Commodity Demand — VIC1: Friday 4 September 2026
Victoria's spot price sits at -$5.09/MWh at 06:25 AEST with demand at 4,547 MW, extending a run of negative pricing that has held for most of the past four hours. Wind is generating 3,264 MW against brown coal's 2,790 MW, pushing renewable penetration to 53.95% and carbon intensity down to 0.562 tCO2/MWh — this oversupply relative to overnight/early morning demand is the direct driver of sub-zero prices, with the market unable to absorb available wind output at these low load levels.
The demand-price relationship overnight has been pronounced: as demand fell from 6,900 MW around 07:35 (03 Sep evening peak, AEST) to below 4,200 MW through the 12:00-14:00 AEST window, prices collapsed from the $80-250/MWh range down to consistently negative territory, frequently between -$5 and -$60/MWh. Demand troughed near 4,150-4,250 MW in the small hours, and price responded almost linearly — every ~500 MW of demand decline has been shaving $30-50/MWh off spot price in this low-demand regime, reflecting thin marginal supply stacks when brown coal is backed off and wind is plentiful.
AEMO's forecast trajectory points to further price softening through today's early hours before a modest recovery: forecast RRP bottoms out around -$50/MWh near 14:30 AEST before climbing back to $8-11/MWh by 03:30-04:00 AEST tomorrow as demand rebuilds toward the next evening peak. Identified low-load windows between 11:00-15:00 AEST show sustained negative pricing (-$22 to -$43/MWh), consistent with the low-demand, high-wind pattern persisting through the day — weather data confirms wind potential easing to 17.7% by tomorrow with cloud cover at 58%, suggesting today's negative pricing window may not extend as deep as the current overnight trough once demand climbs into the day.
On the demand side, no load-shedding directions or demand-response events are active in Victoria. The only notable operational item is AEMO's cancellation of a reclassified contingency event on the Yallourn-Rowville 220 kV lines (lightning-related, resolved 06:09 AEST), which had briefly elevated network risk but carries no demand-side implication. A non-conformance notice against GPWFWST1 (12 MW, 15:45-17:55 AEST yesterday) is historical and not affecting today's supply-demand balance.