Question details
Electricity infrastructure
(537) My adjournment matter this evening is for the Minister for Energy and Resources, and the action I seek from the minister is on what the state government is doing to strengthen Victoria’s power supply and network. Last year Victoria’s energy watchdog warned the Labor government that its failure to maintain transmission lines was a major concern for both safety and power reliability. In November Energy Safe Victoria identified 50 instances of neglect on powerlines. One structure which was identified as a major safety concern in the report contributed to the outage last week that impacted half a million Victorians. Last year the Australian Energy Market Operator also confirmed that Victoria was the worst state in Australia for energy security. It has also predicted that Labor’s accelerated closure of Yallourn will exacerbate the problem – that shutting down our coal-fired power stations and ripping this state off gas without a plan to keep the lights on is a recipe for disaster.
The SEC will not deliver enough renewable energy to meet the demand in time for Labor’s accelerated planned closure of coal-fired power stations. Nearly 18 months since the government announced it would revive the SEC, it has done nothing to shore up our energy supply. It has invested in one single project, as a minority shareholder, when the private sector was already doing the work without taxpayer funds. For almost a decade now Labor has mismanaged the grid and failed to ensure the resilience of the network, and Victorians are literally paying the price, with many now living in energy poverty.
The minister for energy proudly but very incorrectly stood in this place two weeks ago and claimed power prices were going down, down, down. I take this opportunity to remind the minister that power prices have soared 25 per cent in the last year. At one stage during the initial outage on 13 February, when all four units of Loy Yang A went offline, wholesale power prices soared to a whopping $16,600 per megawatt hour. In comparison, prices were just $60 in Queensland and $300 in New South Wales. We are paying more than ever for a power supply that is increasingly unreliable because of this government’s mismanagement. Minister, how can Victorians be assured that the lights will stay on when the Labor government is doing nothing to bring prices down and strengthen our fragile energy supply?
The DEPUTY SPEAKER: Order! The member for Morwell, could you just rephrase your question to provide an action for the minister?
Martin CAMERON: From the start?
The DEPUTY SPEAKER: I do not need the whole adjournment, but if you could rephrase the –
Martin CAMERON: At the start, the action I seek from the minister is what the state government is doing to strengthen Victoria’s power supply and network.
The DEPUTY SPEAKER: You would like an update?
Martin CAMERON: Provide an update.
The DEPUTY SPEAKER: There you go. Thank you very much.
We know that climate change will result in more intense and more frequent storms and bushfires, and that it why we the Victorian Government is taking action to bolster electricity resilience.
Following the severe storm events of 13 February 2024 that damaged 12,000 km of powerlines and poles across the state’s electricity distribution businesses, the Victorian Government has appointed an expert panel to conduct the independent Network Outage Review. This review will investigate the system response and will build on the findings and recommendations of the 2022 Resilience Review report. Community and stakeholders will have opportunities to participate through Public Panel meetings or written submissions to the review, and the expert panel will deliver an interim report to the Minister in June, with the final report delivered in August 2024.
Energy Safe Victoria (ESV) is Victoria’s independent regulator monitoring the energy sector. ESV has advised that the fifty overdue maintenance items in relation to transmission infrastructure, from the 2022/23 financial year as referred to in the November 2023 Electricity Network Safety Report, were not of an urgent nature and did not relate to the structural integrity of the towers.
The Victorian Government is also strongly supporting our new renewables build, contributing to the security of our energy supply. Victoria now has the most comprehensive set of arrangements in Australia for new energy supply, transmission, and the orderly transition to an energy system of the future. These include setting state-wide energy storage targets of at least 2.6 GW of energy storage capacity by 2030 and at least 6.3 GW by 2035.
Victorian renewables contributed about 1,027 megawatts (MW) of new capacity to the National Electricity Market in 2022 and an estimated further 400 MW for summer 2023-24. AEMO has noted new large-scale renewables are a key factor in the improved energy reliability, and AEMO's Electricity Statement of Opportunities forecast clearly highlights how our investments will improve reliability.
Our record investments in cheaper renewable energy mean that Victoria has consistently had the lowest wholesale prices in the National Electricity Market over the past 18 months, which has started to flow through to retail prices. The Essential Services Commission has released its draft Victorian Default Offer for 2024-25, which is nearly 7% lower than the current VDO.
The State Electricity Commission (SEC) is accelerating Victoria’s energy transition, investing an initial $1 billion towards delivering 4.5 GW of new renewable energy and storage projects. The SEC has already invested $245 million in the Melbourne Renewable Energy Hub, which is one of the world’s largest battery projects.
As coal-fired power stations retire and are replaced by renewables, our energy grid needs to change to carry power from new renewable energy sources across the state to Victorian homes and businesses. VicGrid is working to make sure this change delivers the safe, reliable and affordable power that Victoria needs for the future and that host communities have a say and can share in the benefits of the energy transition.
As part of its seven-year transition for Yallourn Power Station and its agreement with the State, EnergyAustralia will install a utility scale battery to better support energy security and provide additional certainty for workers, the community and the energy market. Furthermore, as AGL looks to replace its coal generation assets, the Victorian Government welcomes its investment into renewable energy and storage projects, with its announced plans to develop 12 GW of new generation and firming capacity by 2036. This includes the transformation of its existing operation sites such as Loy Yang into low-carbon industrial energy hubs.
These projects will provide crucial support for Victoria’s growing renewable energy capacity by soaking up power during the day and dispatching it when needed and will make a strong contribution to energy security, sustainability, and reliability.
Hon Lily D’Ambrosio MP
Minister for Climate Action
Minister for Energy and Resources
Minister for the State Electricity Commission