Estimated Energy Purchase Costs for Final Determination
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Estimated energy purchase costs for Final Determination (Draft) Estimated energy purchase costs for use by the Queensland Competition Authority in its Final Determination on retail electricity tariffs for 2012/13 Prepared for the Queensland Competition Authority May 2012 Reliance and Disclaimer The professional analysis and advice in this report has been prepared by ACIL Tasman for the exclusive use of the party or parties to whom it is addressed (the addressee) and for the purposes specified in it. This report is supplied in good faith and reflects the knowledge, expertise and experience of the consultants involved. The report must not be published, quoted or disseminated to any other party without ACIL Tasman’s prior written consent. ACIL Tasman accepts no responsibility whatsoever for any loss occasioned by any person acting or refraining from action as a result of reliance on the report, other than the addressee. In conducting the analysis in this report ACIL Tasman has endeavoured to use what it considers is the best information available at the date of publication, including information supplied by the addressee. Unless stated otherwise, ACIL Tasman does not warrant the accuracy of any forecast or prediction in the report. Although ACIL Tasman exercises reasonable care when making forecasts or predictions, factors in the process, such as future market behaviour, are inherently uncertain and cannot be forecast or predicted reliably. ACIL Tasman shall not be liable in respect of any claim arising out of the failure of a client investment to perform to the advantage of the client or to the advantage of the client to the degree suggested or assumed in any advice or forecast given by ACIL Tasman. ACIL Tasman Pty Ltd ABN 68 102 652 148 Internet www.aciltasman.com.au Melbourne (Head Office) Canberra Sydney Level 4, 114 William Street Level 1, 33 Ainslie Place PO Box 1554 Melbourne VIC 3000 Canberra City ACT 2600 Double Bay NSW 1360 Telephone (+61 3) 9604 4400 GPO Box 1322 Telephone (+61 2) 9389 7842 Facsimile (+61 3) 9604 4455 Canberra ACT 2601 Facsimile (+61 2) 8080 8142 Email [email protected] Telephone (+61 2) 6103 8200 Email [email protected] Facsimile (+61 2) 6103 8233 Email [email protected] Brisbane Level 15, 127 Creek Street Brisbane QLD 4000 Perth GPO Box 32 Centa Building C2, 118 Railway Street Brisbane QLD 4001 West Perth WA 6005 Telephone (+61 7) 3009 8700 Telephone (+61 8) 9449 9600 Facsimile (+61 7) 3009 8799 Facsimile (+61 8) 9322 3955 Email [email protected] Email [email protected] For information on this report Contributing team members Please contact: Marcus Randell Paul Breslin Telephone (07) 3009 8709 or 3009 8700 Paul Hyslop Mobile 0404 822 319 Richard Lenton Email m.randell @aciltasman.com.au Martin Pavelka Cara Chambers Estimated energy purchase costs for Final Determination (Draft) Contents 1 Background 1 2 Changes since the Draft Determination 3 2.1 Price distribution methodolgy 3 2.2 Generation costs and LRMC 4 2.3 Summary of changes 5 3 Response to the submissions 7 3.1 Hedging Strategy 8 3.2 Use of LRMC to estimate WEPC 10 3.2.1 Market contracts give only partial cover of costs 11 3.3 Peak and off peak energy costs 12 3.4 Calculation of contract prices 12 3.5 Carbon tax cost 13 3.6 Peak and off-peak error 14 3.7 Controlled and unmetered loads revised approach 14 3.8 AEMC Report 15 3.8.1 Background 15 3.8.2 Assumption changes 16 3.8.3 Summary 18 3.9 Creation of load data 19 3.10 Allowance for losses 21 3.11 Transmission constraints 21 3.12 Queensland Gas Scheme 22 3.13 LGC prices 22 3.14 STC prices 22 4 Estimation of WEPC 24 4.1 Outline of hedging approach 24 4.2 More detail on hedging approach 26 4.2.1 Developing 41 years of load traces each representing 2012/13 27 4.2.2 Developing 10 plant outage scenarios for the NEM 28 4.2.3 Application of transmission and distribution losses 28 4.3 Data sources 29 4.3.1 Generation cost and other data 29 4.3.2 Fuel Prices 31 4.3.1 Plant outages 32 4.3.2 Load data 33 4.3.3 Other data 34 ii Estimated energy purchase costs for Final Determination (Draft) 4.4 Estimated contract prices used in the hedging approach 34 4.5 Results for WEPC 40 5 Other energy purchase costs 44 5.1 Renewable Energy Target scheme 44 5.1.1 LRET 45 5.1.2 SRES 47 5.2 Queensland Gas Scheme 49 5.3 NEM fees 50 5.4 Ancillary services 51 5.5 Summary of renewable energy costs and market fees 51 6 Summary of energy purchase costs (EPC) 52 6.1 Application of energy purchase cost to the individual retail tariffs 53 A ACIL Tasman modelling capability 55 List of figures Figure 1 Load weighted pool prices and hedged price for Energex NSLP 2012/13 9 Figure 2 