RHIANA WHITSON, REPORTER: Flicker’s textiles in Melbourne is one of the last two remaining manufacturers of its kind left in Australia.YARON FLICKER, FLICKERS AUSTRALIA: We're a textile mill that dyes fabric. To dye fabric, we need to make hot water and steam, and the only economical way at this point in time is to use gas.
TIM PIPER, AUSTRALIAN INDUSTRY GROUP: Victoria's been a great manufacturing state for over a century now. We want to maintain that, and part of maintaining that is to have a permanent gas supply that is consistent. TIM PIPER: Worst case scenario for industry in particular is that we will be lacking in a gas supply in a couple of years’ time, that the costs will skyrocket and companies will either have to decide whether to stay in Australia or how they are going to change their manufacturing outfit, and that's going to be really difficult and really expensive to do, and some can't do that, so they might decide to up and leave Victoria.
RICK WILKINSON: This makes a lot of sense, because to bring gas as LNG from Western Australia into Port Kembla for Sydney, or into Port Phillip Bay for Melbourne, the cheapest way is to do that on a ship versus a pipeline. LILY D'AMBROSIO: Well, I would dispute that. The market operator, they have indicated the need for other actions to be taken, including an import terminal to be in place, delivering gas for 2028 and the actions that we’ve taken are absolutely in line with meeting all of those objectives.
RHIANA WHITSON: Those who stay connected to gas will be left to help pay for the cost of bringing on new supply on top of being exposed to market shocks.