page_title: History of electricity supply in Queensland
section_title: Regional networks 1938-1963
hierarchical_section_title: History of electricity supply in Queensland / Establishing networks / Regional networks 1938-1963
caption_attribution_description: English: Workmen and engineers on the Barron Gorge tramway, ca. 1935 Barron Gorge Hydro-Power Station was Australia's first underground power station, built in 1935 to harness the water flowing over Barron Falls. This is the access tramway down the side of Barron Gorge during hydro construction. (Description supplied with photograph.).
context_page_description: The provision of electricity in Queensland required a considerable degree of pioneering, innovation, and commitment. Queensland proved to be a pioneer in the supply of electricity in Australia, with the first public demonstration in Australia, the first recorded use for public purposes in the country, the first Parliament House in Australia and the first commercial operations in Australia all occurring in Brisbane.
  Generation and limited distribution was initially the responsibility of local authorities, until a central state-based authority to coordinate the generation and distribution of electrical power was established in 1938. In the late 1990s, the electricity sector was restructured to enable integration with the National Electricity Market.
  The history of power generation and distribution in Queensland can be considered in three major phases: Initial local generation and distribution; creation of a statewide body and the consequent creation of an extensive network; and the restructure to enable integration with the NEM.
context_section_description: On 17 January 1938, the SECQ was established, and quickly began to strengthen CEL by actively ensuring that all the other electricity undertakings in South East Queensland were absorbed into the one entity. By 1940, CEL had acquired the generating and distribution assets at Ipswich, Southport, Nambour, Coolangatta, Gympie, Redcliffe, Boonah, Beaudesert and Highfields, and the Tweed Shire in northern New South Wales. This created a situation where the two electricity providers in South East Queensland were the BCC and CEL. The two systems were connected in 1940 as a wartime contingency.
  The SECQ commissioned construction of transmission lines to Kilcoy, from Townsville to Stuart, Dalby to Jandowae and Cairns to Mossman in 1938, and encouraged the Maroochy Shire Council to connect Maroochydore to the CEL north coast 33 kV line then under construction to Nambour via Caboolture, Woodford, Maleny and Mapleton. Goomeri was connected to Murgon in 1940, and the north coast transmission line reached Gympie in 1943. Despite the materials shortages experienced during WW2, the length of transmission lines constructed in Queensland by 1945 had increased 88% to 771 km, supplying nearly 48,000 customers.
  During this period a private power station was established at Yarraman in 1939, and operated until 1954 when that town was connected to the transmission network, this being the last private power generator of the pioneering era.
  In 1946, the SECQ announced plans to construct three regional power stations at Howard (on a coalfield near Maryborough), Rockhampton and Townsville, to supply regional networks centred on those locations. The power stations opened in 1951, 1952 and 1953 respectively. Nanango was connected to Kingaroy in 1948, both being supplied by the Howard power station upon its opening in 1951. The interconnection of the Darling Downs area from Toowoomba also commenced in 1946, with Stanthorpe and Killarney connected that year, Pittsworth and Millmerran the following year, Acland in 1948 and Goombungee in 1949, the supply to the Darling Downs area being boosted with the construction of the first 110 kV line from the CEL network to Postmans Ridge (near Toowoomba) in 1950.
  In 1953, the SECQ was regionalised, with the Southern Electricity Authority (SEA) immediately acquiring CEL and installing Queensland's first peak load power stations, both 10 MW units, at Abermain (on a coalfield north of Ipswich) and on the site of the Tennyson Power Station, then under construction by the Brisbane City Council. CEL had also been constructing a new power station, Bulimba B, which opened the following year, and it together with the Tennyson station which opened in 1955 significantly eased the post-war power shortages that had seen frequent brown-outs, load shedding by industries and staggered work hours introduced to alleviate that situation.
  In the far north of the state, expansion of electricity generation capacity in the Cairns region was determined to be more economically achieved by hydro-electric schemes, as the cost of shipping coal to Cairns was significant. The Kareeya Hydro Power Station was commissioned in 1957, and the Barron Gorge power station was significantly expanded in 1963. At Mt Isa, the first stage of the Mica Creek Power Station was commissioned in 1960, coal being transported there as a 'back load' in wagons used to haul metal ingots from the smelter to Townsville that would otherwise be empty on the return journey. This continued until the station converted to burn gas in 2000.
  By this stage most towns with a population greater than 1,000 had an electricity supply, and in recognition of the needs of smaller and more remote communities, the Queensland Government introduced the 'Local Powerhouse Scheme', whereby it would subsidise 67% of the cost of a local power supply to towns with a population of >250. Powerhouses opened in Charleville, Augathella, Quilpie, Aramac and Muttaburra in 1952 under this scheme, as did Jericho's in 1953 and those in Morven, Tambo, Bollon, Yuleba, Baralaba, Capella, Kilkivan and Texas in 
caption: Access tramway used for the construction of the Barron Gorge Hydroelectric Power Station, ~1935
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