The Energy is dedicated to covering the business of energy and in particular the people, capital, projects and emerging technology behind the energy transition.
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Counting down to Independents' Day
Published 20 days ago • 9 min read
Hey Reader, welcome to The Energy. In today's edition:
The communities hungry for energy information
Health, energy systems at risk
Could a Spain-like blackout happen here?
Counting down to Independents' Day
Regional voters want energy independence, community leaders say, and many are cutting the cord to the major parties as well as the grid.
“People are hungry for information and they want to make the right decision. There is a sense now that the major parties - and for us it’s always been the National Party - have just not addressed any of these issues and people are feeling taken for granted and that they don’t have any say in the decisions being taken around them.” — Independent candidate for Calare, Kate Hook
“Even if they’re not particularly coming from a climate point of view, they’re a lot more interested in managing their own bills and see independence as a way to do that. It’s a new way to reach people who may not believe in the climate science and bring them on board for where we need to go.” — Independent candidate for Lyne, Jeremy Miller
They also want a seat at the table to understand projects in their communities and federal funding for local energy hubs so independent advice can cut through misinformation.
Six national organisations, representing over 350,000 emergency services workers including firefighters, nurses, midwives, paramedics, doctors, and other first responders called on Liberal Leader Peter Dutton and the Coalition to drop their nuclear energy plans, citing “grave safety concerns”.
“Much has been said about the cost of living in this election, but we should not forget the cost of lives. People who live near nuclear reactors have heightened cancer risk, as do firefighters, and we cannot condone an even greater risk to whole communities when there are safer alternatives to nuclear power.” — National Secretary of the United Firefighters Union of Australia Greg McConville
In an address to the National Press Club, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese urged the Coalition to admit to the opportunities of renewable energy and “come clean” on the cost of building nuclear reactors.
Expert view
"While nuclear might have been a solution to our 2030 and 2050 targets if introduced twenty years ago, we must continue supporting the current strategy by addressing network capacity issues and removing bottlenecks. With the runway to 2030 increasingly tight and Australia’s energy systems under immense pressure as fossil fuel plants struggle to manage the demands of a modern population, nuclear presents a difficult pathway to achieving long-term energy reliability and resilience.
The timeline is simply too short to meet Australia’s current energy ambitions. The physical construction process alone will take more than a decade, placing us well past our 2030 timeline. Social licensing constraints will likely take years to overcome, with community pushback and negotiation on transmission lines and renewable energy projects still impacting the speed of the clean energy rollout.
The industry needs to work as a collective, with the public and private sectors collaborating to deploy new solutions that mitigate risk rather than escalate it.”
Jack Curtis
Co-founder, Neara
Could a Spain-like blackout happen here?
The prevalence of big batteries in the NEM and in the pipeline should help to minimise the risks of a market-wide blackout of the type suffered by Spain and Portugal this week, and South Australia in September 2016, said Lisa Zembrodt, head of Schneider Electric’s sustainability business.
On Monday two generators in Spain’s southwest tripped, an interconnector to France tripped, more generators tripped to protect themselves against a frequency drop, and an Iberian Peninsula blackout ensued.
Expert view
"Key factors contributing to the issue spinning out of control appear to be:
A lack of inertia in the Spanish grid at the time, due to high solar output
A lack of storage in the Spanish grid - relative to the extent of renewable energy generation
The relatively small interconnection with France.
The outage does highlight questions for Australia as we transition to renewable generation, but there are already significant enhancements in our generation and network systems that would protect us from such a dramatic outage.
There is significant investment in storage in Australia in recent years as well as a strong pipeline under development, both through private investment and as part of government programs such as the Capacity Investment Scheme and NSW Electricity Infrastructure Roadmap.
Inertia is actively managed in Australia through system strength requirements - resulting in the construction of syncons in SA for example.
Following the South Australian system blackout in 2016 changes were made to renewable energy generators to improve their resilience to network faults, reducing the likelihood of what happened in Spain.
The grid in SA, while much smaller than the Spanish grid, has successfully managed instances with high renewable energy generation for several years now, noting that interconnection between SA and Vic and soon NSW is much closer to typical demand, providing much greater relative capacity than between Spain and France.”
Lisa Zembrodt
Principal and Senior Director Sustainability Business, Schneider Electric
Catch up
Capital
Origin Energy said in a market update that the retail and energy supply businesses continued to perform well in Q1, although revenues from Australia Pacific LNG fell more than 10% as commodity prices fell and Tropical Cyclone Alfred disrupted shipping.
"Consistent with our strategy, Origin is investing to accelerate renewables and storage in our generation portfolio. Large-scale battery projects under construction at Mortlake and Eraring continue to progress well, with Eraring stage 1 reaching the milestone of holdpoint 1 testing with AEMO. In addition, Origin’s priority wind development, Yanco Delta, has secured ~1.5 GW transmission access rights, which is another important milestone towards its potential development.
At Octopus Energy, the UK and international retail businesses continued their strong growth with significant customer additions in the quarter and Kraken is closing in on its target to achieve 100 million accounts contracted to the platform ahead of plan.” — Origin CEO Frank Calabria
Despite a quarterly rise, electricity prices are down by 11.5% compared to 12 months ago, the Australian Bureau of Statistics said, releasing the latest CPI data. Electricity prices rose 16.3% in the March quarter. This followed falls of 17.3% in the September quarter and 9.9% in the December quarter due to the introduction of the second round of the Commonwealth Energy Bill Relief Fund (EBRF) rebates from July 2024, which was expanded to include all households.
