Identified Network Needs

Identifying network needs is a key element of the network planning process through:

• Network analysis using the latest demand forecasts to identify emerging network capacity or supply security limitations; and
• Asset condition or performance assessments to identify assets approaching their end-of-life.

Network needs that have been identified as being subject to the RIT-D process are outlined in RIT-D Investigations section.  These are within the 5-year planning horizon.

Projects that do not meet the RIT-D criteria and that will be investigated for non-network options.

Future network needs that are beyond the 5-year planning horizon have also been identified and presented below. These future network needs are dependent upon demand growth and progress in proposed developments prior to any commitment to network investment.

Definition of terms used in network needs

Table below provides definitions of the terms used in the Identified System Limitations section of this page.

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RIT-D investigations

This section presents the RIT-D augmentation and replacement projects in the 5-year planning horizon that Endeavour Energy will investigate. Endeavour Energy reviews its network needs at least annually and the dates shown may be adjusted from year to year as the underlying customer demand and network need change over time.

Listed in below table are the identified augmentation RIT-D projects and next table details the retirement or replacement RIT-D Projects. The Endeavour Energy project identification number has been included to allow matching to our other regulatory reporting.  Identified needs based on place names may change over time and place names are determined by other statutory authorities.

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_{Identified Network Need – Retirement or Replacement projects}

Next table provides the RIT-D process timetable for each proposed project. Additional details for these RIT-D projects are provided in the DAPR Mapping Portal.

Details are provided for each identified project including the constraint and the time frame over which a nonnetwork investigation and program implementation would be expected to operate to successfully address the constraint.

If a screening test identifies that a non-network option is feasible then Endeavour Energy will issue a NonNetwork Options Report. All registered participants on Endeavour Energy’s register of interested parties will be notified of the release of the document.

If a screening test identifies that non-network options are not feasible, Endeavour Energy will publish a notice of the screening result on its website and all registered participants will be notified.

Projects that do not meet the RIT-D criteria

Endeavour Energy also plans to investigate non-network options for some network needs that are below the RIT-D threshold of $6 million these are shown in below table

If a non-network option investigation identifies that a demand management option is feasible for a project below the RIT-D threshold, Endeavour Energy may issue a public tender document to provide interested stakeholders and service providers the opportunity to submit proposals to address the need. All registered participants on Endeavour Energy’s register of interested parties will be notified when a tender document is issued.

_{Identified Network Needs – Projects That Do Not Meet The RIT-D Criteria}

_{Investigation Timetable – Projects That Do Not Meet The RIT-D Criteria}

Future network needs

Endeavour Energy’s future network needs presented below are major supply requirements in the 5 to 10 year ahead planning period.

In the early stages of these developments the proposed timing is uncertain, however the estimated constraint date is based on the best available information. These identified future network needs are shown in below table.

Impact on transmission – distribution connection points

Below table details constraints in the network which impact on the capacity of transmission – distribution connection points.

Primary distribution feeders

For any primary distribution feeders for which Endeavour Energy has prepared forecasts of maximum demands and which are currently experiencing an overload situation, or are forecast to experience an overload within the next two years, Endeavour Energy must set out:

• the location of the primary distribution feeder
• the extent to which demand exceeds, or is forecast to exceed, 100% of the normal cyclic rating (240A) of the feeder (or a lesser percentage of the cyclic rating of the feeder where maximum utilisation factors are employed), under normal conditions during summer and/or winter periods
• Endeavour Energy employs a utilisation factor of 80% for the distribution feeder cables exiting a zone substation to allow 20% of the thermal rating of the feeder to be available for transfer of load from an adjacent feeder under first level emergency conditions
• the types of potential solutions that may address the constraint or forecast constraint, and
• where an estimated reduction in forecast demand would defer the constraint for a period of 12 months, including:
  • an estimate of the year and month in which the constraint is forecast to occur
  • a summary of the location of relevant connection points at which the estimated reduction in forecast demand would defer the constraint, and
  • the estimated reduction in demand required to defer the forecast constraint.

Options that are considered for all forecast constraints include:

• non-network solutions
• augmenting the network
• rearranging the network by switching and load transfers, and
• monitoring the situation if the forecast constraint is not significant.

Details of Endeavour Energy’s primary distribution feeders which are currently overloaded can be located in the DAPR mapping portal.

Other factors impacting network needs and solutions

There are a number of factors that are impacting network needs and solutions that go beyond the traditional and well established business as usual practices of operating the network.

Each of these factors are further discussed below.

The evolving grid within a low carbon economy

Governments, businesses and communities are setting increasingly ambitious emissions reduction targets to limit the impacts of climate change.

This requires fundamental changes to the way we produce and consume energy and changes the nature of the energy system. Our electricity networks will underpin this evolution, and we must keep pace with the change.

In the coming years, our network needs to cater for the growing customer uptake of clean and distributed energy resources such as solar PV, battery storage, and electric vehicles. As our customers take up these technologies they will participate more actively in the energy market and unlock more value from their investments.

