The current Wiring Rules, AS/NZS 3000:2018, are being rewritten. Standards Australia's committee EL-001 has been working since 2024 towards a new edition targeted for publication in mid-2027, and the draft for public comment, which the Electrical and Communications Association of WA's published timeline (opens in a new tab) places in the third quarter of 2026, has not yet appeared. With eight days left in the quarter, and a Clipsal by Schneider Electric webinar on the changes scheduled for 23 September, this is the point at which an installer should know what is coming and what is not.
Where the revision stands
The restructured EL-001 committee spent 2024 on a scoping exercise informed by more than 500 items of industry feedback, and in November 2024 Standards Australia put a maintenance strategy proposal out for comment with a closing date of 5 December 2024, circulated to members by Master Electricians Australia (opens in a new tab). The proposal set out a targeted update of AS/NZS 3000 for publication around mid-2027, and it is that date the committee has held to since.
Writing a year later in Electrical Connection (opens in a new tab), Lucy Finlay, Standards and Regulation Manager at Schneider Electric and a member of the committee, described the intervening six months as 65 working group and technical committee meetings across five separate working groups, each on a specific subject, alongside the main committee. Her stated aim at that point was a public comment draft before mid-2026 and publication in mid-2027. ECA WA's timeline, published two months later, moved the draft to the third quarter of 2026 and kept mid-2027 for the final edition.
Neither the Standards Australia Wiring Rules page nor the sources above listed a public comment draft as at 22 September 2026. The third quarter ends on 30 September. Whether the draft lands in the coming days or the target moves again, the practical reading is the same: the comment period has not opened, and the mid-2027 publication date should be treated as a target that depends on it.
Three subjects driving the rewrite
The committee has been open that this edition is not a tidy-up. Three subjects are reshaping core clauses.
The first is earthing. Australian installations are built around the multiple earthed neutral system, which the international standard IEC 60364-1 classifies as TN-C-S. The committee intends to incorporate requirements for the other system types described in that standard, including TT, IT and the remaining TN variants, so that the Rules can describe installations that do not rely on the MEN arrangement.
The second is energy systems, and it follows from the first. Finlay put the question directly: will a single earth electrode be sufficient when an installation operates in island mode after a grid failure? A home with a battery and backup circuit is an islanded installation for as long as the outage lasts, and the earthing arrangement it depends on in that state is not the one it depends on when the grid is present. New requirements are planned for installations with more than one source of supply on the same busbar, which is the arrangement every AC-coupled battery retrofit creates, and the one an electrician now meets during unrelated work on a home that already has a battery.
The third is EV charging. The Rules currently require 100 per cent of the rated capacity of an EV charger to be used in determining maximum demand. The committee is examining how an electrical energy management system that limits the charger could be recognised in that calculation. For a residential switchboard already carrying a heat pump, an induction cooktop and a hybrid inverter, the difference between a 7 kW charger counted in full and one counted at a managed limit is the difference between a straightforward addition and a supply upgrade.
ECA WA's summary of the expected changes adds a set of structural items: clarified definitions, including how the distinction between a repair and an alteration is applied; revised switchboard terminology and the introduction of a "control cabinet" definition; a restructuring of RCD requirements and the positioning of Type AC devices within the clauses; closer alignment with IEC standards; and a simpler clause structure.
A fixed four-year cycle after 2027
The 2018 edition has been amended three times in five years. Amendment 1, published on 31 January 2020, adjusted the service protective device provisions and added references to AS/NZS 5139 for battery systems. Amendment 2, in April 2021, changed RCD selection and started the 24-month transition away from Type AC devices, with switchboard accessibility and verification changes that Western Australia made mandatory from 30 October 2021. Amendment 3, published on 19 May 2023, rewrote the switchboard and switchgear clauses, replacing references to the AS/NZS 3439 series with AS/NZS 61439 and references to AS/NZS 60884-1 with AS/NZS 3112.
The committee's proposal is to end that pattern. After the 2027 edition it intends a fixed four-year cycle, with only amendments addressing critical safety issues permitted between editions, supported by a maintained issues register and a published roadmap of anticipated changes. For a contractor, a predictable cycle is easier to train and document against than an amendment arriving whenever a referenced standard changes, and the register gives a place to lodge the problems found on site.
What it means in Western Australia now
Nothing. An installation carried out today is done to AS/NZS 3000:2018 incorporating Amendments 1 to 3, as called up under the state's electrical requirements, together with the connection and installation standards that sit alongside it. A draft for public comment, when it is published, has no standing on site, and neither does the final edition until it is called up in the state. Western Australia set its own mandatory date for Amendment 2, and the next edition will be adopted on a WA date decided separately from the Standards Australia publication date.
What the revision does change now is what is worth reading and attending. Clipsal by Schneider Electric is running a one-hour webinar, "The Next Edition of the Wiring Rules: what is changing", on Wednesday 23 September 2026 from 4pm to 5pm AEST, which is 2pm in Perth, presented by Lucy Finlay. In October, ECA WA and Master Electricians Australia bring the WA Electrical Industry Night (opens in a new tab) to Hillarys Yacht Club on Thursday 15 October 2026, from 4.30pm to 6.30pm, with Western Power, Building and Energy, Before You Dig Australia and the Construction Training Fund present. Attendance is free.
What to do now
- Treat every date in this article as a target. Check the Standards Australia public comment listing before quoting a draft or an edition date to a customer, a trainee or a subcontractor.
- When the draft is published, read the earthing and multiple-supply clauses against the group's standard battery retrofit and backup-circuit designs, and lodge comment where a clause would not fit an arrangement already being installed in WA.
- Keep the current Type AC RCD and switchboard verification practice from Amendment 2 in place, alongside the testing regime for grid-connected hybrid inverters. The next edition may reposition those requirements, but it does not relax them, and the WA adoption date for anything new is not yet set.
- Put the 23 September webinar and the 15 October Hillarys evening in the training calendar for supervising electricians, and keep the WA solar and battery compliance centre as the index for the current-edition references until the draft is published.
