Jemena has constructed the mains and pipelines that deliver natural gas to the Barangaroo urban renewal project in Sydney, New South Wales.
Natural gas is now flowing to Barangaroo’s waterfront development, marking a significant milestone in the precinct’s timeline.
The Barangaroo project encompasses a promenade, parklands, plazas and coves.
Jemena stated that connecting the natural gas to the 52,000km2 precinct was not without its challenges, including the laying of new, high pressure steel service, which had to be fed through a precast sleeve installed in the concrete slab two years prior.
The highly complex process also required specialist welding crews, which were provided by Zinfra, part of Jemena’s group of companies.
In addition, the company has advised that it is planning to renew 146km of mains to improve network efficiencies to the Jemena gas network (JGN), following the Australian Energy Regulator’s (AER) final decision on its pricing proposal for the 2020-2025 period.
Jemena further outlined that the 2020-2025 period will also deliver customer benefits through improvements to the JGN, which transports natural gas to 1.4 million NSW customers.
As part of the improvements, Jemena will: maintain the safety and reliability of the network; connect more than 145,000 homes and business across NSW to the network; and streamline customer experiences.
Jemena advised that from next month the amount charged for the distribution of gas to homes and businesses via the JGN in NSW will fall.
The company stated that gas distribution charges is around 35-40 per cent of a residential gas bill, with NSW residential customers set to save $254 over the next five years.
In addition, those in regional areas are also set to save $369 over the next five years, and small to medium commercial customers will save between $1585 and $15,516.
AER chair Clare Savage recognised Jemena’s high quality approach to customer engagement following a time where the business community is calling for lower gas prices at the economy responds to the impacts of COVID-19.
“To its credit, JGN has in turn responded to those concerns by putting forward a proposal that puts downward pressure on gas network charges and consumers’ bills in the 2020–25 period,” Savage said.
Prior to the announcement, Jemena, alongside other eery distributors announced that it was participating in the Energy Network Relief package, and would waive gas distraction charges for customers experiencing hardship following COVID-19.