22 November, 2012
Energy White Paper – The Reform Table
Practice Group(s):
By Fiona Melville, Partner, and Jenny Mee, Partner
Energy
The Energy White Paper provides detailed reasons to support the reform agenda being progressed by
the Commonwealth and States' "Standing Council on Energy and Resources".
Priority areas and work streams include:
• reducing retail electricity costs by encouraging the removal of regulated retail tariffs, adopting a
national customer framework and empowering consumers through adoption of demand side
response and smart meters
• enhancing competition in gas by establishing a broker model trading hub at Wallumbilla covering
three major gas transmission pipeline
• reducing electricity network tariffs by encouraging demand side reductions and enhancing the
economic regulation of network service providers
• developing a nationally consistent approach to clean energy technology, including national feed-intariffs
• harmonised coal seam gas framework covering multiple land use, water management, well
integrity, hydraulic fraccing and chemical use
• promoting exploration of minerals and energy resources by publicising relevant data
• improving upstream petroleum administration and regulation standards
• developing national frameworks for energy supply safety, mine safety and smart meters.
The White Paper anticipates that the reform agenda should assist in attracting the A$530 billion
capital investment required to develop the Australian domestic energy sector and energy resources
development projects over the next two decades. With that sentiment in mind, and appreciating that
regulatory certainty is a key factor, the White Paper also commits to only conducting major reviews of
the energy policy every four years.
Click here to access further details of the reform program and timelines for action.
Authors:
Fiona Melville
Fiona.melville@klgates.com
+61.9513.2498
Jenny Mee
Jenny.mee@klgates.com
+61.9513.2555
Energy White Paper – The Reform Table
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