Regional Outlook — VIC1: Friday 22 May 2026

The Victoria spot price sits at $47.93/MWh as of 06:30 AEST, with total demand at 5,007 MW — well below the morning peak of around 7,200 MW that cleared at prices above $150/MWh between 17:00 and 18:00 AEST. The 24-hour price profile shows the familiar winter weekday shape: a sharp morning ramp from near-zero and negative prices (touching -$1.51/MWh at 14:20 AEST) through a sustained peak corridor of $110–$160/MWh during the 06:30–09:00 AEST window, before a sustained step-down through the afternoon and evening back to moderate levels. The current $47.93/MWh reflects typical Saturday evening off-peak conditions.

The generation mix at the most recent trading interval (06:00 AEST) shows brown coal contributing 4,386 MW, wind at 1,664 MW, hydro at 0.52 MW, and battery dispatch at 0.80 MW. Gas (both OCGT and CCGT) and solar are producing zero MW — consistent with winter overnight conditions where solar is unavailable and gas is not required for peaking. Renewable penetration sits at 27.52% per the latest carbon intensity reading, a material improvement from the trough of 8.09% recorded during the morning peak around 16:30–17:30 AEST, when wind output was lower relative to elevated brown coal dispatch. Carbon intensity is currently 0.8843 tCO2/MWh, down from the intraday high of 1.0977 tCO2/MWh at 16:00 AEST. The downward carbon trend through the afternoon and evening tracks the rising renewable share as demand falls and wind output holds steady.

Predispatch forecasts for the 07:00 AEST (21:00 UTC) interval are clustering in the $55–$69/MWh range, with the most recent run (06:01 AEST) showing $55.09/MWh. The 07:30 AEST (21:30 UTC) interval is forecast slightly higher at $72–$82/MWh across successive runs, suggesting a modest ramp as Saturday evening demand lifts from the current trough. The forward window from 08:00 AEST onwards shows forecasts softening back toward the $35–$42/MWh band through the overnight period, consistent with low weekend overnight demand. Load window modelling confirms excellent-quality dispatch opportunities overnight between 08:30 AEST and 13:00 AEST (23:30–03:00 UTC), with multiple intervals forecast at floor-level prices of $10.50/MWh or below.

Two market notices are relevant to Victorian operations today. Notice 144122 (issued 20 May, still active) flags a planned outage of the South Morang F2 500/330 kV transformer rescheduled to conclude at 17:00 AEST today, with constraint set V-SMTX_F_R invoked across interconnectors including VIC1-NSW1 and V-SA. Traders should confirm whether that constraint set has been revoked on schedule. Additionally, a AEMO market systems notice (CHG0110834) flags planned maintenance to Cisco ISE servers with an outage window of 10:00–17:00 AEST today; SSL