The energy challenge behind business growth

When people think about electricity, they often think about keeping the lights on. For Tasmania's largest energy users, it's about much more than that.

It's about whether a business can expand. Whether a new facility can be built. Whether equipment can be electrified. Whether an investment stacks up.

That was the focus of a recent conversation between TasNetworks and a group of large customers from industries including aquaculture, aviation, manufacturing, water services and energy.

While their businesses are very different, many are grappling with a similar question: what will they need from the electricity network over the next decade?

For some, the answer is capacity.

Several businesses described plans to grow, electrify parts of their operations or invest in new infrastructure. But making those decisions often depends on understanding what electricity supply will be available, when it will be available and what it might cost to access.

One large customer explained that future growth is increasingly linked to electricity availability, particularly in regional areas where capacity can be more limited. Another described network capacity as a critical factor in long-term planning and investment decisions.

Reliability was never far from the discussion.

For many businesses, an outage is more than an inconvenience.

Airports spoke about the importance of power quality and redundancy. Aquaculture operators described the role electricity plays in supporting systems that are essential to production, environmental management and animal welfare. Other businesses highlighted the operational and financial impacts that can come from outages, voltage fluctuations and uncertainty around restoration timeframes.

Several participants said they had invested in backup systems to manage these risks, but noted that backup generation and batteries are not always a replacement for reliable network supply.

The discussion also highlighted how the relationship between businesses and the network is changing.

Customers spoke about increasing interest in electrification, demand response, batteries and smarter ways of managing energy use. Some businesses said they would be interested in greater flexibility, particularly where it could help support the network while also creating value for customers.

There was also a strong desire for better visibility.

Not necessarily more information, but the right information.

Customers spoke about wanting clearer visibility of future network capacity, earlier conversations about constraints and upgrades, and practical information that would help them make decisions with confidence.

What stood out most from the discussion was that these businesses see electricity as more than a utility service.

For them, the network is part of how Tasmania grows.

The insights shared through these conversations are helping TasNetworks better understand the opportunities and challenges facing large customers, and how the network can continue to support investment, innovation and economic growth across the state.

The feedback wasn't just about today's challenges. It was about understanding what businesses will need from the network in the future. Those insights are now helping inform TasNetworks' planning and the development of its Revenue Reset proposal for 2029-34.