I am advised:

The three-year data does not provide an accurate trend for Essential Energy, it is important to note that network performance is also highly influenced by weather. 2014 was a particularly benign year in terms of weather impacts on the network, which resulted in their lowest ever (i.e. best) result on record for the System Average Interruption Duration Index.

Over the past five financial years (2011-12 to 2015-16), Essential Energy recorded an improvement in network performance of almost 10 per cent, from approximately 237 minutes in 2011-12 to 214 minutes in 2015-16.

That Essential Energy reports its average duration of power outages for the year 2016 as 227 minutes, 2015 as 217 minutes and in 2014 it was 183 minutes.

Endeavour Energy reports its average duration for the year 2016 as 85.4 minutes, 2015 as 92 minutes and 2014 as 89.1 minutes.

Ausgrid reported its average duration for the year 2016 as 70.8 minutes, in 2015 it was 77.3 minutes and in 2014 the average duration was 64.3 minutes.

Due to the long line lengths and low customer density, rural electricity networks inherently experience more power outages than urban networks. Power outages also take longer to fix due to the long distances when responding to outages.