Thats because any news publication in nz nowadays would never spend 7months researching any topic lol. If they cant find the story on TikTok or redit that dont fucking bother. Such a shame.
I would like to tell you a true event story, decades ago Powerco was public owned, however there was the big privatization push. What happened is the rate paying citizens of Wanganui got a small number of shares in the new company. Ok. However some years later my Dad who had held onto those shares... along with a number of other shareholders. They all got letters telling them... in some fancy legal mumbo jumbo that they no longer had shares and they were worthless. A number of people in this situation kicked up a stick but nothing ever happened. It's a bit of history that needs to be recorded about everyday people being screwed.
Limi, I'm sorry I didn't see this ten months ago. Thanks for committing your time to making it. I mean, I basically knew most of this but it's fascinating to see it laid out like this. Particularly because I have lived under the 100% Council/Government controlled model and this one. And all I can say that both of them were a mess but the first one was at least fair to the consumer.
I saw this coming around 2005 & geared up to be totally off grid which I achieved in 2010.. rural 3 bdrm house with comprehensive garage workshop, no real constraints on usage & best decision ever.. The savings I made going off grid has now equaled my capital investment so essentially my power is free until the components fail, excluding maintenance costs which are minimal so far..
It’s funny how the electricity industry is similar to the food industry where distributors buy directly from farmers for pennies on the dollar and then hike up the price for producers, manufacturers, retailers and ultimately consumers.
Although with food, there are farmers' markets where the growers can sell directly to their customers. I can't take my excess solar to anyone but the power company I'm with. Maybe run a long extension cord to my Neighbour? 😂
@@chrisgorman1652 farmers markets that end up being more expensive than supermarkets by design*. not gonna go too far into it but my point is farmers have to buy supplies too, if supplies cost as much as the supermarkets charge then the farmers by default have to charge enough to buy their own stuff. ie: they have to price their goods equal to or above the supermarket to be competitive, although if you know of a farmers market that's actually cheaper than a supermarket then i'll take their entire stock!
actually they are nothing alike - the Spot Market - where the generating companies 'sell' electricity to 'the market'/Transpower to keep the national grid running is completely and utterly *SEPARATE* to the retail side - where consumers buy/pay for electricity. when there are spikes in electricity (where are few & rare) - these are NOT passed onto the consumer at all.
the 3 hours free power one was funny, we managed to use 3-4x our daily usage just in those 3 hours by everyone showering and using the heatpump set to 27 degrees while all the power tools and shit was on a timer, washer and dryer all going, pretty sure we dropped the line voltage down to 210v doing all that, you definantly noticed all the lights dim
Not sure why the algorithm is only pushing this now but i certainly appreciate it! This is such a succinct summary of something that I'm sure was a nightmare to understand. Instant subscribe!
Good on you for trying to disentangle the electricity industry in NZ. Over to your west in Australia we have similarly arcane divisions of generators, distributors, retailers and so on. That obfuscation makes it hard to know whether we consumers are getting good value for money, but your deep dives shine a light on an industry that likes to hide under a rock.
Nice work. I worked for Genesis Energy dealing with the data side. I sympathize with your pain researching into all the rules policies and data. It's almost as mind numbing as the data spaghetti myself and other architects had to deal with when Telecom started the process towards becoming Spark.
Has to be one of the most contrived systems in the world to create competition, the end result has been unstable prices , a lack of investment, and productivity.
@@BJL2142 that mindset works when companies dont just hike prices up year after year, yknow like a profit incentive tends to incentivize... state regulated prices would be as simple as "electricity costs this much per KWH no matter what". human rights should not have to be profitable.
@@BJL2142 Competition only brings prices down when there's an incentive for the companies involved to do so. If the market has prices going up, companies can raise their prices and still maintain their market share, leading to the same results as a monopoly. This is because the companies' profit motive outweighs the social motive to maintain low prices. A simple solution is to put the companies under the control of the public sector to remove the profit motive.
@@BJL2142 I like capitalism as much as the next guy, but state ownership also fixes this problem. A government-managed monopoly would have little incentive to raise prices above the socially optimal level. Maintaining several private competitors in a market as small as NZ is hard.
Unstable prices that trend upwards at significantly greater levels than inflationary pressure should cause, even if the infrastructure investment was adequate.
