Watt’s up: Regulatory round-up

The AER has published its AER price-responsive reporting guideline. The guideline follows new AER monitoring and reporting functions that were introduced as a result of the December 2024 Australian Energy Market Commission (AEMC) rule change intended to provide transparency on the impacts of unscheduled price-responsive resources on efficient market outcomes.

Unscheduled price-responsive resources refer to a wide range of energy resources and load that are unscheduled but can and/or do respond to the market price. These include:

• household consumer energy resources (CER),
• home energy management systems that control traditional assets,
• industrial assets with components of controllable demand, and
• small unscheduled generation and storage units.

In preparation for this additional function, the AER has published the AER price-responsive reporting guideline to set out how it will meet its new monitoring and reporting obligations, including the publication of an annual report. This report will present analysis on the impact of unscheduled price responsive resources on forecast deviations and consequential impacts on the efficiency of the market. Reporting will provide insights on emerging trends as the scale of unscheduled price-responsive resources increases in the future.

The AER’s annual report on the impact of unscheduled price-responsive resources will be published by 31 December each year and cover the previous financial year. The first report will be published in 2026.

From 1 October 2026, new energy rules will require retailers to have processes that are effective in helping customers switch to a cheaper plan.

This is part of a broader suite of upcoming changes to Victoria’s energy rules, including other rules to help Victorians switch to their retailer’s cheapest plan:

• From 1 July 2026, retailers must ensure that all customers on contracts older than four years are paying a reasonable price for their energy.
• From 1 October 2026, retailers must automatically switch customers experiencing payment difficult to their retailer’s best plan.

The Australian Government has introduced temporary relief measures from application fees and levies for offshore electricity infrastructure prospectors.

Amendments to the Offshore Electricity Infrastructure Regulations 2022 provide temporary financial relief for licence holders for two years. The regulations:

• waive annual levies for feasibility and research and demonstration licences,
• halve annual levies for transmission and infrastructure licences,
• reduce the fees to apply for a research and demonstration licence from $300,000 to $20,000, and
• reduce the fee to apply for a transmission and infrastructure licence from $300,000 to $150,000.

Electricity Infrastructure Investment Act 2020 (NSW) (EII Act):

• provide for the community purposes and employment purposes for which access scheme fees may be used,
• enable the planning, provision and management of system security services in connection with infrastructure that is not owned by the system strength service provider,
• broaden the infrastructure in relation to which long-term energy service agreements (LTES agreements) may be entered into for the purposes of the electricity infrastructure investment safeguard,
• enable the Minister to terminate the appointment of the consumer trustee if the Minister is reasonably satisfied the consumer trustee is unable to act independently,
• amend and clarify the functions of the infrastructure planner and the consumer trustee in the recommendation and authorisation of network infrastructure projects,
• to facilitate payments to the infrastructure planner out of the electricity infrastructure fund for costs incurred by the infrastructure planner in the exercise of the infrastructure planner’s functions, and
• make other administrative, minor and consequential amendments.

Electricity Supply Act 1995 (NSW) (ESA):

• facilitate and support the efficient and timely investment in electricity infrastructure under the EII Act,
• enhance the regulation of network-to-network connections, including through increased penalties and new licence conditions,
• enable the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal (the Tribunal) to pursue certain proceedings, including for civil penalties, under the National Electricity (NSW) Law (the NEL (NSW)),
• create offences for a retailer or an exempt seller to
  • charge small customers at a rate less than $0 per kilowatt hour for solar-generated electricity supplied by the customer to the retailer or exempt seller, or
  • charge other customers more for solar-generated electricity supplied by the customer to the supplier or exempt seller than the amount credited to the customer for the electricity during a billing period.
• provide for the Tribunal to make price determinations for energy, hot water and air-conditioning services provided to customers through embedded networks and require operators of embedded networks or persons who sell energy, hot water or air-conditioning services delivered through an embedded network to comply with approved energy ombudsman schemes,
• provide increased flexibility for the strategic benefit payment guidelines, including by providing for the eligibility of an expanded category of impacted land owners and other holders of interests in land to receive strategic benefit payments,
• improve the administration of licence applications and licences, and
• make other administrative, minor and consequential amendments.

National Electricity (New South Wales) Act 1997:

• to provide a regulation-making power to modify the National Electricity Rules to allow network service providers to recover costs associated with making payments to landholders for hosting certain types of energy infrastructure.