Why did renewables leader South Australia miss out on energy bill relief?

Thursday 28 May 2026

The media and Climate Change and Energy Minister Chris Bowen were busy crowing about renewables supposedly helping lower the Default Market Offer (DMO) electricity prices, which were released this week by the Australian Energy Regulator (AER).

“We’ve just hit 50% renewables, and renewables are the cheapest form of energy, and that puts downward pressure on prices”, Bowen told ABC’s AM.

“We reformed the default market offer to really make sure that only the absolute necessary prices or costs are included, [for example] very minimal allowances for energy companies to go and get new customers”.

The full text of this article is available to MacroBusiness subscribers

$1 for your first month, then:

$24.99 / month

$249 / year

Cancel at any time through our billing provider, Stripe

About the author

Leith van Onselen is Chief Economist at the MB Fund and MB Super. He is also a co-founder of MacroBusiness. Leith has previously worked at the Australian Treasury, Victorian Treasury and Goldman Sachs.