Honestly fascinating, thank you for making this video I bet to took a load of work and it was awesome to learn more about how our power works! Great work man keep it up
Well done. I think the word 'insane' in the title says it all. There are issues with curret structure, especially where gentailers seem to be rewarded for not increasing capacity, thus keeping prices high.
Very informative video I live in NZ and work for a company that makes the distribution transformers for NZ electricity network and I didn’t really understand how the system worked as a whole, now I understand it better
Awesome video. I really appreciate that you absolutely powered through it to. So man youtubers try to stretch their content out way too far, so this was a refreshing change.
Very interesting and informative but boy do you talk at hyper speed. I'm going to watch this again at a slower speed. Thank you for your 7months of research! 🎉
Because Shayne Jones needs a crisis to pimp nz out for 30 years. There is no crisis if the main owner is the government who is conveniently blaming their underlings, for something that doesn't even exist.
Good job on this overview, I like your style. I was trained (many years ago) by Southpower which was the CHCH powerboard. I love the trade. I feel that the consumer is overcharged for power these days, the privateisation was not good. Anyhow keep up the good work m8. Churrr Elly
This is top notch stuff! I'd be interested in a closer look at our generation stations - history of certain dams, the natural gas plant near Taupō and your professional, much trusted recommendations for the future.
I currently work in the NZ electiricty industry for a retailer and i just wanted to say Great video, I'd Just like to make a few admenents to what you said. 1. For meter readings, no less than 90% of a retailers customer base should have readings once every 4 months, but generally are read every month. 2. Retailers do a bit more than you explained as they are responsible for site compliance with the EA rules. That means if there is any issue with the site it is the retailers responsibility. Otherwise everything sounds good.
Awesome video man. Thought I might try and clear up the thing about Powernet operating in the Aurora area. The Lakeland network is what is known as an embedded network. These are smaller networks that are inside larger networks. Another example of this is Heritage Estate near Te Anau. This is in the Powernet region but is operated by Aurora. Most Malls around New Zealand also run on embedded networks. Hope this helps
This video on the NZ electricity system must be very useful to those that work in the industry so that they have at least some clue where they fit in and why up until this point they have never figured it out.
Please CHECK. The description of the Wholesale market did not seem to mention the fact that 95% of the electricity is bought and sold on long-term 'Hedging' contracts that have very stable prices (eg $80-$130 per MWh) over a period of months or even years. The huge price fluctuations of $0 to $400 per MWh only apply to the remaining 5% or so, and 7/8 of the time end up cheaper than the hedging contracts. So, not entirely crazy.
oh yes so its justified that the majority of nz gets f'd in the a because "actually its cheaper than the made up number the corporations wanted to charge you!!!"
This is one thing ive learnt since making this video i wasnt aware of :) - was a little shocked- - it all does technically go through the spot market though, im still not 100% on it
@mikerutland8683 an interesting comment. From where do you get this data/information. Is it really 95% hedged for months? This data needs to be explored and interpreted because it does not explain why the likes of Winstone are shutting down because of energy pricing. I know Tiwai point fixes its costs over multiple years for example. But so too would the power companies we buy our kWh from, at least for 80% of their predicted annual monthly requirements.
@@woody6t1 for a matter of so much public interest, I have found it surprisingly difficult to obtain the figures that I quoted. So much so that I suspect they are kept hidden on purpose, even well after the time when they were relevant. The electricity authority does publish the spot prices, but not the amounts sold. I was unable to find any public data on hedge contract prices and volumes directly, but I have investments in some generators and gentailers, and their annual reports make it possible to produce reasonable estimates. As regards why wood processors are indicating that they may be shutting down their operations, my personal thoughts include the possibility that this is a ploy, intended to pressure the government into giving a deal similar to the aluminium smelter before the grid was upgraded and able to send surplus electricity northwards. one of the problems arising from giving favorable (& non-commercial) terms to one user, is that everyone else will ask for similar favours -- not totally unreasonable.
Fantastic video. All along the way each company is clipping the ticket. The whole thing should be brought back into public ownership. I now live in Perth WA, and over here (for the domestic market) there are two electricity retailers (both state govt owned), Synergy for Perth, the South West, and Kalgoorlie. With Horizon for the other outback towns, and cities. The whole operation is owned by the state government, and electricity prices are set by the state government.
