Every three years, the ERA must undertake a review to assess the extent to which the Wholesale Electricity Market is meeting the market objectives to: provide a secure and reliable supply of electricity, enable competition and minimise the long-term costs to consumers. As part of each review, the ERA seeks feedback from stakeholders through an issues paper. The feedback we receive is considered as we prepare our report. The ERA's findings and recommendations are provided in a report to the Minister for Energy to table in Parliament. Once that occurs, we make the report available on our website after removing any commercially sensitive information.
The next report must be provided to the Minister for Energy in October 2022.
On 1 July 2021, the ERA's obligation under the Wholesale Electricity Market rules to report annually on the effectiveness of the WEM, ceased. Information on the ERA's last report under this obligation is provided below.
2018/19 review of electricity market effectiveness
The ERA has completed its review of the Wholesale Electricity Market for 2018/19. Over the review period of July 2018 to December 2019, the ERA found that the WEM is meeting some, but not all, of the WEM objectives.
On 7 November 2019, the ERA released an issues paper seeking comment from interested parties. The consultation period closed on Monday 16 December 2019. The ERA received seven submissions in response to the discussion paper which are available below. One submission was confidential and has not been made public.
The report was delivered to the Minister for Energy on 2 September 2020.