Commodity Demand — QLD1: Friday 5 June 2026

Queensland spot price sits at $84.50/MWh with demand at 6,176 MW at 6:25 AEST this Saturday morning. That price level is consistent with the moderate demand ramp that tracks the winter morning load build, which earlier today ran from an overnight trough of around 4,000 MW — reached near 2:00 AEST — up through the 6,000 MW threshold around 5:40 AEST when price sharply stepped from near-zero to $50/MWh and above. The overnight trough period saw sustained negative and near-zero prices from roughly 2:30 to 5:30 AEST, reflecting supply surplus at low demand. The price-to-demand relationship is tracking tightly today: each 500–600 MW increment in demand as morning load built corresponded to a material price step-change, with the $80–90/MWh band solidifying once demand cleared 6,000 MW.

The demand profile shows a classic winter Saturday shape. The morning peak reached approximately 7,800 MW around 7:40–8:00 AEST at prices in the $85–91/MWh range, before demand eased through the mid-morning and midday period to the current 6,176 MW level. Demand is now rebuilding from the early-afternoon trough near 5,500–5,700 MW that occurred between roughly 14:00 and 17:30 AEST — a period characterised by prices in the $67–75/MWh band, indicating capacity was adequately available at suppressed afternoon demand. The ongoing morning ramp-back is pushing prices back toward the $84–85/MWh level consistent with recent forecasts for the 7:00 AEST dispatch period of $84.50–$85.40/MWh.

Forecast RRPs for the 7:00 and 7:30 AEST trading periods (21:00 and 21:30 UTC) sit at $84.50 and $85.40–$85.84/MWh respectively, signalling the market expects demand to hold in the 6,000–6,500 MW range without the supply tightness seen during the morning peak. Current weather conditions support this: temperature is 9.8°C with clear skies, producing a heating demand signal of 8.2 and no solar contribution at this hour. The load windows data indicates prices are expected to fall sharply from around 8:30 AEST to the near-zero and negative range from approximately 10:00 AEST through to 15:30 AEST as solar generation builds — consistent with today's forecast maximum solar potential of 25.2 — pushing demand netted of solar well below 5,000 MW and reprising the negative-price conditions seen in the early hours.

One active market notice warrants attention for demand-side participants: AEMO declared unit WOOLGSF1 non-conforming in the QLD region for two periods this morning (11:35–12:00 AEST, 7 MW deviation in the 12:15–13:40 AEST window). The constraint set NC-Q_WOOLGSF1 was invoked for both periods, which would have had a marginal influence on dispatch outcomes during the midday demand trough. No load shedding events or major network constraints are active in Queensland at this time. The overall demand outlook for today points to a narrow window of elevated pricing in the $80–90/MW