Shane Jones accuses power companies of profiteering

[Lilith7]

Never thought I'd agree with Shane Jones; definitely not a fan of his but I'm inclined to agree on this. But then profiteering is the name of the game in the Neo Liberal system.


https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/524...ofiteering

[king1]

iirc the government owns over 50% of these gentailers so there is absolutely NO incentive for government to make meaningful fixes to the market when it directly contributes to the government coffers... They will do 'just enough' to prevent industry like sawmills collapsing, but thats about it...

I believe Contact is privately owned but can't imagine they will have incentive to undercut either...

[Oh_hunnihunni]

When it costs more to deliver a product than the product itself, it is either essential, or someone really likes it...

Guess which one is power.

[Lilith7]

A govt putting profit ahead of the well being of its people....whoever would have thought.

[nzoomed]

There needs to be more reform on the power companies. It was better in the 90s before it all got messed up with the abolishing of district power boards, it actually did the opposite of what was the intention.

[harm_less]

Typical Shane Jones sidestepping actually answering questions by spouting verbose riddles.

The one point he does support is the high cost of imported fossil fuels (i.e. coal) but then goes on to suggest we import LNG. NZ has no LNG ship handling facility and to build one from scratch would have significant delay in both public consent and construction. Such facilities are extremely dangerous and typically aren't sited near population centres, or upwind of same, due to the ignition risk. Port Taranaki on the western side of New Plymouth fails in both regards but does have gas transmission connections at its oil and methanol loading wharf.

The current 'dry year' issue will keep occurring as climate change destablises our weather patterns so a long term solution needs to be formulated. The Lake Onslow pumped hydro was suggested for just this scenario by like so many other constructive infrastructure and social need policies has been ditched by Luxon and co in favour of unresearched and poorly thought out alternatives.

Currently solar is the cheapest electricity generation available in terms of whole life costs followed by onshore wind and then offshore wind. Solar is also very quickly installed and its output can be buffered over time of day by utility scale battery storage. The other option is domestic 'rooftop' solar but our governments seem to have a mental block in terms of any form of incentivisation for its installation.

Finally the current spiking power prices, which will move through to retail electricity prices, and threat of discontinuity of supply is the perfect incentive for installation of PV and battery storage by those that can afford to do so. This situation is referred to as the utility company death spiral as more customers either reduce their consumption from the grid, and potentially install sufficient generation and battery capacity to cut ties with the grid altogether, thereby leaving a reducing customer base to pay for ever more expensive supply prices from the grid. As EVs become able to be used as home storage batteries (i.e. V2G) the abandonment of the grid by customers will only accelerate.

[Lilith7]

Typical Shane Jones sidestepping actually answering questions by spouting verbose riddles.

The one point he does support is the high cost of imported fossil fuels (i.e. coal) but then goes on to suggest we import LNG. NZ has no LNG ship handling facility and to build one from scratch would have significant delay in both public consent and construction. Such facilities are extremely dangerous and typically aren't sited near population centres, or upwind of same, due to the ignition risk. Port Taranaki on the western side of New Plymouth fails in both regards but does have gas transmission connections at its oil and methanol loading wharf.

The current 'dry year' issue will keep occurring as climate change destablises our weather patterns so a long term solution needs to be formulated. The Lake Onslow pumped hydro was suggested for just this scenario by like so many other constructive infrastructure and social need policies has been ditched by Luxon and co in favour of unresearched and poorly thought out alternatives.

Currently solar is the cheapest electricity generation available in terms of whole life costs followed by onshore wind and then offshore wind. Solar is also very quickly installed and its output can be buffered over time of day by utility scale battery storage. The other option is domestic 'rooftop' solar but our governments seem to have a mental block in terms of any form of incentivisation for its installation.

Finally the current spiking power prices, which will move through to retail electricity prices, and threat of discontinuity of supply is the perfect incentive for installation of PV and battery storage by those that can afford to do so. This situation is referred to as the utility company death spiral as more customers either reduce their consumption from the grid, and potentially install sufficient generation and battery capacity to cut ties with the grid altogether, thereby leaving a reducing customer base to pay for ever more expensive supply prices from the grid. As EVs become able to be used as home storage batteries (i.e. V2G) the abandonment of the grid by customers will only accelerate.

Its difficult to understand how it is that govts seem unable to take a long term view.

[harm_less]

Its difficult to understand how it is that govts seem unable to take a long term view.

Easy. They've only got 3 years of guaranteed control so that is the extent of their foresight. And they spend a good portion of that 3 years shitting on the previous government's policies.

[Lilith7]

Its difficult to understand how it is that govts seem unable to take a long term view.

Easy. They've only got 3 years of guaranteed control so that is the extent of their foresight. And they spend a good portion of that 3 years shitting on the previous government's policies.

Yeah - it seems standard practise to blame everything on the prevoous govt for about their first 12-18 months.

You'd think though, that they might manage to develop some reasonable long term policies, in view of the fact that they;re supposedly in govt to benefit all of us.