Sophisticated digital platforms will increasingly underpin and automate more responsive users, coordinated by energy ‘aggregators’ such as virtual power plants. These changes form part of the solution to limit the 57 impacts of climate change, and the augmentation of our network must reliably and affordably deliver the capability to balance dynamic, responsive, bi-directional flows

These new technologies, and the changes to the way our communities will choose to use and share electricity, will change the role of the network. Open, real-time data sharing will become critical to the successful operation of a network, allowing and incentivising customers and third-parties to use their technologies to help balance the system. The network will become a platform of energy trade, and underpin the modern, low carbon way of living.

Below we provide more detail on these new technologies and how each of them impact our network.

Solar photovoltaic (PV) generation

The uptake of Solar PV systems by households and businesses on Endeavour Energy’s network is forecast to increase rapidly in the coming years. Currently, more than 20% of Endeavour Energy’s customers have installed Solar PV systems to supplement their energy requirements. By 2030, this figure is projected to reach 55%.

The changing profile as a result of the high penetration of solar PV creates network wide and localised issues which will need to be addressed. At the network scale, this includes the “duck curve” whereby solar input reduces the demand for electricity during the day at the same time as growth in electricity use increases night time peaks.

PV systems can also impact the quality of supply. Traditionally, distribution networks were designed to accommodate voltage drops arising from the flow of power in one direction, from the high voltage system through to the low voltage system and connected customers. However, the large volumes of rooftop solar PV connected at customer’s premises in some locations results in power flows in the reverse direction from the LV to HV at times of peak solar generation and overall low system demand. This reverse power flow situation is often not predictable and can lead to both voltage rise and voltage drop situations in various parts of the network having to be managed simultaneously to ensure voltage at the customer’s premises remains within statutory limits.

Battery Energy Storage Systems

As more variable renewable energy sources feed into the grid, such as solar PV, energy storage will play an increasing and crucial role to balance supply and demand. As costs of battery energy storage technology decline the installation of battery storage is expected to increase rapidly across our network.

Storage will be delivered at the household, local and grid-scale, and will be a vital contributor to the management of seasonal, daily and micro variations in supply and demand. These services can only be delivered via the active participation of customers and third parties, which requires a dynamic and digital capability and necessitates the more central role of the grid.

Household

As the costs of battery storage decline, more customers are choosing to install privately-owned, behind the meter storage systems. In its simplest use, battery storage allows customers to store the solar energy otherwise fed into the grid during the day and consume that energy at night when it is needed.

Grid-scale

There are several energy storage solutions that are becoming increasingly viable at the system level, from Battery Energy Storage Systems to the Seasonal Hydrogen Storage Systems. These technologies enable distributors to more accurately manage the demand and supply of energy across the network.

Aggregation and Virtual Power Plants (VPPs)

Sophisticated digital platforms and energy ‘aggregators’ (such as VPPs) unlock value for households by accessing wholesale markets. This transforms households into energy market participants, responding to price signals and delivering market services. However, this can create local network capacity issues, as households become orchestrated in their supply and demand from networks

A residential battery energy storage system trial completed in 2019 demonstrated that battery systems provide opportunities for Endeavour Energy to utilise stored energy during critical peak times to defer investment in the augmentation of the network. Several battery systems can be aggregated into a single or multiple virtual power plants (VPP) in order to deliver the network capacity required. The capacity from the VPP can be dispatched using third party aggregation platforms.

Electric vehicles

Endeavour is closely monitoring the current and projected uptake of electric vehicles and the impact on demand levels across the network both in aggregate and locationally specific to ensure that adequate supply capacity is in place to cater for this major change towards the electrification of transport. The electrification of transport, in many ways, is similar to the rise of air conditioning in the past few decades where the widespread adoption led to the need to cater for this with widespread augmented network supply capacity.

The electrification of transport will have impacts on the distribution network both due to the large demand when the vehicles are being recharged and also for the potential for the batteries in the vehicles to be used to support the electricity network during periods of peak network demand.

Endeavour has assisted the NSW Department of Planning, Industry and Environment in the development of an EV charging infrastructure map to support the objectives laid out in the NSW Electric and Hybrid Vehicle Plan. The objective of the map is to inform the market about potential locations for EV fast charging infrastructure. Preferred locations include those with adequate network capacity for fast charging stations.

Endeavour is a DNSP partner in a large scale electric vehicle trial led by a retailer and funded by the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA). The trial aims to assess the value of EV charging orchestration using managed smart chargers installed in participants’ homes. Two emerging EV 59 orchestration technologies that have significant commercial potential, Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G) and Vehicle Application Programming Interface (API) integration, will also be assessed as part of the trial.

By 2029 there are 200,000 EVs expected in households connected to the Endeavour Energy network, up from 2,000 currently.

EVs are an emerging consumption on the network, and a changing profile of demand. The contribution of 200,000 EVs to peak load increase from 1MW in 2022 to approximately 60MW by 2029. This will result in requests for new connection points and will likely require network augmentations and many local levels.