Much gratitude for making this video. It was really interesting. :) Wow it's all a lot more complicated than our off-grid setup at home. We just make the power, store it, use it, and buy gasoline if there ain't enough Sun! lol
If only electricity was still treated as a basic human right and hadn't been privatised so that we don't have a small number of companies monopolising and constantly hiking prices :(
Private companies can run down assets. public organisations have to follow the motivations set by politicians. Public organisations are bad at trimming fat for efficiency, private ones bad at actually competing without forming big monopolies. Presumably the balance is to have a few of both. government organisms that keep the private ones honest, and private companies that seek to attract customers by being efficient and deploying new technologies effectively.
@@glenmcgillivray4707 In physics, it is impossible to have true efficiency. I'm not an economist or accountant but why would organisations, companies, SOEs be any different. Perhaps people have to accept that things cannot be run perfectly efficiently and do need some "fat". Maybe we need more engineers running the show and less bean counters lol.
Thanks for the great video! Some feedback if you don't mind: Try speaking to the camera a little more like an announcement to an assembly or other large group, with slightly slower line delivery and some words being enunciated more firmly. You have such a wealth of information to present and it would be a shame to miss it, as sometimes it can slightly jumbled together (This is something I am very guilty of some times, specially when I am talking about something I am passionate about! :P ). I found myself adjusted the speed setting to 0.75 on YT. While it made it a bit slow, it allowed my to process you content better. Anyway, just my thoughts, feel free to do with as you wish.
I love the grid, especially the old highly customised components. Especially vacuum fuses, transformers, common mode noise rejection filters, glass insulators, hall effect resistors and the sound of it. I've never ever heard not seen a switching station ever switch, although I suspect sometimes I see it in my light bulb. If you ever do a piece on switching.... can they swap phases and is that ever done? In this country, it's likely done once or twice in the life of any switch yard (swap phase X with Y etc). That's the main benefit of switch yard right? Other than on/off or redirection.
Great video mate! More people should learn about these kind of things so they have an informed decision when it comes to policy or regulation. Sadly most people would invest a lot of their time into distractions and knowledge that does not benefit them.
When I worked for Transpower (92-03) I was one of a 2 man team who toured NZ on a 'common Interest drawings' project. To cut a long story short some old NZED drawings had 'Proposed Nuclear Power Station Site'. These drawings were classed Cat 1 during the project. (Of no interest to Transpower). Oh and I saw most of NZ for free.
Great job on the video! NZ could have one entity called the Ministry of Electricity, with district offices. The ministry would be responsible for supplying electricity throughout NZ. They would also build new power plants, build wind turbines, build solar farms, build new hydro, maybe build small nuclear plants, maintain power plants, build and maintain lines, & bill customers directly for the electricity. Everyone would be billed the same price per unit whether they lived in central Auckland or on a remote West Coast farm. Sure, the Ministry would be bloated but would it be any worse than the screwed up system we have now?😂
Well done Limi, good to see a fellow Kiwi on YT. Having done all that work, maybe now you do a follow up on any ideas you might have on how to fix this convoluted mess, but with so many separate interested parties it might be impossible to fix, maybe. I saw a thing saying we are paying ten times what they pay across the ditch for power, that's insane and needs some kind of silver bullet for sure. I don't claim to understand even half of it, but it looks like far too many fingers in that pie. For a nation that is blessed with rivers and lakes galore, you'd think hydro even alone should be more than enough to supply our needs, and don't even get me started on green energy etc. Right now all the efforts and financial sacrifice that we make seems kind of pointless when we have the likes of China that spews out more CO2 than all other nations combined , opens a coal fired power station at a rate of about one per week and is not slowing down.
It's ridiculous. We have a huge amount of renewable energy coming from a majority of stations that were paid off in the 80s. Looking at world tables nz is the 3rd cheapest to produce energy however in the top 5 for cost. Power companies are printing money..
really?? - "we have the most expensive power in the Western world" - please cite your sources. (also "western world" ?! - really) - I didn't want to spent too much time & energy on this - one source has a map of the world with 12 ranges - Aotearoa/New Zealand is on the LOWER end of the scale - looks to be on par with countries such as Australia, Canada, Japan - 10 Countries with high prices for electricity are: Denmark Germany UK Austria Italy Belgium Bermuda Spain Cayman Islands Czech Republic Rwanda 8 of these 10 ARE "western" - "Denmark pays about $0.54 USD Germans pay approximately 53 cents" NZ $0.19 this source - World Population Review - prices as of March 2023
@@brenthargreaves7085 We don't. We perform quite well to peers on prices, especially residential. The complaints of late are from a very small number of large industrial users who gambled, took on too much risk, and eventually lost.
