The National Gas Law NGL and National Gas Rules NGR impose general duties and specific requirements on the service providers of transmission and distribution pipelines. These obligations include, but are not limited to, following ring fencing requirements, compliance with an applicable access arrangement or access determination, maintaining suitable records, appropriately handling confidential information and following bundling requirements.
The Annual Compliance Order (ACO) is the mechanism with which the AER has monitored the compliance of (scheme) pipeline service providers with their obligations. Due to changes made to the NGL and NGR in March 2023, the previous ACO no longer applies to any service providers. The new ACO is issued to both scheme and non-scheme pipeline service providers.
On 19 February 2024, we published a consultation paper to seek stakeholder feedback on the proposal to issue a new ACO and the first drafts of the new ACO and response template. Submissions were open until 12 March 2024. Submissions are available here.
On 17 April 2024, we released our draft decision including an explanatory note that sought stakeholder feedback on our updated draft documents and our responses to the submissions on the proposal. Submissions on the draft decision were open until 9 May 2024.
On 7 June 2024 we published the finalised ACO and response template. The explanatory note outlines our responses to stakeholder submissions and amendments made to the updated draft documents.
The new ACO commences on 1 July 2024, with reporting to start for the 2024-25 financial year.