Australia’s main grid reached a record level of renewables in its electricity supply and a record level of wind and solar penetration on the weekend.
The peak renewables share appears to have reached 55.9 percent at 11.05am on Sunday morning, with wind and solar alone providing 53.4 percent, according to figures on the National Energy Market website.
The renewable energy sector says it was a record level in terms of market share on a day with strong wind conditions, generally sunny conditions and low weekend demand.
The share of renewables also held at more than 50 percent for about six hours of the day from 9am to 3pm and was above 50 percent for several hours on Saturday.
At the same time, the share of gas fell to just 1.3 percent, and coal to around 42 percent.
The average share of renewables over the last 12 months has been a little over 28 percent, with coal at 65 percent over the last 12 months.
More than 4000MW of large-scale wind and solar has been added in 2020, and a similar amount is expected to be commissioned in the current calendar year, along with nearly 4GW of rooftop solar.