@@juliaconnell thanks for the summary! unfortunately it looks like a lot more people will read and believe the original comment than yours. “A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes.” - Mark Twain
When it was owned by the State and Local Bodies we did not have the current situation, in fact the legislation required specifically the delivery of an efficient supply of energy, and it said energy because some local bodies supplied gas as well as electricity. All was removed by the populace accepting the lie that private was more efficient than public. And it is a lie any secondary school physics student should be able to tell you the manner in which it is a lie. That we are talking commerce and not science is irrelevant for there is but one formula for establishing efficiency.
Determining efficiency isn't the issue, achieving it is. And govt depts are almost by design immune to being efficient due to how they get paid (Ie not by their customers who have real alternatives to choose among). Private corps can have the same issues, but in general the complex structure has worked tolerably well for several decades. Now if only we had a couple of GW range 4th gen nuclear plants to take away the high price spikes.
@@phillipshorter7751 My point is the manner in which the lie is broadcast that private is more efficient and the manner in which the lie is used to convince a trusting population that something is true when patently not is my issue. And people often lie to gain some advantage that becomes unavailable with the truth. As was the case with the Power Board and electricity supply structures in the 1990s. The detail in the differences are largely irrelevant because the purposes are different. Let’s create a pigs ear out of a silk purse but lets not present in that manner the populace wont buy it.
@@phillipshorter7751 Given the manner in which electricity is currently priced any continuance is only going to continue to profit those it currently serves and domestic consumers needs and wants will be a consideration of the lowest order. Previously, pre 1990s restructuring there was assurance of supply within the nations capacity to supply because it was managed in the interests of everyone, now it is managed in the singular interest of the economic right wing. If there is nothing to be embarrassed by it simply admit it.
@@phillipshorter7751 How can not determining efficiency not be an issue but achieving it can? I have worked in Central government, Local government, and the Private sector. NZs biggest employ, the Govt, NZs largest f private company in its day, Fletchers (twice) NZs wealthiest man at the time John Spencer right down to a little provincial contracting firm. They all have there reason to be and means of achieving it but to say that the manner in which payment is made makes one any better than another is beyond me, little of what you say coincides with my life experience., Not that my experience is in any way superior simply different.
@@phillipshorter7751 Ithink you need to research how efficiencies are determined, it is not a difficult but it is a disciplined process. You say determining it is not important but achieving it is, how do you determine if you have achieved it if you are unable to measure it. How many businesses do you think might have to shut down overnight if the govt said no more tax write offs for leases, rents and rates. I would think rent, in any provincial city in NZ is unavailable for under $1000/week, that is is two persons basic wage. Does the vaunted private enterprise efficiencies come from that level of subsidy, and those two wages are also a tax write off.
This is how things work in most countries. User pays, 100% availability, the physical world, and complex maths to compute efficiencies and demand prediction. Not to mention opaque politicians family trusts making a few bucks here are there.
Nice work. I think the reasoning behind customer-owned distributors not requiring the same Quality checks is that they ultimately answer to their customers through a Community Trust. There's a democratic means to complain about and address a bad distributer. The for-profit distributors need some similar check, else they are just a monopoly that can cut as many corners as they want and screw over the customers.
And none of these companies raised capital and built the resources they now collect rentals on - instead they persuaded corrupt MPs to privatize public resources, which is why our power prices are not competitive. There is a great injustice here, and the power companies must be made to pay for it.
A great effort. O what a tangled web we weave! Long before you or your parents were born we had a much simpler system called the New Zealand Electricity Department with more stable and cheaper power.
7 months! solid effort! im pretty sure meridian retail and meridian generation are seperate companies, had an issue working at manapouri where we couldent charge realjourneys for their power use because the station is owned by meridian generation, not meridian retail and meridian retail still has to buy its power wholesale or some shit so they dont have a monopoly on the retail market in places where the distributors dont charge a higher price than the average wholesale price (aurora charge like 21c/kwh distribution, so of the 32c/kwh you pay on the aurora network 21c goes to aurora, 7-8 cents go to the generator and 3-4c/kwh to the retailer)
Great effort in your research, however your delivery left a lot to be desired. (I sound like a teacher ( 😀 ) Invest in a good microphone and recording area, then we could hear what you were saying. Take note that there a a significant number of people have also commented that your were speaking way to fast, focus on that as well. The standing and delivering of the content clearly showed that you worked hard to research the data you have, great job.