Five of the biggest Chinese solar manufacturers including Jinko Solar Co. collectively posted over 8 billion yuan (US$1.1 billion) in losses between them in first quarter earnings reports this week. (Bloomberg)
Funding for energy storage companies in the US fell 81% (year-on-year) in the first quarter of 2025 according to research and consulting firm Mercom Capital Group.
Projects
In a boost for the big push to lift clean energy development from the low levels of recent years, AEMO said the pipeline of wind, solar and battery projects swelled by nearly two-fifths to a record 51 gigawatts in the year to the end of March. (The Energy)
Technology
What we do - and do not - know about the blackout in Portugal and Spain. (CarbonBrief)
This chart might keep you from worrying about AI's energy use (IEEE Spectrum)
Policy
South Australia’s Department of Energy and Mining opened consultation on the state’s mining laws. Possible amendments include consistency with the Hydrogen and Renewable Energy Act 2023 and the Energy Resources Act 2000, according to the Issues Paper.
Regulation
Final revenue decisions for Energex and Ergon Energy balance affordability and investment in a safe and reliable network, according to the Australian Energy Regulator. Changes have been made since the draft decision to shift the default network tariff to a time of use rather than a demand charge for customers with a new smart meter. The regulator said this responded to concerns raised by consumer groups as well as the ACCC’s evidence that consumers on a demand charge pay significantly more than the Default Market Offer. Existing customers with a demand charge will be transferred to a time of use network tariff over six months from July 1.
The final revenue decision announced for SA Power Networks was similarly significantly impacted by higher inflation and higher interest rates, contributing around half of the increases for all three. The regulator said ensuring consumer preferences were taken into account in the revenue proposal, was reflected in SA Power Networks’ refinement of its innovation fund and the further development of solar soak tariffs and two-way pricing that are able to be packaged by retailers to reward those consumers that are willing and able to shift more of their use into periods of lower electricity prices during the day.
“We expect these tariffs will contribute to improving the utilisation of network assets over time reducing future network costs.” — AER Chair Clare Savage
Electricity distribution network businesses are required to submit revenue proposals to the AER every five years outlining how much they intend to recover from consumers, resulting in a nominal increase to a typical residential customer’s electricity bill.
People
Arc Infrastructure announced the appointment of Horizon Power’s Stephanie Unwin as Chief Executive Officer, effective August 4.
Research
Support for nuclear power among Australians has fallen, with the numbers of people wanting to maintain Australia’s ban growing since Opposition leader Peter Dutton announced his nuclear power policy in 2024, the latest National Climate Action Survey shows. The full results of the survey will be released in September. (Monash University)
A group of Dutch researchers exploring willingness to adopt vehicle-to-grid (V2G) technology found financial incentives were the primary driver (49%), followed by electricity grid-stability (26%) and environmental (25%) factors. The main barrier for most was loss of flexibility (55%), followed by battery degradation (27%) and data concerns (18%).
Benchmark Mineral Intelligence released its analysis of the impact on the energy transition supply chain after the first 100 days of Trump's second term as US President.
On Battery markets: "Considering the US reliance on LFP battery cell imports from China, the battery energy storage systems industry is particularly hit hard, with imports of Chinese lithium-ion cells now facing tariffs of up to 180.9%, with this set to increase up to 198.4% from 2026. In addition, the BESS industry remains in a state of uncertainty as tariffs on Chinese cells are set to increase costs significantly. Although the effect of tariffs will not be seen for several months due to inventory build-up, it may lead to project cancellations in the future."
On Tariffs: "Trump's erratic tariff policy, characterised by various policy U-turns, has led to policy uncertainty, increased prices for US battery imports, and trade retaliation from China in the form of export controls on rare earth elements (REEs) and permanent magnets. These have had rippling effects on US clean energy and defence industrial supply chains."
On Electric vehicles: "Policy uncertainty more broadly arises for the US battery and EV supply chains over the further implementation of the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (BIL). The EV market has continued to grow in Trump’s first 100 days, but legislative changes may be on the horizon, potentially affecting EV demand growth. For instance, the impending budget reconciliation bill in the US Congress could act as a vehicle for repealing or revising the IRA EV tax credits. Benchmark forecasts assume an end to the EV tax credits."
What's on
May 1 CEDA Climate & Energy Summit
Superpower Institute Director Professor Ross Garnaut and Climate Change Authority Chair Matt Kean will speak at this Melbourne event. They will be joined by Victorian Minister for Energy Lily D'Ambrosio and AEMO CEO Daniel Westerman.
May 1 Virtual report launch: Maximising Australia's green growth
Fortescue Decarbonisation Director Christiaan Heyning will speak at this webinar hosted by the Australian Sustainable Finance Institute.
May 6 Australian Wind Industry Forum
Australian Energy Infrastructure Commissioner Tony Maher will deliver a keynote address in Melbourne at the Clean Energy Council’s onshore wind industry event.
May 8 Melbourne Energy Institute public lecture: Contracts for gas prioritisation to power plants and grid reliability during winter emergencies
Pennsylvania State University Associate Professor of Energy Economics Chiara Lo Prete will speak at this hybrid event.
The Energy is dedicated to covering the business of energy and in particular the people, capital, projects and emerging technology behind the energy transition.
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