The Enhanced System Planning Project, led by the Centre for New Energy Technologies (C4NET), was a landmark collaborative research initiative aimed at improving electricity system planning in Australia beyond 2030. Bringing together over 100 leaders from industry, government, and research sectors, the project looked to determine how to deliver more cost-effective and coordinated planning approaches across Australia.
It pioneered a world-first, whole-of-system, bottom-up modelling approach for electricity distribution networks. This innovative methodology produced scalable tools and models designed to support and feed into the Australian Energy Market Operator’s (AEMO) Integrated System Plan (ISP) to inform whole of system planning. While the research for this project was conducted on Victorian case studies, the models are relevant across Australia and ready to be built for national application.
Victorian Energy Minister, Lily D'Ambrosio, launched the Enhanced System Planning Project report in June 2025.
Using this groundbreaking methodology, the project demonstrated that considerable savings and efficiencies can be gained if network augmentation is avoided. Additionally, the research helped quantify the impact of large-scale electrification on the grid, answering key planning and policy questions arising from this.