Better than any NZ news publication explanation
Thats because any news publication in nz nowadays would never spend 7months researching any topic lol. If they cant find the story on TikTok or redit that dont fucking bother. Such a shame.
@@danielobrien9536 All major news outlets serve the disinformation machine.
@@danielobrien9536 Yeah why the hell would a news company make something like this what would be the reason
The news outlets in NZ is just filled with woke Gen Z's thinking they're "working smart" by scraping reddit and tiktok, hence the trash publications
Many Thanks for your 7 months of hard work ! No news media companies in NZ could do what you have achieved! You’re a Legend !
I would like to tell you a true event story, decades ago Powerco was public owned, however there was the big privatization push. What happened is the rate paying citizens of Wanganui got a small number of shares in the new company. Ok.
However some years later my Dad who had held onto those shares... along with a number of other shareholders. They all got letters telling them... in some fancy legal mumbo jumbo that they no longer had shares and they were worthless. A number of people in this situation kicked up a stick but nothing ever happened. It's a bit of history that needs to be recorded about everyday people being screwed.
That's atrocious 😮
yep it happened :( i am from there
classic kiwi corruption
Classic neoliberal capitalism moment
@AzidationsAnonymous I'd say neoliberals are feudalists not capitalists.
Mate this video was top notch! I love the dedication to the research and the shoot locations. Well done!!
Great explainer!! Thanks Limi ⚡
Limi, I'm sorry I didn't see this ten months ago. Thanks for committing your time to making it. I mean, I basically knew most of this but it's fascinating to see it laid out like this. Particularly because I have lived under the 100% Council/Government controlled model and this one. And all I can say that both of them were a mess but the first one was at least fair to the consumer.
I saw this coming around 2005 & geared up to be totally off grid which I achieved in 2010.. rural 3 bdrm house with comprehensive garage workshop, no real constraints on usage & best decision ever.. The savings I made going off grid has now equaled my capital investment so essentially my power is free until the components fail, excluding maintenance costs which are minimal so far..
What total panel & battery capacities did you go for? (I'm presuming solar, or perhaps you have micro-hydro?).
Spend 30k plus every 10 or so years, ludicrous
@@VK4VO dude... if you still think solar panels last 10 years then you're living in the 90s.
@@VK4VO did you travel here directly from 1985 or are you just uninformed
@@VK4VO It would cost 30k for a large house if you just bought retail power... That's only $250 per month
Slowing the video down to 0.75 helped a lot!
Not if you've got ADHD. I have to watch most videos at 1.75 or 2x speed or I get bored and distracted. This video is perfect.
agreed - i usually watch videos at 1.5 - 1.75 but i couldn't watch this at 1.0
Really? I just thought it's how normal people talk excited on a subject?!
Insane speed of speech obviously not made for humans.
Found the American... maybe... Got me curious though
It’s funny how the electricity industry is similar to the food industry where distributors buy directly from farmers for pennies on the dollar and then hike up the price for producers, manufacturers, retailers and ultimately consumers.
Although with food, there are farmers' markets where the growers can sell directly to their customers. I can't take my excess solar to anyone but the power company I'm with. Maybe run a long extension cord to my Neighbour? 😂
@@chrisgorman1652 farmers markets that end up being more expensive than supermarkets by design*. not gonna go too far into it but my point is farmers have to buy supplies too, if supplies cost as much as the supermarkets charge then the farmers by default have to charge enough to buy their own stuff. ie: they have to price their goods equal to or above the supermarket to be competitive, although if you know of a farmers market that's actually cheaper than a supermarket then i'll take their entire stock!
@@Dman6779wtf are you talking about? My local farmers market sells produce for between 1/2 and 1/4 of the duopoly supermarkets price.
actually they are nothing alike -
the Spot Market - where the generating companies 'sell' electricity to 'the market'/Transpower to keep the national grid running is completely and utterly *SEPARATE* to the retail side - where consumers buy/pay for electricity.
when there are spikes in electricity (where are few & rare) - these are NOT passed onto the consumer at all.
