{"id":341988,"date":"2026-03-22T09:24:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-22T09:24:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/341988\/"},"modified":"2026-03-22T09:24:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-22T09:24:11","slug":"australia-fuel-supply-strong-no-plans-to-ration-energy-minister-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/341988\/","title":{"rendered":"Australia fuel supply strong, no plans to ration, energy minister says"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/4L7QHCR_RNZD1042_jpg.jpeg\" width=\"1050\" height=\"700\" alt=\"Finance Minister Grant Robertson, and Climate Minister James Shaw meet with their Australian counterparts, Treasurer Jim Chalmers and Climate and Energy Minister Chris Bowen, and sign a joint statement outlining areas of enhanced cooperation, to support accelerated climate action and economic opportunities that the clean energy transformation offers both countries.\"\/><\/p>\n<p class=\"photo-captioned__information\">\nAustralian Energy Minister Chris Bowen.<br \/>\nPhoto: RNZ \/ Angus Dreaver\n<\/p>\n<p>Australia&#8217;s fuel supply remains strong and there are no immediate plans to ration fuel to manage the impact of the Iran war on the nation&#8217;s supply chain, Energy Minister Chris Bowen says.<\/p>\n<p>Australia, which imports about 90 percent of its fuel, has experienced localised shortages, as the escalating US-Israeli war disrupts supply.<\/p>\n<p>The nation has 38 days of petrol, and 30 days of diesel and jet fuel, Bowen said. Supply remains strong, despite the cancellation of six fuel shipments from Asia.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;While we are dealing with an uncertainty, we still have two refineries working full pelt,&#8221; he said. &#8220;It would be better if we had more, sure, but we do have two and we also have the boats continuing to arrive.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Asked about whether the centre-left government would consider using emergency powers to ration fuel, Bowen said: &#8220;We&#8217;re a long way from that.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Prime Minister Anthony Albanese again urged Australians not to panic-buy fuel amid shortages in some rural areas.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;People need to engage responsibly and I&#8217;m sure that, overwhelmingly, that&#8217;s what Australians will do,&#8221; Albanese said.<\/p>\n<p>Last week, Albanese said his government would roll out additional measures to safeguard fuel supply, appointing Anthea Harris, the former boss of the Australian Energy Regulator, as head of a national fuel supply taskforce to tackle shortages and improve the domestic fuel supply chain.<\/p>\n<p>&#8211; Reuters<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Australian Energy Minister Chris Bowen. Photo: RNZ \/ Angus Dreaver Australia&#8217;s fuel supply remains strong and there are&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":341989,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[48,47,42,43,49,46,44,45,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-341988","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-audio","tag-current-affairs","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-podcasts","tag-public-radio","tag-radio-new-zealand","tag-rnz","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341988","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=341988"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/341988\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/341989"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=341988"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=341988"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=341988"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}