The new Bureau of Resources and Energy Economics (BREE) has begun operations as an independent research unit within the Federal resources, energy and tourism portfolio.

 

The new agency will be headed up by chief economist, Professor Quentin Grafton, whose appointment was announced last week and will take up the position in August. Professor Grafton is currently based at the Australian National University as the Director of the Centre for Water Economics, Environment and Policy and Professor of Economics at the Crawford School of Economics and Government.  He is also the UNESCO Chair in Water Economics and Transboundary Water Governance.

 

The agency is made up mostly of staff transferred from the resources and energy branch of ABARES.

 

An advisory board of leading energy and resource sector economists has also been appointed to support the creation of BREE.  These include: Professor Paul Simshauser, Chief Economist from AGL; Vivek Tulpulé, Chief Economist from Rio Tinto; Justin Smirk, Senior Economist at Westpac; Dr Lynne Chester from the University of Sydney; Anne Nolan, Director General of the WA Department of Finance; Dr David Gruen, Commonwealth Treasury’s Deputy Secretary; and Phillip Glyde, Executive Director of ABARES.

 

BREE’s responsibilities will include maintenance of the full existing suite of the ABARES publications and data series relating to the resource and energy sector; and as a professional services organisation, undertaking projects for external third-party clients and publishing in professional journals.

 

BREE will establish written research protocols which will extend on and further formalise many of the current practices undertaken by ABARES as a research organisation operating within the Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry. BREE  and ABARES will collaborate on shared areas of interest, including relevant databases.

 

More information is at http://bree.gov.au/about.html