Why has electricity transmission become a major policy issue?

As the impacts of climate change intensify and ageing coal-fired power plants retire, there is growing urgency for Australia to accelerate the shift to renewable sources of power. A major pillar of Australia’s plans for the energy transition is the construction of high-voltage transmission lines to deliver electricity from new solar, wind, and battery infrastructure to major cities and industrial centres.

The planned routes for these new transmission lines are being mapped out across regional Australia, including farms and bushland. While hosting transmission infrastructure can provide local economic benefits – for example via landholder payments and community benefit schemes – concerns about impacts on landscapes, economies and ecosystems have led to significant community opposition in some areas.

Perceptions of fairness are central to public opinion about renewable energy infrastructure. Regional development and people’s wellbeing – as well as the ongoing sustainability of Australia’s energy system – rely on affected communities having a genuine say, and the design of this infrastructure being viewed as fair.

What are the project's aims?

The Just Transmission project (2025 - 2028) aims to investigate how electricity transmission law, policy and practices in Australia can advance a just and coherent energy transition.

The project intends to generate new knowledge on best practice for:

• meaningful and inclusive engagement regional communities on transmission projects;

• fair distribution of benefits and impacts flowing from transmission projects; and

• managing synergies and trade-offs between multiple policy objectives associated with transmission (including energy security, regional development, and social cohesion)

We hope these practical insights will contribute to a fairer and more effective energy transition in Australia, that allows economic and environmental benefits to be harnessed and shared without undermining community wellbeing, public trust, and social cohesion.

What will the project do?

Our multi-disciplinary research employs a mix of legal and policy analysis, place-based research, co-design and theoretical innovation. One component of the project involves legal and policy analysis to compare how New South Wales (NSW) and Victoria regulate transmission projects, including rules and guidance around community engagement.

A second component involves place-based research focusing on two major transmission infrastructure projects: the Hunter Transmission Project (in NSW) and VNI West (focusing on the Victoria section of the planned route). Research questions, methods, and outputs will be codesigned with key partner organisations based in and around the regional locations of the research, to ensure we ask the questions that matter to regional communities and provide answers in accessible formats. Through interviews, focus groups and workshops with community members, we aim to better understand communities’ experiences so far of engaging with electricity transmission planning and consultation processes, and their perspectives on what a fair approach to the energy transition would look like.

Based on insights from this work, we aim to develop an account of energy justice that can be applied across large-scale transmission projects and the energy transition more broadly. Findings from our research will be published in peer-reviewed academic journals, and communicated to the public and policymakers through targeted outputs including policy briefs and reports, community guidance, submissions to government inquiries, short videos and podcasts.

Who is conducting the research?

The project is led by a multi-disciplinary team of academic researchers with expertise in political science, law, geography, and co-design methods (see photo) based at the University of Canberra, the University of Sydney, and Macquarie University.

Pictured L-R: David Schlosberg, Amanda Tattersall, Madeline Taylor, Lian Sinclair, Wendy Conway-Lamb, Jonathan Pickering [Photo: Jonathan Pickering]

The team will also include two Community Fellows based in the project locations in New South Wales and Victoria, who will conduct field research and local community engagement, as well as a PhD student and a research assistant.

An Advisory Group comprising a range of government, First Nations, civil society and business representatives is providing expert input and oversight as the project evolves.

The project is funded under the Australian Research Council’s Discovery Project scheme (grant number DP250103027) for three years (July 2025-June 2028) with total funding of $1.48 million.

Main project photo: Existing electricity lines in the VNI West project area, Victoria [Photo: Jonathan Pickering]