However, EVs will also represent the opportunity for mobile (battery) storage. The rise in EVs will rapidly enhance the flexibility of consumption and will form a crucial component of the dynamic architecture of the future network. They will become a very useful tool to balance loads, but will require sophisticated, transparent, digital capabilities operating with a proliferation of third-parties to optimise this value.

Demand response and flexible demand

When managing the capacity of the grid, the focus has historically fallen on the energy generators to ensure the supply to the grid matches demand. But with changes in consumer behaviour affecting when, where and how people access the grid, there’s a growing opportunity to manage capacity by tackling the demand for energy

A shift to a more dynamic and transparent tariff regime will further incentivise these behaviours. In a system with abundant, but variable, renewable energy, households and businesses will benefit from the ability to reduce demand or transition to more flexible operations. This is part of the solution to balancing the low carbon, variable energy system.

Demand response is the voluntary reduction or shift in the customer’s use of electricity. This is typically achieved by financially incentivising consumers to switch their use of power to off-peak periods to ease the demand on the network.

Flexible load refers to the coordination of electricity consumption used for existing loads. For households this includes water heaters, air-conditioning systems and pool pumps. For business and industry, this includes flexible production which can lower individual production costs and balance loads on the network.

The role of the network is to facilitate the ability of customers to participate in such a way. In this light, the value of the network shifts more in favour of its capacity to allow participation, rather than the electricity demanded. This change requires re-consideration of tariff structures to reflect the alternative value of the network (such as capacity charges).

Large scale renewable energy generation

Decarbonising Australia’s economy will be challenging, involve a variety of alternative fuels developed through multiple different pathways, and approaches will vary within and across industries and use cases based on needs and opportunities. Hydrogen, which is very similar to natural gas and can be produced from renewable electricity, represents one such option.

The NSW Government through its Electricity Infrastructure Roadmap and Hydrogen Strategy is aggressively pursuing the activation of new renewable energy zones to drive decarbonisation of its electricity generation and establishment of a hydrogen industry, for both domestic and export markets. This will drive significantly more variable renewables into the generation mix and may add considerable load to the distribution network.

The scale of electricity generation associated with large-scale hydrogen production dwarfs that of Australia’s current demand. NSW is targeting 12GW of renewables to deliver 110,000 tonnes per annum of hydrogen by 2030. It is focusing on production in two key hubs, Illawarra and the Hunter Valley (with Wagga Wagga considered a strategic location mainly for transport).

The wave of renewables will create system challenges, but also new opportunities. Hydrogen may act as a flexible way to lift minimum demand and store excess energy. It may also play a role in decarbonising gas networks, with localised production, storage and potentially generation, supporting grid stability.

However, with the commercial pathway to hydrogen production still some way off, we will need to prepare for scenarios where we see large scale electrification, a hydrogen economy emerge, or something in between.

Microgrids and Stand Alone Power Systems

Microgrids and Stand-Alone Power Systems (SAPS) are essentially a group of localised energy sources and loads that are capable of functioning autonomously in times of need. Thus, they require less or no connection to the traditional electricity network, mitigating the need for new, or significant augmentation or replacement of existing, connections to communities. The transformation of the grid will lead to a more ‘compartmentalised’ network, with many localised networks functioning like microgrids, and interacting in a broader system.

The increasing value that can be derived from microgrids and SAPS is two fold. Firstly, with the decreasing cost of distributed generation and storage technologies, as well as the increasing costs of providing traditional network connection, SAPS are becoming more commercially feasible. Secondly, and in addition to the potential commercial value, SAPS can avoid the need for long, stringy connections. In the face of increasing extreme weather events, this will reduce the risks to the safety and reliability of the network

In addition to these two benefits, microgrids can offer communities a chance to help co-design their energy system, specifically creating elements for their unique values and needs.

For Endeavour Energy, microgrids, in particular, present new opportunities to deliver growth and replace assets more affordably, with lower risks. With a huge range of different areas for our network to cover, and that creates many different challenges for both existing locations and newly developing areas, designing and maintaining a network that is safe and reliable, but also makes best use of all locally generated renewable energy is what we are striving to achieve with microgrids.

However, any use of SAPS and microgrids will need to align with the guidance from the AEMC and AER regarding appropriate distributor-led use.

Asset ratings

Endeavour Energy investigates potential cyclic or emergency rating of assets to identify the actual capacity of the network and to accurately forecast the emergence of constraints. This ensures optimal utilisation of existing network assets and presents opportunities for deferral of investment in augmentation of the network.

Embedded generation connections

Our non-network option consultation process will provide an opportunity for embedded generation proposals to be submitted and considered for each constrained location.

During 2022 we received 309 applications for non-micro embedded generator connections and 34,472 micro embedded generator connection applications. We had an average turnaround time for micro embedded generator applications of less than 1 day.

At the end of 2022, there was a total of 237,276 PV generators connected to Endeavour Energy’s network with a total combined capacity of over 1,275 MW

There were no significant issues recorded as arising from the connection of these generators to Endeavour Energy’s network.

Endeavour Energy received six large embedded generation connection applications and enquiries in 2022.