Last week small electricity retailers were bleeding so badly they doubled their prices and asked their customers to leave.
This week it’s a big gas retailer, as Australia belatedly faces the same pain that hit and wiped out UK energy retailers:
Gas retailer Weston Energy’s collapse stirs call for Labor intervention
Perry Williams, The Australian
Weston Energy, which provides gas to more than 400 companies and government agencies, ceased trading with immediate effect on Monday, creating uncertainty for major manufacturers with 7 per cent of the east coast’s commercial and industrial market forced to find a new supplier.
The company said it could no longer finance cash flow requirements of its trading portfolio “on a timely basis” with prices rising over 180 per cent since April, and almost three times higher than at the start of the year.
These are blistering rises in costs:
With spot gas prices up to four times higher than normal levels and wholesale electricity prices in NSW on track to finish the June quarter twice as high as the previous record, Mr Willox called on the Albanese government to respond.
It’s a cult.
Presumably at this point geniuses will suggest we need even more solar power — thus creating an even greater demand for expensive gas until we get a battery the size of Tasmania, or the sun goes Supernova and runs 24 hours a day.
Better yet — the inner city Teal voters could offer to run off their solar panels and donate their gas to the poor?
Will any of the Labor Party, Professors and Energy Experts even think of boosting gas production and exploration, and vaporizing the red tape? Probably not. But will they miss the chance to redevelop the cheap brown coal of La Trobe Valley and take the pressure off gas use and energy prices. We know they will…
We could make Australia more competitive, help plants thrive and food grow, and stop feeding foreign wars (do Ukrainian Lives Matter?). But we probably won’t. Not yet at least. Wait til those bills start to come in:
The Australian Energy Regulator will publish its default market offer for NSW, south-east Queensland and South Australia on Thursday. Households in those states may face a 10-20 per cent jump in their bills when new annual charges kick in on July 1, experts say.
Those states being about 65% of Australias population.
All the mainland states on the NEM are all still struggling with incredibly high $200+ per megawatt hour prices.