On 17 April 2025, the AER granted Transgrid a waiver from the AER’s Ring-fencing guideline to provide telecommunication services not associated with the transmission network to one customer for a period of 12 months.
Transgrid requires a waiver to provide these services due to changes that came into effect as part of version 4 of the guideline, which was introduced 1 March 2023.
These changes expanded the scope of transmission network service providers’ legal separation obligations to capture all non-electricity services. As a result, Transgrid was required to novate its contracts for telecommunication services not associated with transmission services.
On 12 April 2024, the AER granted a waiver to Transgrid from its obligation to comply with clause 3.1(b) of the Guideline for 12 months to transfer the contracts for such services of six customers to another entity.
On 2 April 2025, Transgrid requested a new waiver as it had only been able to novate contracts of five of the six customers since 12 April 2024.
The AER has granted this further waiver, valid until 12 April 2026, to allow Transgrid additional time to transfer this customer’s contract to another entity.