On 4 December 2015, the AEMC published the 2015 Residential Electricity Price Trends report. This report is the sixth annual residential electricity price trends report prepared by the AEMC at the request of the COAG Energy Council. The report provides information on the electricity supply chain cost components expected to affect the trends in residential electricity prices for each state and territory of Australia from 2014/15 to 2017/18. These components are network costs, competitive market costs, and environmental and other policy costs.

The possible future price trends presented in this report are not a forecast of actual prices but rather a guide to what may drive prices, based on current knowledge, assumptions and legislation as at 4 December 2015.

Over the next three years, residential electricity prices are expected to be flat or slightly increasing for most jurisdictions. This trend is being driven by increasing wholesale electricity costs being partly offset by decreasing network costs.

The trends in the underlying supply chain cost components and drivers of those trends will vary across jurisdictions and over time. This reflects differences in population, climate, consumption patterns, government policy and other factors across the states and territories.

Our report considers trends for both standing and market offer prices. Our analysis of trends in market offers covers Queensland, New South Wales, the Australian Capital Territory, Victoria and South Australia.

Updated 2015 report

On 23 February 2017, the AEMC corrected 2015 Residential Electricity Price Trends data for New South Wales, Victoria, South East Queensland, the ACT and the national summary.

The errata does not affect the AEMC’s 2016 Residential Electricity Price Trends report published in December 2016.

The changes are detailed in the attached Information sheet.

Infographics and information sheets released in December 2015 which reflected uncorrected data have been removed from this page.