IPART sets the maximum prices that Hunter Water can charge its customers for water, wastewater and stormwater services. These are the prices for most households and businesses in Newcastle and the Hunter region.
The prices we set in this review will apply from 1 July 2025 for 5 years.
How will we review the prices
Customers should pay only what water businesses require to efficiently deliver the services their customers need. Our aim is to hold water businesses accountable in a way that delivers good short, medium, and long-term customer outcomes.
We have a robust and comprehensive framework to assist us in considering these matters. Our framework focuses on customers, costs, and credibility – which we refer to as the ‘3Cs’. It is underpinned by 12 guiding principles which both IPART and water businesses use to develop and assess pricing proposals. Our Handbook provides further information on our 3Cs framework.
What has Hunter Water proposed?
- Hunter Water has proposed bills increase by around 6% a year plus inflation.
- It has developed 6 outcomes to guide its service delivery for the next 5 years, based on its customer consultation. These are high quality water services, value for money and affordable, water security, great customer experience, environmentally sustainable and community focused. It has 10 performance metrics to measure these. It plans to improve performance against 3 outcomes - water quality, water security and environmental sustainability.
- Hunter Water proposed to invest around $480 million in a desalination plant to secure its water supply against climate variability.
- It also proposed a 2.8% increase in capital expenditure (excluding the desalination plant). It proposed to increase the renewal and replacement of older assets and reduce spending on growth and improvement assets. It proposed investing $41.3 million in water conservation.
- Hunter Water also proposed a modest increase operating expenditure (for day-to-day expenses).