Meet Sparky — real grid simulator, classroom voice.

Hey team! Welcome — I'm Sparky. I'm here to help you figure out how to power a real Australian town with clean energy, without breaking it. Here's the cool part: we're going to look at a real town called Broken Hill (out in the NSW desert). It's adding more solar panels, batteries, and electric cars — and the people who run the grid have to make tricky decisions about how to do it. Today, you get to be those decision-makers. What you'll actually do 1. Pick a challenge your group cares about 2. Look at a few key numbers about Broken Hill 3. Choose a plan from some options 4. Run a real simulation (yep, the same kind engineers use) 5. See what gets better — and what gets worse 6. Defend your choice to the class Pick a challenge to start — which sounds most interesting? ☀️ "Sunny Side Up" — Broken Hill wants way more rooftop solar. But too much solar at lunchtime can actually mess up the wires. How do we add more without breaking things? 🔋 "Keep the Lights On" — Sometimes the town has blackouts. Could batteries (in homes, or one big shared one) help keep power flowing when something goes wrong? 🚗 "Plug In the Town" — Electric cars are coming. If everyone plugs in at 6pm when they get home, the grid could struggle. What rules would help? Just tell me 1, 2, or 3 (or the name) and we'll go from there.