The Justice and Equity Centre made a submission to the Australian Energy Market Operator’s (AEMO) draft Electricity Network Options Report (ENOR). The final version of the ENOR will inform the Inputs, Assumptions and Scenarios Report, which in turn forms the foundation of the 2026 Integrated System Plan.
We cautioned against the belief that upward pressure on inputs to electricity network infrastructure will turn out to have been short term in nature. We offer reasons for these pressures to extend into the 2030s and 40s, and urged AEMO to accelerate its exploration of non-network alternatives.
We commended AEMO for its initial consideration of demand-side factors, but urged them to expand this to include not just consumer energy resources and distributed energy resources but also demand flexibility, energy efficiency, electrification and the introduction of data centres. Ultimately, we argue, ‘consideration’ of these musts extend to orchestrating investment in all the different aspects of the energy system. Until this is done, consumers will continue to pay more than is necessary for their energy.
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