LATE Wednesday afternoon, reports emerged from Canberra that the federal government would use Friday's National Cabinet meeting to force a domestic coal price cap of $125 a tonne, with the governments of coal-producing states - namely NSW and Queensland - being given the responsibility of implementing the policy.
Whether or not the mooted $125 a tonne price turns out to be the actual figure, the Albanese government clearly feels itself in the middle of a political storm - one that is arguably of its own making, seeing it went to the polls earlier this year pledging the election of a Labor government would result in lower power prices.
While a range of opinion polls have recently shown strong public support for the idea of price controls on energy costs, such a result is hardly a surprise.
Few people, if asked, will say "no" to the idea of cheaper prices for anything, regardless of whether the reasons for doing so stand scrutiny.
The global onset of inflation means that energy prices, along with almost everything else, are marching higher.
Electricity generation is an especially complex field in this regard, because the industry itself is in the midst of a revolutionary practical and philosophical change - from fossil fuels to renewables.
Early and clearly misguided optimism about the ease of this switch has recently given way to a growing realisation that renewable energy is far from "free".
At the same time, the environmentally-driven effort to drive down the coal industry has resulted in supply shortages, which have in turn resulted in price spikes, given that prices are ultimately a mediation between supply and demand.
As we have reported this week, the biggest domestically focused coal company, Centennial, is already supplying its power station customers at prices well below the mooted $125 a tonne cap, thanks to long-term "legacy" contracts that were set well before prices began rising two years ago.
Price caps inevitably invite suggestions of unconstitutional "restraint of trade", and any agreement to limit prices will presumably have a corresponding promise by the state - funded by the taxpayer - to make good the coal companies' shortfalls.
That would mean "subsidising" coal companies. Whatever happens tomorrow, it will be interesting.
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