Why we work on developing the electricity market

Our approach to improving the performance of the electricity market hinges on creating the right conditions for innovation and efficiency rather than stipulating particular outcomes. This means there’s no point where we can say ‘the job is done’ because it’s about continual improvement or development of the market for the net benefit of consumers.

How we develop the electricity market

We work to develop the electricity market in a way that is consultative, strategically focused, principles-based and transparent.

Consultative

We develop the market in ongoing consultation with consumers, industry participants and other stakeholders. The results are efficient, robust, enduring solutions that the industry can implement.

Strategically focused

Our focus on the long-term benefit of consumers and the fact that market development initiatives can take several years to deliver the expected benefits means that we take a long-term view to our work.

Principles-based

We use principles to create certainty around developing the market and the Code and to help parties make investment decisions.

This means:

• wherever feasible, we estimate costs and benefits to assess Code amendment proposals
• we favour greater competition, give weight to dynamic efficiency gains and favour market solutions, flexibility to allow innovation and non-prescriptive solutions.

Transparent

We seek to be highly transparent in our work - we do this by explaining our plans and how we work.

We also seek to make the electricity sector transparent - for example, we collect and make freely available a wide range of data to assist with making the sector more competitive. A lot of this data is on the EMI website(external link).

We also investigate and report on unusual events, which could lead to compliance action or identification of recommendations for market development work.

Monitoring – Enquiries, reviews and investigations