On 30 November 2015, the Australian Energy Regulator has published its second annual benchmarking reports for electricity distribution and transmission networks.
Last year, the benchmarking models revealed that the Victorian and South Australian distribution network service providers (DNSPs) were the most productive. The 2015 report has found that the same DNSPs have remained top performers.
However, the 2015 benchmarking report shows the performance gap between DNSPs has narrowed. Since last year’s report Energex, Ergon Energy and Essential Energy have improved relative to the Victorian and South Australian DNSPs. Consequently, the productivity performance of the majority of DNSPs is closer than ever before.
Generally, over the last nine years, the costs of maintaining and augmenting the networks has increased more rapidly than the demand for network services. In addition, new government obligations, such as those aimed at mitigating bushfire risk, have increased the costs faced by some DNSPs. As a result, productivity, has on average been trending down.
The productivity of the transmission network service providers has also been trending down in recent years. However, TasNetworks improved its productivity between 2013 and 2014.