Brilliant Video. "Insane" is the right word to describe the Electricity system.
the 3 hours free power one was funny, we managed to use 3-4x our daily usage just in those 3 hours by everyone showering and using the heatpump set to 27 degrees while all the power tools and shit was on a timer, washer and dryer all going, pretty sure we dropped the line voltage down to 210v doing all that, you definantly noticed all the lights dim
Not sure why the algorithm is only pushing this now but i certainly appreciate it! This is such a succinct summary of something that I'm sure was a nightmare to understand. Instant subscribe!
Good on you for trying to disentangle the electricity industry in NZ. Over to your west in Australia we have similarly arcane divisions of generators, distributors, retailers and so on. That obfuscation makes it hard to know whether we consumers are getting good value for money, but your deep dives shine a light on an industry that likes to hide under a rock.
im starting to understand just how corrupt our countries our two countries are. they're still the crooked colonies they always were.
Obfuscation - my thought exactly.
Nice work. I worked for Genesis Energy dealing with the data side. I sympathize with your pain researching into all the rules policies and data. It's almost as mind numbing as the data spaghetti myself and other architects had to deal with when Telecom started the process towards becoming Spark.
Well done and well explained, thank you.
Has to be one of the most contrived systems in the world to create competition, the end result has been unstable prices , a lack of investment, and productivity.
Competition keeps prices down, monopolies lead to price gouging due to lack of consumer options
@@BJL2142 that mindset works when companies dont just hike prices up year after year, yknow like a profit incentive tends to incentivize... state regulated prices would be as simple as "electricity costs this much per KWH no matter what". human rights should not have to be profitable.
@@BJL2142 Competition only brings prices down when there's an incentive for the companies involved to do so. If the market has prices going up, companies can raise their prices and still maintain their market share, leading to the same results as a monopoly.
This is because the companies' profit motive outweighs the social motive to maintain low prices.
A simple solution is to put the companies under the control of the public sector to remove the profit motive.
@@BJL2142 I like capitalism as much as the next guy, but state ownership also fixes this problem. A government-managed monopoly would have little incentive to raise prices above the socially optimal level.
Maintaining several private competitors in a market as small as NZ is hard.
Unstable prices that trend upwards at significantly greater levels than inflationary pressure should cause, even if the infrastructure investment was adequate.
Honestly fascinating, thank you for making this video I bet to took a load of work and it was awesome to learn more about how our power works! Great work man keep it up
Fantastic introduction to the sector!! Thank you!!
thanks dude! this is extraordinarily well researched and explained.
Your great effort deserves more airplay.
Good explanation and good research. Nice one mate.
Well done. I think the word 'insane' in the title says it all. There are issues with curret structure, especially where gentailers seem to be rewarded for not increasing capacity, thus keeping prices high.
Awesome summary! And love the frenetic pace - it's a pretty dry subject and loved how much content you fit into so little time.
Nice job, I have a much better understanding of the system now.
Appreciate your work.
New Limi banger
Very informative video
I live in NZ and work for a company that makes the distribution transformers for NZ electricity network and I didn’t really understand how the system worked as a whole, now I understand it better
Awesome video. I really appreciate that you absolutely powered through it to. So man youtubers try to stretch their content out way too far, so this was a refreshing change.
This is very informative, and even more impressive that you're doing cardio at the same time.
Well researched, very informative.
Nice video mate! Always nice to see fellow Kiwis talking about our country.
And an opportunity to learn about it too!
Great video! Clearly passionate and a great in depth dive.
Loved it Limi, thank you for your hard work
Very interesting and informative but boy do you talk at hyper speed. I'm going to watch this again at a slower speed. Thank you for your 7months of research! 🎉
So now power blackouts are rearing up to darken NZ's winter night skies. I wonder why. Thanks for working hard to produce this video.🙂
Because Shayne Jones needs a crisis to pimp nz out for 30 years.
There is no crisis if the main owner is the government who is conveniently blaming their underlings, for something that doesn't even exist.
I have more questions than answers now...
Thanks for the video, great pacing
Super informative - thanks for making and sharing this!
Good job on this overview, I like your style. I was trained (many years ago) by Southpower which was the CHCH powerboard. I love the trade. I feel that the consumer is overcharged for power these days, the privateisation was not good. Anyhow keep up the good work m8. Churrr Elly
Woah! Super interesting!!!!! You just popped up on my page even though I wasn't following you! Congrats on going viral!
Great video, I hope more people get to see it soon! Thank you!
Sweet vid man, id watch every doco you do forever
Great video. Thanks for your huge effort.
