Industry consultation on new gas reforms ramps up ahead of winter

23/02/2023
2 min

Yesterday, Energy Ministers published an information paper to continue consultation on proposed east coast gas reforms to support a more secure, resilient and flexible market.

In August 2022, Energy Ministers decided to act to address gas market security concerns, prompted by significant challenges experienced in 2022 and analysis forecasting potential gas supply shortfalls emerging from 2023.

In the following months, Energy Ministers agreed to amend the National Gas Law, National Gas Rules and associated regulations, extending AEMO’s functions and powers to manage reliability and gas supply adequacy in the east coast gas market.

Today, AEMO is responsible for operating the following gas markets that utilise the interconnected east coast gas system: Short Term Trading Market (Sydney, Adelaide and Brisbane hubs), Victoria’s Domestic Wholesale Gas Market (AEMO is also the transmission system operator), and the Gas Supply Hub (at various locations where AEMO operates a gas trading exchange).

AEMO also offers other trading services and the Gas Bulletin Board, which aggregates and displays data on gas production and flows across the east coast gas transmission system.

The release of the information paper provides stakeholders with an overview of the associated regulation and rule refinements that have been agreed by Energy Ministers, which incorporate consultation feedback. In addition, the paper supports AEMO’s continued industry consultation on the development of procedures and guidelines ahead of implementation of the new framework before winter 2023.

AEMO Executive General Manager Reform Delivery, Violette Mouchaileh, said that stakeholder consultation will ramp up on the reliability and supply adequacy framework associated with AEMO’s new responsibilities.

“The Energy Minister’s proposed reforms present a material change to AEMO’s roles and responsibilities across the east coast gas market,” Ms Mouchaileh said.

“As such, we’re taking a leading role through our working group with gas industry stakeholders and market bodies to develop suitable procedures and guidelines to monitor, communicate and respond to emerging reliability and supply threats by winter 2023,” she said.

AEMO’s East Coast Gas Reform Project working group held its first meeting in mid-January to seek information and feedback on relevant processes, procedures and guidelines.

The working group has an upcoming industry briefing on Tuesday 28 February to ensure participants are aware of the information paper and to provide more details of the changes. Formal consultation of the new procedures will commence from Monday 27 February with guideline consultations commencing mid-March 2023.

The working group will be kept up to date with the overarching coordination of reform initiatives and will support effective engagement in both reform phases.

Further information on the regulatory amendments to extend AEMO’s functions and powers to manage east coast gas supply adequacy can be found on the Australian Government Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water website.

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