The Australian Energy Regulator (AER) has published its final report on incentivising and measuring export service performance. Export services are part of the core services provided by distribution network service providers (DNSPs).
The final report was informed by stakeholder submissions to our draft report (released in November 2022) and consultation paper (released in August 2022).
The AER’s final report intends to:
- introduce reputational incentives via annual export service performance reporting. In order to prepare these annual reports, the AER will collect new data from DNSPs.
- undertake a future review of incentive arrangements and its approach to incorporating export services into annual benchmarking reports by 2027. This review will also consider whether amendments to the distribution reliability measures guideline and demand management incentive scheme and innovation allowance mechanism are necessary. The AER does not consider it necessary to amend these guidelines at this time.
- introduce a new small-scale incentive scheme for export services (the export service incentive scheme, or ESIS), allowing DNSPs to consult with customers and propose bespoke export service incentive arrangements. Amendments to the service target performance incentive scheme are not proposed at this time.
Invitation for submissions
The AER has also published a draft export service incentive scheme which is now open for consultation until 28 April 2023. Stakeholders can send their submissions by email to exportservicesreview
aer [dot] gov [dot] au (exportservicesreview[at]aer[dot]gov[dot]au).
Background
Consultation was undertaken in response to the Australian Energy Market Commission’s rule change relating to access, pricing and incentive arrangements for distributed energy resources. The Rule change aims to integrate more distributed energy resources (DER) such as small-scale solar, batteries and electric vehicles into the grid. It requires the AER to consider appropriate incentive arrangements for export services, consult on changes to network performance reports and annual benchmarking reports, as well as review and amend guidelines where necessary.
This consultation considered export services in the context of three interrelated workstreams: incentive arrangements (including whether a new incentive scheme is necessary), annual performance reporting and annual benchmarking reports.