Overview

Our core business is supporting regional, rural and remote NSW communities by operating and maintaining one of Australia’s largest electricity networks.

Our 183,000 km of powerlines cover 95 per cent of New South Wales (NSW) and parts of southern Queensland, serving more than 890,000 customers including homes, hospitals, schools, businesses and community services. Our priorities are employee, contractor and community safety and the reliability, security and cost efficiency of the network. We keep our customers’ network charges as low as possible while delivering an acceptable Return on Capital Employed.

Our vision is empowering communities to share and use energy for a better tomorrow by enabling energy solutions that improve life. This means maintaining a safe and reliable network as we become an energy business for the future by implementing a whole-of-business transformation program.

Our values inform our decisions and the way we do our work, including how we treat our customers and each other. All of our employees are enabled and encouraged to make safety their own, be easy to do business with, make every dollar count, be courageous, shape the future, and be inclusive, supportive and honest.

We have about one-third the number of customers per kilometre of powerline compared with average customer density across the National Electricity Market, due to the geographic spread of our network and the absence of large urban areas.

We need more poles and wires to reach each customer, which increases our service costs. Our relatively sparsely populated networks also present significant logistical and economic challenges in terms of achieving reliability and service quality targets.

Essential Water operates in the far west of NSW, servicing a population of approximately 18,000 people. We deliver a secure water supply to around 10,500 people in Broken Hill, Menindee, Silverton, and Sunset Strip, as well as rural customers. We also provide reliable sewerage services to around 9,700 customers in Broken Hill. The network includes dams, water treatment plants, sewage treatment plants, reservoirs, water and sewage pumping stations, mains, and related infrastructure.