 reflects tightening conditions as evening demand approaches. Carbon intensity stands at 0.1152 tCO2/MWh with renewable penetration at 81.13%, a marked improvement from the 0.27 tCO2/MWh recorded during this morning's early business-hours ramp when gas dispatch was heavier relative to wind.

Forecast pricing for the 07:00 AEST (21:00 UTC) interval is converging around $85–$86/MWh, with the 07:30 AEST interval forecast at $89–$90/MWh — consistent with the pattern of demand continuing to build into the evening peak. Based on today's trajectory, demand is likely to approach or exceed 1,600–1,700 MW in the 17:00–19:30 AEST window (equivalent to the 07:00–09:30 UTC block), which is where earlier today's price history showed sustained $81–$101/MWh conditions. The absence of solar generation from here and mild heating demand (2.5 heating degree units at 15.5°C) points to steady residential and commercial gas-substitution load through the evening.

One infrastructure note with direct demand implications: AEMO's market notice confirms the Tailem Bend – South East No.1 275 kV line completed a planned outage and returned to service at 15:20 AEST, with constraint sets S-X_TBSE+BDBU and S-BC_CP revoked. That line's availability restores full interconnector capacity between SA and Victoria, which reduces the likelihood of price separation events during tonight's evening peak. Flex load operators and battery optimisers should note that the overnight window from approximately 08:30–11:30 AEST (22:30–01:30 UTC) is forecast at $23–$51/MWh — a substantial discount to current and expected peak pricing — making that window the primary arbitrage and demand-shift target for today.