The costs of any new environmental or climate change schemes must be "proportionate" to the benefit they are trying to achieve, the Turnbull government says.
In the clearest signal yet that the government is about to walk away from chief scientist Alan Finkel's recommendation of a Clean Energy Target, senior ministers are stressing the Coalition will only adopt green schemes where the benefits clearly outweigh the costs they impose on the energy system.
Cabinet is expected to consider Energy Minister Josh Frydenberg's policy proposals on Monday, with the package to be taken to the Coalition party room as early as Tuesday. The government is expected to dump the CET - the main recommendation of Professor Finkel's energy system review - amid stiff opposition from the Coalition's right wing.
The government's package will instead emphasise prices and reliability.
Treasurer Scott Morrison said on Monday a new Australian Competition and Consumer Commission report demonstrated the urgent need to get prices under control.
"The report made a number of recommendations the government will now consider, including that the costs of any future environmental schemes needed to be in proportion to the benefit they were trying to achieve," Mr Morrison said.
The ACCC report found green schemes account for only 7 per cent of the 63 per cent increase in power prices over the last decade. The main driver was a huge increase in network costs, driven by regulation and over investment, or "gold-plating".
Nevertheless, Finance Minister Mathias Cormann emphasised the impact of the environmental schemes such as Labor's carbon tax. Axing that tax produced the biggest drop in electricity prices ever seen, Senator Cormann said.
"Any policy settings - any environmental schemes as you call them - need to actually provide a proportionate benefit. They need to provide a benefit that is proportionate to the additional cost that imposes on the system," he told ABC radio on Monday.
Senator Cormann also took aim at Labor for signalling it will seek to block any energy policy that does not include a Clean Energy Target.
Labor's environment spokesman Mark Butler said at the weekend the opposition would not give the government a "blank cheque" in the Parliament.
"What we are very worried about - and what I think people in the community who care deeply about this energy crisis are worried about - is the increasing likelihood that Malcolm Turnbull is walking away from the Clean Energy Target under pressure from Tony Abbott," he said.
"If that is what he does then he won't get the support of the Labor Party."
Senator Cormann said Mr Butler's comments were "reckless".
"It's always dangerous to lock yourself in before you've seen what's on the table," he said. "The government clearly will put forward a policy framework that's in the public interest, that's in the national interest."
