Community
22 October, 2025
Beach warns about proposed reform
BEACH Energy has responded to the Australian Manufacturing lobby’s campaign to impose gas price controls.
In a speech to the National Press Club on Wednesday, October 8, BlueScope Steel managing director and chief executive Mark Vassella said the state of Australia’s gas market was in decline and needed urgent reform.
“The looming risk to manufacturing is the result of long-standing dysfunction in the domestic gas market and the lack of a fair gas price for Australian customers,” he said.
“If industry and government are smart enough to navigate these conditions, our manufacturing sector will remain viable, and the Federal Government’s Future Made in Australia economic policy can be a reality.
“Immediate reservation of uncontracted gas would bring rapid relief for east coast manufacturing businesses.
“Our analysis confirmed by external experts indicates that it should be possible to deliver gas to east coast customers at well below $10-per-gigajoule and still achieve reasonable returns on investment for gas companies based on their production costs.
“There won’t be a reform put on the round table that would create a bigger or faster boost to productivity than an east coast gas reservation system.”
Beach Energy managing director and chief executive office Brett Woods said the manufacturing sector’s campaign to encourage gas price-setting as part of the Federal Government’s National Gas Market Review was “overly simplistic and distracts from real solutions” to fixing the east coast gas market – removing policy and regulatory roadblocks and ensuring clear incentives to developing more domestic supply.
“Timelines from discovery to first gas continue to lengthen while uncertainty around policy settings add significant cost and risk to investment decisions,” he said.
“Gas exploration in Australia has decreased by 74 per cent during the past decade, indicating that policy, fiscal and regulatory settings are discouraging essential capital investment which will improve local supply.
“Any further economic constraints will only see this decrease further, and therefore deliver less natural gas to manufacturers, businesses and Australian households.
“It is difficult to see how introducing market intervention that would significantly deter exploration, production and supply could have anything but a detrimental impact on the Federal Government’s Future Made in Australia policy and the jobs and economic benefit tied with it.”
Mr Woods said price capping gas would not work in the market long-term.
“Despite the challenges of bringing new supply to market, Australian wholesale natural gas prices are in the lowest quartile of Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) nations,” he said.
“If manufacturers believe there is cheap natural gas to be discovered and developed, then they should partner with producers to risk capital, invest upstream and share the commercial realities of bringing new natural gas to market.
“History shows us time and time again that arbitrary market intervention through price caps and regulation does not work.
“Any short terms benefits to buyers are soon lost due to the much more severe long-term impacts of disincentivising supply-side capital investment.”
As a major supplier to the industrials and manufacturing segment, Beach Energy has publicly supported a prospective domestic natural gas reservation policy.
Beach Energy supplies 100 per cent of its east coast natural gas to domestic customers and ranks as the third largest domestic only supplier – 19 per cent of market share produced and marketed in financial year 2025 – with a stated vision and strategy of growing its domestic gas position.
Mr Woods said it was important the manufacturing, oil and gas industries were aligned in advocating for policies and regulations to promote more local natural gas supply and storage to support peak periods.
“We understand the pressure facing manufacturers and I agree that manufacturing represents the highest value use of gas – however it is important that the sector focuses on viable solutions to fix the east coast market through increased supply,” he said.
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