The Government wants to push generators to invest more in backup fuels to defend against dry-year risk. Photo: Lynn Grieveson
Long-awaited reforms have stopped short of major change to the structure of the country's electricity sector.
The Government is pledging it will provide capital to its majority-owned electricity gentailers for more investment in backup supply, such as coal and gas plant. It will begin procuring an import facility to bring in offshore gas from Monday.
It is also giving some more market influence to the regulator, the Electricity Authority.
The government has rejected a proposal from consultants Frontier Economics to fully privatise the three gentailers it has majority share in.
Those are the key moves it has announced today, along with releasing the advice it received from consultants in a review commissioned after last year's dry year energy crisis.
Energy Minister Simon Watts says it can take 25 years for the economy to recover from inflated electricity prices such as those that happened last year.
Critics have called for major reform, ranging from structural separation of the generator-retailers - to re-nationalising those three gentailers.
Kathryn speaks to Craig McCulloch, RNZ's acting political editor, who was at the government briefing before reaction from Major Electricity Users Group chair John Harbord and Electric Kiwi chief executive Huia Burt.
