I see from a recent NZ Energy & Environment weekly (15 July) that Contact Energy have lost an astounding 10% of their retail customer base. 10% of their customers is huge.
This followed their large increase in directors fees, but I for one think another reason is at play in Otago, where their customer base is substantial. Contact is proposing more hydro dams on the Clutha.
This is very unpopular down our way. Remember the “Save Manapouri” movement or the controversy over the Clyde dam (pushed through by empowering legislation by a National government).
Is the lesson for Contact is “don’t mess with our rivers if you want to keep your customers”?
I am an ex Contact customer. Like everyone else who has left that I know…it was because Contact were/are price rise leaders. Using the calculator at Consumer.org I found I saved over $300 per annum by changing to Meridian.
I doubt very many folk who have left did so because of ‘messing with our rivers’. I think there has been much more noise over the windfarm on the Lammemoor Range, which is not a Contact project and with the proposals with the lower Waitaki River …again nothing to do with Contact.
Nice try.
Welcome to the blog world David
@Peter – maybe they are just making lots of mistakes.
David I think in the current economic climate you can put almost entirely down to pricing. Besides that, don’t you think hydro power is critical to our emissions reductions? It requires people to get past the NIMBY attitude you’re ascribing to the Otago residents.
Not sure where you were last year as Minister of Energy but there was the small case of the Directors granting themselves massive hikes in fees over the wishes of small shareholders. It was front page news for a week, Bruce Sheppard was all over it.
That is the direct cause of them losing customers. If it was a water issue why would Meridian gain customers ? Again while you were a Minister there was small project called project aqua.
It’s a shame that we’re stuck with the hydro is clean vs we need the land dilemma.
power power power. the country is full of NIMBY’s. We need more power, as do all countries but what do we do? hydro .. shit no, Nuke’s .. shit no, wind .. shit no, wave power .. shit no, thermal .. shit no. No NO No.We need a Govt who will just do it .. whatever it is.
I know, we have an obeasedy epidemic, so why not make all the obease people ride exercycles that are connected to generators – yay two birds with one stone.
I meant obeasity!
I happen to know for a fact that a lot of Otago people are outraged over Contact Energy’s dam plans for the Clutha. We produce more than twice the power we need, and we have been ripped off for many years by Contact Energy and their predecessors. Their price gouging and arrogance over the dam issue has lost them heaps of customers (David Parker didn’t imagine this!). Contact Energy’s proposals don’t represent international best practice; they represent a third-world development model. It’s well-known that large hydro schemes cause innumerable problems. Large dams are the dinosaurs of the high-tech energy industry, and smart people and countries are avoiding them like the plague. The renewable argument doesn’t wash either, because any gains are typically more than destroyed by negative impacts. California has already moved to disqualify new hydro over 30MW from carbon credit eligibility. Let’s be smart, save our rivers, and invest in the emerging green technologies. The last thing we need is more of the same stuff that got the world into this spiralling economic and environmental disaster.
International Rivers said this:
http://www.box.net/shared/9ba3m5ra38
I completely agree with the diversifying & decentralising of energy supply…to marine, wind and geothermal Also Making it possible for households to become more self sustainable.
Also, to make this one of our major focus points would create jobs,show our innovative world wide leadership in climate change and make green more co operative, not a threat.
I agree saving money is part of it, and Contact’s hike in directors fees annoyed many. But environmental concerns are also right up there for an increasing number of consumers, which is great.
Yes, we need more renewables in order to avoid greenhouse gas emissions (carbon capture and storage will not be a practical or affordable option for many years, if ever), but I’m with Finn and Cherie.
Geothermal is our cheapest source and also has the lowest environmental impact. Wind is also important, and the visual effects can be distributed across the country. There’s no strong case for lots more hydro. The water is renewable, but the river ecosystem isn’t.
So its pretty easy for the next 20 years, and by then marine power or deep geothermal or photovoltaics or concetrated solar will be viable and will mean we still won’t need to dam more rivers.
Isn’t it about time we reconsidered the atom as a source of cheap, large-scale, non-carbon producing energy ? The advantage with it is that it can be sited much closer to the area of greatest demand – all we need is the political foresight !
Putting aside safety issues of nuclear power, and “what the heck to we do with the waste?” questions – it’s my understanding that because of NZ’s smallish population nuclear doesn’t make much sense. We just can’t provide the level of demand to make their economies of scale make sense.
From what I’ve heard, nuclear power in NZ would be extremely expensive.