Driving down power prices, and cutting emissions in Victoria

Our Labor Government created the Victorian Default Offer (VDO), which slashed power prices for households, and continues to push power prices down today.

Importantly, the VDO is also the maximum allowable price that can be charged in embedded networks, which are common in high-rise apartment buildings.

The newly released 2025-26 draft default offers show Victorians will continue to pay less for electricity than those in other states.

For households, the draft VDO for Victoria is $448.90 per year or more than 21 per cent cheaper than the draft average DMO across SA, NSW and QLD.

For small businesses, the draft VDO for Victoria is $1582.80 per year or more than 30 per cent cheaper than the draft average DMO across SA, NSW and QLD.

Victoria’s VDO and power prices are lower because we’ve prioritised household cost of living, over energy company profits.

The VDO has the lowest-allowed profit margin for energy retail companies in the country (five per cent), reduced in 2024-25, and again in 2025-26.

The Minister for Energy and Resources wrote to the ESC in early 2025 calling on them to prioritise households’ cost of living, even if that meant less profits for private energy companies.

Victoria’s power prices are lower than other states, led by our record investment in renewable energy.

We’re also supporting apartment residents to save with solar with our nation-leading Solar for Apartments program. Hundreds of apartment buildings across the state are now installing solar thanks to these rebates, with many located in our local area.

Victoria is proud to be leading the country in delivering climate action and transitioning to renewable energy. We are bringing back the State Electricity Commission – to drive down power bills and create thousands of jobs.

The Allan Labor Government has legislated ambitious targets for renewable generation of 65 per cent by 2030 and 95 per cent by 2035, and nation-leading storage targets of at least 2.6GW by 2030 and 6.3GW by 2035.

We’ve also legislated offshore wind energy targets of at least 2GW by 2032, 4GW by 2035 and 9GW by 2040.

These are critical to achieving our world leading climate targets to reduce Victoria’s emissions by 45 to 50 per cent below 2005 levels by 2030, 75 to 80 per cent by 2035 and achieving net zero emissions by 2045.

Victoria is well on its way to meeting these targets. We’ve more than tripled the share of renewable energy since 2014 and are now generating 39 per cent of our power from renewables. •