Final Report SEQ Grid Service Charges 2011-12 July 2011 Level 19, 12 Creek Street Brisbane Queensland 4000 GPO Box 2257 Brisbane Qld 4001 Telephone (07) 3222 0555 Facsimile (07) 3222 0599
[email protected] www.qca.org.au Authority staff who contributed to this report include: Will Copeman, Peter Halligan, Michelle Kelly, Einar Oddsson, George Passmore, Rick Stankiewicz © Queensland Competition Authority 2011 The Queensland Competition Authority supports and encourages the dissemination and exchange of information. However, copyright protects this document. The Queensland Competition Authority has no objection to this material being reproduced, made available online or electronically but only if it is recognised as the owner of the copyright and this material remains unaltered. Queensland Competition Authority Preamble PREAMBLE The Authority has recommended Grid Service Charges (GSCs) for the Grid Service Providers (Seqwater, WaterSecure and LinkWater) to apply in 2011-12. Consistent with the Minister’s Direction Notice, the Authority’s regulatory scrutiny is limited to a review of the prudency and efficiency of non-drought capital expenditure and post-completion drought capital expenditure, and fixed and variable operating costs. It does not address capital charges related to existing assets (return on capital and depreciation), capital expenditure or depreciation on drought assets, or the QWC levy. As a result, only some 33% of the total recommended GSCs have been eligible for regulatory review. The Authority’s final recommendations for the 2011-12 GSCs are included in the table below, compared to the approved 2010-11 GSCs. Grid Service Provider Approved 2010-11 QCA Recommended 2011-12 $m $m Seqwater 370.0 398.8 WaterSecure 317.7 306.5 LinkWater 192.5 205.7 Total Grid Service Charges 880.2 911.0 On the basis of the volume forecast provided by the South East Queensland Water Grid Manager (WGM), the total GSCs across all GSPs average $3,299/ML.