Guidelines for the CCO in determining regional critical contingencies.
The Gas Governance (Critical Contingency Management) Regulations 2008 (CCM Regulations) were amended in 2013 following a Gas Industry Co recommendation to the Minister of Energy and Resources. One of the amendments changes the arrangements relating to regional critical contingencies to ensure the status of an event (regional or otherwise) be determined as soon as possible during a critical contingency. As a result, the 2013 amendments included the following requirements:
- the industry body (Gas Industry Co) must prepare and publish guidelines to assist the critical contingency operator (CCO) to determine whether a critical contingency is a regional critical contingency.
- as soon as possible after determining a critical contingency, the CCO must determine whether it is a regional critical contingency and publish a notice of that determination; and
- during a critical contingency, the CCO must also consider whether any event has occurred that would cause it to revise the CCO's determination and, if so, publish a notice to that effect.
Before Gas Industry Co can publish guidelines it is required to:
- prepare and publish draft guidelines for consultation; and
- consider submissions and make any necessary changes to the guidelines.
Accordingly, Gas Industry Co has released a brief document containing draft guidelines for consultation and sought stakeholder feedback on those draft guidelines.