Architect of ACT’s transition to 100 pct net renewables to head Victoria’s State Electricity Commission

Victoria’s rebooted State Electricity Commission has a new leader, with the appointment of renewable energy policy and investment champion, and former ACT energy minister Simon Corbell as chair of the renewable energy and electrification focused public utility.

State energy minister Lily D’Ambrosio on Tuesday announced the appointment of Corbell to head up the SEC board along with four new board directors – Joycelyn Morton, Anna Skarbek, Jo Benvenuti and Damien Barnes. Work is underway to fill two additional board positions.

D’Ambrosio says Corbell’s “considerable experience” in renewable energy policy, regulation and investment – most recently as CEO of the Clean Energy Investor Group – will be key to guiding the SEC in its work.

Corbell established himself as a spearhead of renewables policy in his role as the ACT’s minister for the environment and – at the time, in the 2010s – the architect of the only functioning renewable energy policy in Australia.

That policy – and the territory’s renewable energy auctions – both for large-scale solar and wind energy capacity – were game changing and life-saving for the industry at a time when policy, both federally and in other states on the NEM, was being either removed or pared back.

In his role as CEO of the CEIG, Corbell has campaigned for reform on some of the key barriers to the scale of renewable energy investment needed in Australia at the moment, to usher out coal and replace it with firmed renewables.

“There is an enormous, gargantuan pool of capital,” he told the 2024 Smart Energy Conference in Sydney in March. “But capital will go to where it can get the best returns. Capital will deploy where the risks are lower and the returns are therefore more predictable and more certain.

“As our grid transitions to the 82 per cent renewables target set by the federal government we need to keep a focus on fit for purpose market design. Because we do have a market and it needs to be an efficient one and it needs to enable the lowest cost of capital outcome.”

This will be an important focus in his new role, too, with the SEC’s overarching mandate being to help deliver 4.5 gigawatts of new renewable electricity generation and storage to fill gaps in the state’s power mix as its last three coal plants exit the system over the coming decade.

Speaking in ad address to the Centre for Economic Development Australia in Melbourne earlier this month, the SEC’s acting CEO Chris Miller said the prevailing market signals aren’t generating investments in new renewable energy capacity and storage at the speed and scale Victoria need.

“There’s a need for a pragmatic … investor to help with this and this is where we think the SEC can play a really important role.”

Corbell says Victoria is relatively well placed in the race to renewables, compared to other jurisdictions, thanks to the government’s ambitious 95 per cent by 2035 target and to recent reforms to the state’s planning assessment process, to help fast-track the development of new solar and wind projects.

He says the SEC needs to use its equity – the Commission was launched with a $1 billion budget, a quarter of which has gone towards funding a 600MW big battery at the Melbourne Renewable Energy Hub – to leverage private investment.

“We need to use our capital, which is the Victorian people’s capital, to accelerate more investment overall,” Corbell told Renew Economy on Tuesday.

“So I want to see strong partnerships with the private sector, with private investors … In collaboration we can deliver more than we would just by either of us acting alone. And I think that’s a really important piece for us to deliver.”

The other really important piece, he adds, is to make sure the community is brought along on the journey.

“I think the key challenge in Victoria will remain social licence and community engagement, as well as delivery of [new transmission]. So those those two things will be challenges for the SEC as much as they are challenges for the market as a whole,” Corbell told Renew Economy.

But the first order of business for Corbell, he says, will be to set in place a well established and functioning SEC board and to support its management team to operate as an independent, government owned business in the energy sector.

“This is something that has not existed in Victoria at all, since since privatisation in the in the 80s. And so this is a big undertaking for the government and for the community to have a government-owned business back in the energy space.

“So it’s really about …building out a really clear scheduled program of investment in the assets that we need to help the government meet its renewable energy and climate change goals – and do that in a way that delivers value to the Victorian community.

“So that means jobs and economic activity, but it also means opportunities to deliver sustainable returns to the people, to taxpayers, and then finally, to help the community make the shift in terms of the energy transition and electrification.

“There’s a lot of work for us to do,” he says. “But initially, let’s make sure that the SEC is set up for success with strong governance, strong support to the executive team from the independent board, and engagement with the … private investment community.”

Will there be a boost to the funding for the SEC, now the new board is in place?

“Well, I think we have to let the board get their feet under the boardroom table [first],” Corbell says. “But I think everyone shares the ambition that we need to we need to get on with it and make sure that the community, the government and the market, understands what we’re doing and how we’re doing it.

“I want to accelerate that activity, but we’ll do that still in an orderly way, and in a considered way, consistent with the strategy the government has given us.”

Of Corbell’s fellow board members, Joycelyn Morton has broad experience as a director of both ASX-listed companies and government-owned corporations, including Epic Energy, Gelion and Snowy Hydro, where she also chaired the Risk and Audit Committee.

Anna Skarbek is another very well known name in Australia’s climate and clean energy space, including as the current CEO of Climateworks Centre and a founding director of the Clean Energy Finance Corporation. She has also already served on the SEC Expert Advisory Panel.

Jo Benvenuti is on the Board of Gippsland Water and also served on the SEC Expert Advisory Panel, while Damien Barnes is a Bidjara man with 30 years experience in law, commercial management and engineering, including in infrastructure, mining,resources, energy, renewables and cultural heritage.

“Simon Corbell and the new board directors have exceptional credentials in their fields and will lead the revived SEC as it accelerates our energy transition and drives down energy bills for Victorians,” said D’Ambrosio on Tuesday.