Such it is that this week, after years of reports and solid indications that some long-term planning was needed around Australia's energy market, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull declared it a "crisis".

It was time, he believed, to call the well-heeled executives of our major gas companies to a meeting, to try and prevent this island nation (or at least it's eastern states) from running out of gas.

What prompted this declaration of such magnitude?

The Australian Energy Market Operator this week released its annual market update, reporting that it was finally time - what with South Australia, Victoria and New South Wales (including the ACT) set to run out of LNG two summers' hence - to institute some sort of vague notion of a "strategic national planning" for gas development.

"It requires holistic planning across the entire supply chain to enable investment decisions to be made in the long-term interests of consumers," AEMO's chief operating officer Mike Cleary said.

The market operator is not alone - the problem, and many others across Australia's energy markets - have long been harped on about in some quarters.

Still, Australia has no strategic national energy policy? Surely not.

The issue has long been a serious one, there have been inquiries, hearings and reports on everything from fuel security to distribution networks and gold-plating, not to mention climate change.

Australia, starry-eyed in the face of potential gas royalties, has thrown away a series of opportunities to secure more domestic supply, which some advocate would help - but in reality is a short-sighted approach to the broader problem, or only one of several prongs of attack that could be undertaken.

Similarly, an outright moratorium on gas exploration is no solution to water protection, climate change, gas or energy supply.

The moderate approach to all of these issues would be to formulate an evidence-based (read: informed by market economics and credible science), national policy for both the energy market and climate change.

But Mr Turnbull, lurching from one problem to the next, has not promised a systematic approach, instead declaring it a national crisis.

A crisis it will become, if the greater problem is ignored and a single meeting with company executives makes for a media stunt and distraction, not a solution.

The AEMO outlined a number of options from here on in: redirecting gas from export to domestic markets, expanding exploration to new areas and ramping up production from existing areas among them.

But the government's Energy and Environment Minister, Josh Frydenberg, says only that state governments need to lift any moratoriums on exploration, conventional or unconventional.

A fair point, but one that ignores the fact that Australia is exporting plenty of gas that could otherwise be used for domestic consumption (household or business).

Some states have suggested releasing new areas for exploration for domestic-only sale, rather than global export.

There are of course, many other elements that could form part of a potential solution to such a complex, national [problem.

But without certainty on Australia's approach to one of the biggest threats to long-term certainty - climate change - investors will not put their money in to pursue any of these options.

A national energy policy must first consider a market-based approach to climate change and then incorporate a coherent, evidence-based policy to gas shortages and all the other problems the market has thrown up in recent years.

To address one factor without considering all others would be plain ignorant.