Comparison of annual time weighted wholesale electricity price ($/MWh, nominal) for Queensland used in the Draft Determination 19 Figure 3 Time series of trade volume and price – d-cypha Trade base futures for Q3 2012, Q4 2012, Q1 2013 and Q2 2013 36 Figure 4 Time series of trade volume and price – d-cypha Trade peak futures for Q3 2012, Q4 2012, Q1 2013 and Q2 2013 37 Figure 5 Time series of trade volume and price – d-cypha Trade caps for Q3 2012, Q4 2012, Q1 2013 and Q2 2013 38 Figure 6 Variation in price across the 410 years - hedging approach 41 Figure 7 Energy purchase costs at the customer terminals – Draft and Final Determinations using the hedging approach with and without carbon 43 Figure 8 Large-scale renewable energy target 57 Figure 9 RET and assumed contribution from existing generators and SGU/SHW 59 List of tables Table 1 Comparison of EPC estimates for Draft and Final Determinations 6 Table 2 Median observation used in calculating the WEPC for the Energex NSLP in 2012/13 10 Table 3 Assumption updates and estimated impact on the Queensland time weighted average wholesale electricity price ($/MWh) 18 Table 5 Details of Queensland generators used in pool price modelling for 2012/13 31 Table 6 Fuel prices assumed for Queensland power stations (nominal $/GJ) 32 Table 7 Planned and forced outages for Queensland power stations 33 Table 8 Data source and method of estimating contract price 39 iii Estimated energy purchase costs for Final Determination (Draft) Table 9 Quarterly base, peak and cap estimated contract prices – 2012/13 Final Determination and Draft Determination ($/MWh) 40 Table 10 Estimated WEPC using the median price from hedging approach ($/MWh) 42 Table 11 Elements of the 2012 and 2013 RPP estimates for the LRET scheme used in Final Determination 47 Table 12 Estimated cost of LRET – Final Determination 2012/13 47 Table 13 Estimated cost of SRES – Final Determination 2012/13 48 Table 14 Comparison of the Draft and Final Determinations - cost of LRET and SRES ($/MWh) 49 Table 15 Estimated cost of Queensland Gas Scheme using AFMA data, $/MWh 50 Table 16 Estimated NEM fees ($/MWh) 50 Table 17 Estimated ancillary services charges ($/MWh) 51 Table 18 Summary of OEPC – at the regional reference node ($/MWh) 51 Table 19 Estimated wholesale energy purchase costs for Energex and Ergon Energy settlement classes 53 iv Estimated energy purchase costs for Final Determination (Draft) 1 Background This report has been prepared for the Queensland Competition Authority's (the Authority) Final Determination (Final Determination) on notified retail electricity tariffs for 2012/13. It provides estimates of expected energy purchase costs for each settlement class. The energy purchase cost estimates provided in this report represent updated estimates over our draft report incorporating the latest available data and also responding to the submissions to the Authority's Draft Determination (Draft Determination) on notified retail electricity tariffs for 2012/13. It also corrects for any anomalies identified by ACIL Tasman, the Authority or in the submissions. Retail tariffs are made up of three components: network costs, retailing costs and energy purchase costs. This report is limited to the energy purchase costs component. In accordance with the Ministerial Delegation1 and the brief provided by the Authority, the methodology developed by ACIL Tasman provides an estimate of energy purchase costs which reflect the actual cost of purchasing electricity. Energy purchase costs (EPC) comprise wholesale energy purchase costs (WEPC) and other energy purchase costs (OEPC) associated with renewable energy incentives and market fees. As far as estimating the EPC is concerned, ACIL Tasman has been instructed by the Authority to provide our best estimate of energy purchase costs based on expected market conditions in 2012/13. In accordance with the brief and based on the Authority’s interpretation of the Ministerial Delegation as advised to ACIL Tasman, the energy purchase costs presented in this report are based on estimates of the expected WEPC for National Electricity Market (NEM) based independent electricity retailers in 2012/13 along with the expected OEPC. In this sense our estimate of the WEPC is the market price that an independent retailer would expect to pay for energy purchased from the NEM in 2012/13. WEPC estimates are based on expected market prices not generation costs. The market prices are those expected to prevail in 2012/13 and have been estimated by NEM simulation and by averaging of the quarterly future contracts prices from d-cyphaTrade and AFMA. These prices reflect the existing supply-demand balance and the existing level of competition both in the pool and contract markets.