Renewable Energy Metrics

Open Electricity provides several metrics for measuring renewable energy generation, including storage-adjusted variants that account for battery and pumped hydro contributions.

Renewable Generation

Metric: generation_renewable (MW) / generation_renewable_energy (MWh)

Renewable generation is the sum of all generation from renewable fuel technology types, plus battery discharge and pumped hydro generation. Hybrid hydro-with-storage facilities are excluded from this metric.

• Bioenergy (biogas, biomass)
• Hydro (excluding hydro with storage facilities)
• Solar (utility-scale)
• Solar (rooftop) — added separately from the AEMO rooftop network
• Wind
• Battery discharging
• Pumps (excluding hydro with storage facilities)

Hydro with Storage Exclusion

Some facilities are hybrid hydro and pumped storage — their generation includes both natural water inflow and water that has been pumped back uphill using grid electricity. Since we cannot separate these two sources at the metering level, hydro with storage facilities are excluded from base renewable generation and included only in the storage-adjusted metric below.

The hydro_and_storage fuel technology type classifies these facilities.

Renewable Generation with Storage

Metric: generation_renewable_with_storage (MW) / generation_renewable_with_storage_energy (MWh)

This metric includes everything in renewable generation plus hydro with storage facilities. It represents the total renewable output including hybrid hydro-storage generation.

$$\text{generation\_renewable\_with\_storage} = \text{generation\_renewable} + \text{hydro with storage generation}$$

Renewable Proportion

Metric: renewable_proportion (%)

The percentage of gross demand met by renewable generation:

$$\text{renewable\_proportion} = \frac{\text{generation\_renewable}}{\text{demand\_gross}} \times 100$$

Where demand_gross is gross demand: operational demand plus rooftop solar generation.

Renewable with Storage Proportion

Metric: renewable_with_storage_proportion (%)

The percentage of gross demand met by renewable generation including storage:

$$\text{renewable\_with\_storage\_proportion} = \frac{\text{generation\_renewable\_with\_storage}}{\text{demand\_gross}} \times 100$$

Energy Calculation

All energy metrics (MWh) are derived from power readings (MW) using trapezoidal integration. See the Energy guide for the calculation methodology.

Comparison with AEMO

AEMO publishes two renewable share figures in their Quarterly Energy Dynamics reports:

AEMO metric	Open Electricity equivalent
Renewable energy share (including storage)	renewable_with_storage_proportion
Storage-adjusted renewable energy share	renewable_proportion (closest equivalent)

Our renewable_proportion differs from AEMO’s storage-adjusted metric in that we include battery discharge and non-hybrid pumped hydro in the renewable numerator, while AEMO excludes all storage from their adjusted figure. Our approach counts battery and pumped hydro discharge as renewable since the stored energy originated from the grid’s renewable mix.

Instantaneous renewable share

AEMO’s instantaneous renewable penetration, the figure behind headlines such as renewables supplying 80% of the NEM for the first time on 19 September 2026, is renewable generation as a share of total generation (NEM generation plus estimated rooftop solar), calculated for each half hour. Our renewable_proportion is renewable generation as a share of gross demand, calculated for each 5-minute interval. Both count wind, utility and rooftop solar, hydro, bioenergy and battery discharge as renewable, and neither counts battery charging or hydro pumping. They differ in two ways:

• Denominator. Total generation measures what is produced; gross demand measures what is consumed. Within a region the difference is mostly imports and exports, so a region that exports can supply more than its own demand from renewables and show a proportion above 100%, as South Australia and Tasmania regularly do. We show this deliberately. Across the whole NEM, interconnector flows between regions cancel out and the two denominators are close.
• Granularity. AEMO’s figure is a half-hourly value, the granularity of its rooftop solar estimates. Our interval records use 5-minute intervals, with rooftop solar interpolated to 5 minutes. Demand moves more within a half hour than generation does, so the highest 5-minute interval in an event sits above that half hour’s average, typically by 1 to 2 percentage points.

Renewable Proportion Records

The records feed tracks the highest and lowest renewable_proportion for the NEM, each NEM region and the WEM, over 5-minute intervals, days, months, quarters and years.

• Interval records use a single 5-minute interval. The NEM figure is total renewable generation across all five regions divided by their total gross demand, not an average of the regional percentages.
• Day, month, quarter and year records divide total renewable generation by total gross demand across every interval in the period. This is an energy-weighted share, not an average of interval percentages.
• Confirmed data. Every record is calculated from confirmed data for every region and every interval in the period: operational demand, generation and, in the NEM since October 2015, rooftop solar.
• Timing. Records are published once rooftop solar estimates for the interval are in, usually 30 minutes to 2 hours after it.
• History. Records start in June 2007. NEM records include rooftop solar from October 2015. WEM records before October 2023 are calculated from 30-minute data.
• Precision. Values are shown to two decimal places.

Available API Metrics

Metric	Unit	Description
generation_renewable	MW	Renewable power generation
generation_renewable_energy	MWh	Renewable energy generation
generation_renewable_with_storage	MW	Renewable power including hydro with storage
generation_renewable_with_storage_energy	MWh	Renewable energy including hydro with storage
renewable_proportion	%	Renewable share of gross demand
renewable_with_storage_proportion	%	Renewable+storage share of gross demand