Dynamic, global environment
The CER operates in a dynamic environment that spans all sectors of the economy, levels of government and a wide range of stakeholders.
To achieve our purpose we scan the horizon, domestically and internationally, to identify trends and signals that may have implications for our schemes. Areas of focus include developments in Australia’s energy and carbon markets, such as: the emergence of nature repair markets alongside carbon markets; corporate and government initiatives to reduce and offset emissions; the development of new low emissions products and supply chains such as hydrogen, ammonia and metals; adoption of new technologies and emerging international and domestic transparency initiatives such as mandatory climate-related disclosures and standards.
Engagement with scheme participants, partners and stakeholders
We are committed to working with industry, government departments and other stakeholders as Australia transitions to a net zero economy.
We work with our scheme participants to help them understand our schemes, participate, and comply with their obligations. We are investing in our systems and process to make it easier and quicker to participate, to leverage data to improve risk management and find efficiencies. We understand that there is growing interest in the performance of our schemes and claims made by participants and are increasingly making more data and information publicly available.
Recent feedback shows our stakeholders think the CER continues to do a good job (75%) and are overall satisfied with how we perform our functions as a regulator (74%). These results remain consistent with 2022–23 results, as well as the historical average. The CER will continue to monitor views from stakeholders across all of our schemes as well as other interested parties. We’ll use this feedback as part of our ongoing work to continuously improve our consultation, engagement and support across both our existing schemes and new areas of work.
Clean Energy Regulator
Participants
Organisations and individuals who participate in our schemes, and their professional advisors
Stakeholders
Ministries, other Commonwealth departments and agencies, expert service providers, industry representatives, investors, Australian public
Partners
Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment, and Water, co-regulatory arrangements, state and territory regulators, law enforcement, scheme auditors and inspectors
Carbon markets
Efficient and effective carbon markets play an integral part in the success of our schemes. Carbon markets for ACCUs and renewable energy certificates enable emission reduction to be valued and drive investment into clean energy technology and emissions reduction actions. We continue to provide education and information to carbon markets to enable informed and active market participants. We monitor domestic carbon market developments and regularly publish information through our Quarterly Carbon Market Reports (QCMR).
We are developing a modern Unit and Certificate Register that will be user-friendly with the potential to connect with other trusted digital carbon trading platforms and exchanges while still retaining the necessary security features. The agency is also developing a carbon exchange to improve market depth and liquidity while also improving price discovery, volume transparency, and reducing the overall cost of transactions.
We also continue to support voluntary use of carbon units, improving the tracking and use of these certificates and supporting corporations moving to new mandatory disclosure requirements. Demand for units from Safeguard entities to meet new compliance obligations will see the carbon market increasingly driven by private sector demand. The CER will continue to update the market with relevant information in an open, transparent and timely manner.
Technological development
The CER continues to focus on co-designing fit for purpose technology solutions with industry to drive carbon abatement. The agency is running a change program to modernise our platforms, services and tools. We are creating an integrated ecosystem that will enable us to ingest and manage higher volumes of diverse data, progressively assure compliance on a risk basis and be ready to support other government agencies as they implement initiatives that contribute to Australia’s net zero emissions goal. Through contemporary agile delivery practices, user testing and industry engagement, we are committed to delivering innovative solutions to support evolving carbon markets.
The agency has made extensive use of cloud hosting arrangements with the vast majority of systems already operating in the cloud. Our cloud management capabilities and practices underpin our secure, accessible, and adaptable foundation for digital services.
International developments
We are committed to working with international organisations to enable the sharing of data and knowledge, support the trading of international carbon units and facilitate the development of new international low emissions product supply chains backed by high integrity certification.
As part of our international commitments, the agency continues to provide regular briefings to international government representatives on the schemes we run and Australia’s carbon market, to support climate reporting and carbon
markets internationally.
We monitor international carbon market developments to better understand the implications for Australia’s domestic carbon markets and to support Australia in meeting its international obligations under the Kyoto and Paris agreements.
In conjunction with the Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water, our staff participate in the annual United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) greenhouse gas inventory review process, providing expertise to help ensure that national inventory information submitted by parties under the UNFCCC is consistent, transparent and complete.
Collectors and custodians of data
The CER is the custodian of Australia’s key emissions, energy and abatement data. We provide regular insights and data that inform government policy, programs and activities and help meet Australia’s international reporting obligations. Recent government reforms will enable us to publish more detailed data about our schemes.
Quality data is essential for the integrity of our schemes and in supporting a vibrant carbon market while underpinning the reputation of the agency as a trusted, relevant and expert institution. We are upgrading our systems to automatically validate key scheme data. These steps will improve scheme integrity and make it easier for scheme participants to gain benefits more quickly.
We have released a beta version of our data services website where stakeholders and the public can find, access, use and understand our data. We will progressively populate this site over the term of the Corporate Plan and seek feedback from users. The new platform will provide searchable, flexible, and dynamic access to the data collected and stored by the CER and allow for faster automated information exchanges with data consumers. This work aligns with the Australian Government’s national data strategy and is guided by the provisions within our legislation that govern how we use, share and manage our data safely and securely.
Appetite for data is increasing and we understand that our data can help unlock new business opportunities, understand progress in reducing emissions and evidence environmental claims. We acknowledge that high levels of transparency and accountability are crucial if Australia is to be competitive in a decarbonising world. We welcome recent government commits to increase transparency following the Independent Review of the ACCU Scheme. We have published carbon areas for our registered ACCU Scheme projects and expect to release further details as new rules are made.
Data is critical to everything we do. We are pursuing opportunities for improving the way we use our data, including re-use to reduce regulatory burden, improved integration to enable sophisticated analytics and insights, and cataloguing to aid accurate interpretations. Internally, we will continue to foster a data-led culture to encourage all employees to extend their data capabilities. By focussing on data as part of our workforce planning, we hope to attract, grow and retain a skilled workforce that can confidently use data in decision making, to drive operational efficiencies and to detect and predict trends and potential non-compliance. Work is also underway as part of the data strategy to invest in data infrastructure and tools and uplift data governance and practices to ultimately deliver more timely, reliable and repeatable data services to our people, participants and the public.