In a stinging critique of the NEG prepared for the Australian Conservation Foundation, energy economics consultancy CME says the NEG – the detail of which remains scant – would deliver an inefficient and opaque electricity market that deliberately hides emission prices and undermines competition in wholesale and retail markets.
The report – co-authored by CME director Bruce Mountain, who has been vocal in his concerns about the NEG – also argues that the policy would deliver outcomes to protect coal generators from competition from increasingly cheap wind, solar and battery storage.
The “ultimate cost” of this inefficiency, the report warns, “will be borne by consumers in the form of higher electricity prices, in emission reductions that are more expensive and in a less secure power system.”
— Sophie Vorrath, reporting in renewEconomy on Feb 2nd