Far west NSW residents prepare for rolling blackouts as backup generators struggle - ABC News

Oct 21, 2024

ABC Broken Hill

Topic:Extreme Weather Events

Seven high voltage power lines were flattened in the storm last week. (ABC Broken Hill: Bill Ormonde )

A severe storm swept through the far west of New South Wales last week leaving more than 10,000 properties without power.

A backup diesel generator is supplying Broken Hill with power, but planned outages and rolling blackouts are occurring.

Work to rebuild the transmission towers is expected to finish by November 6.

The NSW opposition is calling for a natural disaster declaration in far west New South Wales after a severe storm flattened seven high-voltage transmission towers last week.

The wild weather swept through the region on Wednesday night, leaving more than 10,000 properties in Broken Hill and surrounds without electricity.

Diesel generators have been running to resume power supply, but blackouts are ongoing.

NSW Nationals leader Dugald Saunders said residents were going to need assistance to work through the continuing outages.

"Time is of the essence," Mr Saunders said.

"We need the NSW Government to officially make this a natural disaster zone so locals can tap into support of all kinds."

Last week's storm left more than 10,000 homes without electricity. (Supplied: Vlatko's photography)

When asked whether the state government would declare a national disaster, NSW Premier Chris Minns said he would take advice and listen to emergency services.

"My understanding is, I've had two briefings on this … and the money is flowing," he said.

"We're obviously on site, we've got contractors who are doing the work they need to."

Mr Minns said the electricity transmission operator was responsible for restoring power to the region.

"We need to make sure that there's a redundancy in place so that power can be switched on at a moments notice — and that's Transgrid's responsibility," he said.

Mr Minns said there must be more effective systems in place to deal with extreme weather events in remote communities.

"When you've got one connector in and one connector out in one of the most isolated cities, not just in Australia but in the entire world, you need to make sure you've got backup generation for precisely an event like this," he said.

Generators are being used in Broken Hill while infrastructure is damaged. (Supplied)

One diesel generator is currently powering Broken Hill, placing significant pressure on the backup supply.

Residents were told that planned outages would occur between 11pm and 5am last night, allowing crews to carry out maintenance on the generators to ensure they met demands.

However, power was not resorted at 5am and some residents had to wait until 8:30am before electricity became available.

Generators have been delivered to Menindee, 110 kilometres east of Broken Hill. (Supplied: NSW Rural Fire Service)

General Manager of Network Operations at Transgrid Jason Krstanoski said it took longer than anticipated to restore electricity after maintenance works were completed.

Mr Krstanoski said they had learnt from last night's problems and that there was a "good plan" now in place to overcome that in future.

"What they've found during the maintenance was quite good, it was good results, which means that we won't have to take it out of service as much as we originally thought," he said.

More backup generators are being sent out to impacted areas while specialist crews work to rebuild the fallen powerline structures.

Mr Krstanoski said Transgrid hoped to complete the transmission lines' restoration and return power to the region by November 6.

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