Simon Orme, James Swansson and Eli Hefter of Sapere were engaged by the Australian government’s department of Resources, Energy and Tourism (RET) to undertake a project to assess current arrangements for consumer access to energy consumption data and scope proposals for change. The project arose from the Australian Government’s announcement in its 2011 Clean Energy Future Policy that it would ‘undertake a scoping study for the establishment of an energy information hub to improve energy information disclosure that would provide consumers with easier access to their energy information currently held by retailers and distributors’.

The report was cited in the Australian Energy Market Commission’s ‘Power of Choice – giving consumers options in the way they use electricity’, draft report, dated 6 September 2012. In RET’s formal submission to a 2012 Australian Senate Committee enquiry on electricity prices, improvements in information, and feedback to consumers about electricity use and costs, were presented as an option to address peak demand and improve the productivity of the Australian electricity system.