Origin spends a lot of energy talking to all stakeholders

Age
Thursday 12/10/2006, Page: 5

The power company says it needs to lead by example to encourage use of renewable energy, writes Grant King.

Origin Energy has recognised the issues generally described as sustainability as critical to the survival and prosperity of our business. Origin Energy has operations in Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific, with more than 3000 employees, serving more than 2 million customers.

The company's business includes gas and oil exploration and production, power generation, LPG distribution, energy retailing and network management. Origin Energy interacts with a wide variety of stakeholders, including shareholders, customers, community members, employees, governments and regulators.

The sustainability of our activities depends on the trust and goodwill of our stakeholders.

We rely on them for access to land and resources; to buy our products and services; and to maintain a stable political and economic system that encourages investment in and development of resources. We also rely on the community to provide employees and, through them, the skills needed to conduct our business.

Community consultation is a critical part of our development projects and day-to-day operations. We conduct extensive consultation with stakeholders during the planning, development and construction of major projects, and then throughout the life of the assets.

Origin also consults stakeholders in the development of key products. For example, we engaged environment groups in the design of our "green power" products prior to their launch. This consultation partly led to 100 per cent wind product being ranked as a national market leader by a coalition of environmental groups.

Origin also purchases wind power for most of our premises, believing that if we are to encourage our customers to support renewable energy, we should lead by example.

During 2005-06, Origin assisted 15,691 customers with financial counselling and no-interest loans. To better understand customer concerns, Origin Energy established a national customer consultative council with representatives from industry and non-government community organisations. This group has helped us develop our "power on" program to address the inability of some customers to pay for their energy consumption.

Energy policy and regulation are priority issues for federal and state governments, and we seek to maintain effective relationships with government at all levels through participation in public debates where we can make a relevant and meaningful contribution.

Origin is a participant in the Australian Business Roundtable on Climate Change. In April, the roundtable launched the report, Time Business Case for Early Action, which argues that Australia can deliver significant reductions in greenhouse gas emissions at an affordable cost.

Origin's involvement in the roundtable is consistent with the company's commitment to highlight the need for a clear national policy on carbon pricing so that future investors in the energy sector can include carbon risk in their decisions.

Other roundtable members included BP Australia, Insurance Australia Group, Swiss Re, Visy Industries, Westpac and the Australian Conservation Foundation.

We believe that to improve the sustainability of our activities, we must identify, implement and measure key indicators of sustainable performance. At the same time, we are working to ensure that these sustainability indicators, with appropriate objectives and targets, are fully integrated with other measures of management performance.

Grant King is managing director of Origin Energy.