A national assessment of the security of Australia’s energy resources is being conducted by the Department of the Environment and Energy, with an interim assessment of liquid fuel supplies to be completed this year.
Minister for Energy, Josh Frydenberg said liquid fuels such as petrol, diesel and jet fuel accounted for 37 per cent of Australia’s energy use, including 98 per cent of transport needs.
“Over the past two years, we have been focused on securing reliable and affordable electricity and gas,” Mr Frydenberg said.
“It is time now to consider Australia’s liquid fuel security.”
He said results of the whole-of-Government National Energy Security Assessment should be delivered by mid 2019; however, he has ordered the interim assessment of liquid fuel security to be delivered by the end of this year.
Mr Frydenberg said the Department was already consulting with other Government Agencies and would be seeking stakeholder, industry and expert views to help form the assessment.
He said the assessment was a prudent and proper thing to do to make sure there was no complacency, and it should not be construed as Australia having a fuel security problem.
“The comprehensive assessment will look at how fuel is supplied and used in Australia, including our resilience to withstand disruptions both overseas and in Australia,” Mr Frydenberg said.
“We have not experienced a significant disruption to fuel supplies since the OPEC oil crises in the 1970s, but there is no room to be complacent.”
He said Australia’s liquid fuel supply increasingly depended on overseas sources and relied on market forces to maintain reliability and affordability.
He said the assessment would identify whether the Government should take further steps to ensure Australia’s domestic fuel supply was reliable.
“The assessment will also help inform Australia’s plan to return to compliance with the International Energy Agency’s emergency stockholding obligations by 2026,” Mr Frydenberg said.
