Compensation uncertain amid coal power plant struggles

Queensland taxpayers still don't know the upper limit on financial compensation they'll fund for a private coal power station under a federal price cap.

Reports last year that compensation of up to $450 million would be paid to Rio Tinto and partners for their power station in Gladstone, to make up for a cap on coal prices, were denied last year by Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.

Queensland Energy Minister Mick de Brenni on Monday refused to speculate on a possible ceiling for a rebate paid to the 1680 megawatt plant. 

The plant usually powers Rio's aluminium smelter in Gladstone but has been selling to the electricity grid to fill the shortfall left by the troubled Callide Power Station in central Queensland.

Mr de Brenni said the compensation estimate was still being worked through.

"Those questions are reasonably hypothetical depending on the global prices of coal and other commodities," he told reporters on Monday.

A dollar figure would be publicly released "as part of our ordinary budget cycles", he said.

Publicly owned generator CS Energy announced earlier this month the Callide Power Station wouldn't be fully operational until next January.

The 1540MW plant, which meets roughly 30 per cent of the state's electricity demand, hasn't run at capacity since May 2021.

CS has insisted the delay is not unusual and restoring full capacity depends on issues identified during repair and maintenance of the station's four generation units, after a series of accidents.

The company operates two units at the Callide C plant in a 50-50 joint venture with Genuity, a unit of IG Energy that went into voluntary administration at the weekend.

The private company's collapse prompted the Queensland Conservation Council (QCC) to call for the state government to take over Genuity's stake in Callide C and fast-track Callide's conversion into a renewable energy hub under Labor's decarbonisation plans.

"The Queensland government needs to accept that the joint venture was a failure, and that taking public ownership is the best way to manage the transition to cheaper, cleaner energy, without getting pulled into the financial games of large private companies," QCC energy strategist Clare Silcock said in a statement.

Ms Silcock urged the government to look closely at IG's other privately held Queensland coal-fired power station, Millmerran, and consider bringing it back to public ownership.