Already a subscriber?It was when AGL Energy’s long-planned demerger lay in tatters, market confidence was at an all-time low and the company was at loggerheads with its famous biggest shareholder that then-chief financial officer Damien Nicks knew it was time to step up.
forced by then-11.3 per cent shareholder Mike Cannon-Brookes’ Grok Ventures, which dramatically scuppered the demerger plan earlier in the year. He put in place a decarbonisation plan for AGL that is broadly backed by Grok and overseen the closure of the Liddell coal-fired generator in NSW. RepTrak, which monitors AGL’s reputation, also recently put the company at 51 out of 60 top ASX companies, falling behind peers including Alinta, Origin Energy and EnergyAustralia.
His mother’s return to work also paid for family holidays, “camping, basic type of holidays, but fantastic from a family perspective”, he reminisces.“The learnings from them was all about ongoing commitment, a hard work perspective and it will pay off, and I think that’s really what’s been ingrained in me for many, many years,” Nicks says.
Restless for a change more than three years later, Nicks headed to London with his then-partner, now-wife, landing a role at the broking bank Cantor Fitzgerald, which, he says, “opened my mind to what else is possible”. That led to a gig with Smorgon in the US, being the “first boots on the ground” for a start-up business, LiteSteel Technologies.
“It opened my mind to operational excellence and business performance – they work on very, very skinny margins, you have to get it right in an organisation like that.” Now it’s all about when the plants will close and how AGL will replace them and transition its portfolio as required by the climate crisis, customers and many stakeholders.
for replacement generation, drawing up an “incredibly important” plan that gave clarity on the assets. He contrasts the furore then over the supposedly early closure of Liddell with the pressure now on AGL to move faster on coal shutdowns. Then, investors were taking a black-and-white decision that they were out of the stock if it involved coal, banks were retreating and insurers were turning their back.
“They are particularly focused on enabling decarbonisation of the customer and behind-the-meter opportunities, as well as exploring technologies to support both the decarbonisation of the customer and generation. Our shareholders are generally aligned in wanting AGL to deliver a decarbonised energy system for the future.”
An earlier riser, he’s at his desk in Melbourne’s CBD by 7am after a 45-minute drive in his EV from home in Warrandyte, typically catching up with the international and domestic news on the radio on the way. “Outdoors, for me, is a real cleanser that really cleanses my mind, whether it’s at the beach or in the garden, it’s an opportunity to step away from it all and try and lose yourself in not thinking about energy or not thinking about AGL for a while,” he says.