The Border business was among 14 industrial electricity users and producers who have signed contracts with the Australian Energy Market Operator to help avoid large-scale blackouts like those which hit South Australia last summer.

Visy was also included but the company was unable to confirm if its Wodonga plants would be affected.

Under the agreement, Norske Skog would shut down its paper machine and recycled fibre plant for a set time, likely to be between an hour and several hours, during peak demand so its electricity could be used elsewhere across the network.

Norske Skog regional procurement manager Michael Machin said the contract helped provide operational security for the Ettamogah plant.

“We would much prefer to have a controlled shutdown than to have a breakage on the electrical network which could result in an uncontrolled shutdown,” Mr Machin told The Border Mail.

He said without the agreement the market operator could just shut parts of the network down without notice, with an unscheduled emergency shutdown having a much bigger negative impact on production.

“We understand that if there’s a thunderstorm or a lightning strike hits a powerline, or a bushfire effects it, we’re like everyone else in the local area, whether it be big business or a private consumer, we just have to wear it,” Mr Machin said.

“But where you can foresee some things, you need to be in the game to avoid those nasties if you can help it.

“That’s what we’re trying to avoid, given the events in Victoria and South Australia last summer.”

AEMO would pay Norske Skog for the shutdowns but it would result in a financial loss for the mill.

With a hot summer predicted to drive energy demand higher, the AEMO chief executive Audrey Zibelman was confident the power network could survive the 2017-18 summer despite the earlier than usual hot weather hitting south-eastern Australia in the past few weeks.

“I think we have done all the right things to get ready for this summer. I feel very good about the plan we have put in place,” she told Fairfax Media

Under the Reliability and Emergency Reserve Trade (RERT) process, large electricity users, retailers and generators are contracted by AEMO to either use less energy or generate power from their owner generators. Aggregators are also contracted to procure demand response from electricity users.

The trigger points could be when the price of electricity reaches a certain level or when supply issues become critical.

The amounts AEMO is paying the companies have not been disclosed, but the market operator says the total cost of the summer readiness program, which includes the RERT, is $68 million – which is roughly half what it would have cost to keep the Hazelwood coal-fired power station operating for only two to three days a year.

“There's lots of different ways to drive productivity and efficiency in the system but frankly the markets have not valued or allowed that participation to come in in an easy way,” Ms Zibelman said.

“One of the things we've learned in this industry is when you have someone who has a back-up resources – where they have loads they can shed where it's very flexible – that can be very fast and more certain than turning on a generator.”

During a heatwave in February in NSW, the Tomago aluminium smelter near Newcastle was asked to curtail its production by 30 per cent or 300 megawatts to avoid black-outs across the state.