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Contact boss wants Kiwis to be more adaptive in push for renewable energy

Photo: RNZ / Nate McKinnon Kiwis need to get over themselves when it comes to accepting renewable power projects in their area, an energy boss says. Contact Energy is ramping up its renewable energy supplies, saying investment in that area is critical to the economy. It's just lodged resource consent to expand a battery for power storage it's built on the outskirts of Auckland, which will power another 220,000 homes. Its chief executive Mike Fuge told Morning Report: "Batteries are a great technology, the price of lithium is coming down rapidly. We see batteries as a key part of the system - they take care of the morning and evening peaks." It has 100 megawatts being installed at Glenbrook, it had received consent for another 500mW at Glenbrook and intends to apply for another 500mW for Stratford. "So yes they will form very much part of the new ecosystem and they are part of that solution." However, he was not a supporter of the Onlow battery project proposed by the last Labour government in part because its cost was so high at $24 billion. In response to discussion of a proposed wind farm for Southland which has attracted opposition, Fuge said Kiwis needed to be more receptive to change and adapt to the renewable energy boom. "We're going to have to make trade-offs. Wind farms - they are visual. If you're Dutch you've learned to live with wind farms over a 500-year period and so it's just change, and so we just have to step into that change and make some very deliberate choices as a country that this is what we want to do." Contact's focus was on building new baseload renewable energy and geothermal. It had spent $1.5 billion on Tohara and Tohuka 3 which had brought on 5 percent. Te Mihi 2A which would replace Wairakei was underway as was the country's biggest solar farm, Kowhai Park, in Christchurch and there were plans for a wind farm. "This is our opportunity to move the market to reliable renewable energy which isn't going to just serve us, it's going to serve our tamariki and our mokopuna." The Te Mihi power station. Photo: Contact Energy Asked if all the plans and projects should have advanced faster, he responded: 'Jeez, how could I go faster?" Contact had been accepted into the government's fast track process and he hoped this would lead to faster resource consents. He said increased lines charges were around 6 or 7 percent to bills but the company had committed to the energy component of the increase would be no higher than the inflation rate. "We know that Kiwi homes are doing it tough at the moment and we know that electricity at the best of times is not something people love paying for ... we're doing our best to keep those prices moderated." Four of the 10 highest peaks have occurred this winter while wholesale prices have been 70 percent lower than last year. "Just the calmness is so important." Fuge said Contact was working with a range of industries such as dairy and meat processing to get them converted to electricity at reasonable prices. The country's energy supply was in a much better position than last year when a dry year coincided with outages and some industries were closing although the dramatic drop in gas supply had caught everyone off guard. Another six terrawatt hours of renewable energy had been added in the last six years which was the equivalent of two-thirds of Maui at its peak and around 15 percent of the country's supply. It was made up of wind, solar and baseload geothermal. As well there was the Huntly HFO so that a large coal stockpile (amassing up to 600,000 tonnes) could be used "in an extreme dry year". Long-term gas supply had also been secured. "So I've always argued that in terms of security of supply it's never a magic solution out there .... you've got to do all these things in quick order and that's what we've done that but underpinning this is the renewable energy supply." The removal of the government's oil and gas ban would be "helpful", he said. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.