Empowering consumers to take control of their energy use requires effort and commitment, which is the opportunity provided by the National Energy Performance Strategy.

We make 5 key recommendations to the AEMC in our submission:

We commend the AEMO team on the effort and time taken to produce an IASR that is clearly a step forward from previous versions.

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) face considerable challenges to receiving good consumer outcomes in the energy sector.

We advocate for policy measures that address both the short and long term, to ensure we are responding to the immediate need, as well as supporting and empowering consumers as we build for the future.

The flexible trading arrangement (FTA) rule change, proposed by the Australian Energy Market Operator (AEMO), has been positioned as a way consumers can access more value from their CER, by incentivising flexible demand that can support the operation of the system, while not needing to change their behaviour for their everyday electricity use.

Robust consumer protections such as the DMO are needed to safeguard consumers from unjustifiably high price increases.

30% increases will be hard to absorb for consumers already struggling with rising energy costs.

Caroline Valente, one of Energy Consumers Australia's Senior Policy Associates, delivered this presentation to the API Summer School.

This review is an opportunity to continue progressing a plan for a fair and safe transition from fossil fuel gas in Victoria.