Do coal breakdowns threaten Australia's energy reliability and prices?

Replacing unreliable coal with renewables and storage protects households from price volatility.

There is an urgency for Australia to immediately shift to renewables from coal to avoid reliability risks and price spikes.

Citing data from Reliability Watch, the Clean Energy Council said coal unreliability is increasing. New South Wales and Queensland had around one quarter (24%) of their coal-powered electricity generation unavailable on average in the 12 months to 31 October 2025. In the last four weeks, there have been seven unplanned coal outages across the National Electricity Market.

Coal breakdowns have driven the most recent wholesale price volatility. Wholesale prices increased from $70 per megawatt-hour (MWh) to $177 per MWh in Queensland, and from $70 per MWh to $220 per MWh in New South Wales during October.

“With old coal falling over and new infrastructure coming online, the only way to protect households is an orderly energy transition that permanently replaces coal with modern, cheaper and more reliable assets,” said William Churchill, chief policy and impact officer at the Clean Energy Council.

“The task for Australia now is to get the new system built to schedule — renewables, storage, transmission and modern grid-stability assets, so Australia isn’t stuck relying on ageing generators that are breaking down more often and driving up costs,” he said.