Regional Outlook — VIC1: Monday 31 August 2026
Victoria's spot price sits at $35.78/MWh as at 06:30 AEST, up from a flat, largely negative overnight trough but well below yesterday evening's peak of $124.92/MWh recorded around 17:30 AEST. The past 24 hours have swung from sub-zero pricing overnight (down to -$3.64/MWh around 13:35 AEST as wind generation and low demand pushed the market negative) through to a sharp morning ramp exceeding $115/MWh as demand climbed past 6,900 MW. Total demand currently reads 5,706 MW, mid-range relative to yesterday's peak near 7,006 MW.
Generation mix at the 20:00 UTC (06:00 AEST) interval shows wind leading at 3,253.62 MW, followed by brown coal at 3,005.88 MW, battery output at 55.99 MW, hydro at 39.2 MW, and gas OCGT contributing a marginal 0.4 MW. Solar is at zero, consistent with the pre-dawn interval. This gives a renewable penetration of 52.69% and carbon intensity of 0.5771 tCO2/MWh — a notable improvement on the 07:30 AEST reading of 0.9873 tCO2/MWh (15.34% renewables) seen yesterday, reflecting the diurnal pattern where wind generation has strengthened through the evening and overnight period.
Predispatch forecasts point to a volatile day ahead. Prices are expected to fall into negative territory from mid-morning, bottoming near -$41.17/MWh around 13:00 AEST as rooftop and grid solar ramp up under today's forecast 52% average cloud cover and 15.5% solar potential. Prices recover into the afternoon, with forecasts showing a climb to $59.75/MWh by 01:00 AEST tomorrow (evening peak) before easing into the 17:00-18:00 AEST window at $22.67-$35.94/MWh. Load-shifting windows flagged for tonight include the 01:00-02:30 AEST period (avg -$37.06/MWh, saving $145 vs peak) and 02:30-03:30 AEST (avg -$40.89/MWh) — both attractive for flexible load or battery charging.
No active market notices specifically affect VIC1 operations today beyond routine AEMO systems maintenance (MSATS outage 3-4 September, MarketNet VPN patching 3 September) which are national in scope. The most recent VIC-specific notice was a non-conformance declaration for NUMURSF1 (Numurkah Solar Farm) on 23 August, now resolved, and a since-cancelled contingency reclassification on the Eildon-Mt Beauty 220kV lines from 25 August due to lightning. No current SA-style minimum system load or intervention events are active in Victoria.