This is top notch stuff! I'd be interested in a closer look at our generation stations - history of certain dams, the natural gas plant near Taupō and your professional, much trusted recommendations for the future.
Top effort! Super interesting, I knew it was complicated but damn there's a lot to unpack!
Great video! I myself work for Northpower in the contracting region and its a really interesting way how the whole grid works
Still loving your videos
Works ok at 75% playback speed.
Works at double playback speed too.
Where are you from? When I traveled to the UK people would say I spoke fast.
Seems fine, a bit slow but that's prob for ppl who don't hear a kiwi accent much.
@@uncoiledfish2561
Born a Pom but been in NZ since 1978. Wellington till ‘89 then Far North since then.
@@markysgeeklab8783 This isn't a kiwi accent.. he sounds British to me.
I currently work in the NZ electiricty industry for a retailer and i just wanted to say Great video, I'd Just like to make a few admenents to what you said.
1. For meter readings, no less than 90% of a retailers customer base should have readings once every 4 months, but generally are read every month.
2. Retailers do a bit more than you explained as they are responsible for site compliance with the EA rules. That means if there is any issue with the site it is the retailers responsibility.
Otherwise everything sounds good.
Awesome video man. Thought I might try and clear up the thing about Powernet operating in the Aurora area. The Lakeland network is what is known as an embedded network. These are smaller networks that are inside larger networks. Another example of this is Heritage Estate near Te Anau. This is in the Powernet region but is operated by Aurora. Most Malls around New Zealand also run on embedded networks. Hope this helps
Fantastic video.
Great direct energy distribution from you bro !
That is a brilliant video and takes me back to pre vlogger ridden youtube. And the fact it features Dunedin makes it extra sweet for me personally lol
Dunno how this ended up in my recommendations but great video! Subbed!
This video on the NZ electricity system must be very useful to those that work in the industry so that they have at least some clue where they fit in and why up until this point they have never figured it out.
Please CHECK. The description of the Wholesale market did not seem to mention the fact that 95% of the electricity is bought and sold on long-term 'Hedging' contracts that have very stable prices (eg $80-$130 per MWh) over a period of months or even years. The huge price fluctuations of $0 to $400 per MWh only apply to the remaining 5% or so, and 7/8 of the time end up cheaper than the hedging contracts. So, not entirely crazy.
oh yes so its justified that the majority of nz gets f'd in the a because "actually its cheaper than the made up number the corporations wanted to charge you!!!"
This is one thing ive learnt since making this video i wasnt aware of :) - was a little shocked- - it all does technically go through the spot market though, im still not 100% on it
@mikerutland8683 an interesting comment. From where do you get this data/information. Is it really 95% hedged for months? This data needs to be explored and interpreted because it does not explain why the likes of Winstone are shutting down because of energy pricing. I know Tiwai point fixes its costs over multiple years for example. But so too would the power companies we buy our kWh from, at least for 80% of their predicted annual monthly requirements.
@@woody6t1 for a matter of so much public interest, I have found it surprisingly difficult to obtain the figures that I quoted. So much so that I suspect they are kept hidden on purpose, even well after the time when they were relevant. The electricity authority does publish the spot prices, but not the amounts sold. I was unable to find any public data on hedge contract prices and volumes directly, but I have investments in some generators and gentailers, and their annual reports make it possible to produce reasonable estimates.
As regards why wood processors are indicating that they may be shutting down their operations, my personal thoughts include the possibility that this is a ploy, intended to pressure the government into giving a deal similar to the aluminium smelter before the grid was upgraded and able to send surplus electricity northwards. one of the problems arising from giving favorable (& non-commercial) terms to one user, is that everyone else will ask for similar favours -- not totally unreasonable.
How incredibly useful, thanks for your hard mahi. I feel like I'm relatively informed but knew very little about these details
F'n brilliant work man. Bravo
The tism is strong in this one. Great video, very informative. Cheers
This is really good. What a maze of entities for such a small country.
interesting, I'm not entirely sure why youtube is recommending this, but it was a good watch
That was an excellent video.
Fantastic video. All along the way each company is clipping the ticket. The whole thing should be brought back into public ownership.
I now live in Perth WA, and over here (for the domestic market) there are two electricity retailers (both state govt owned), Synergy for Perth, the South West, and Kalgoorlie. With Horizon for the other outback towns, and cities. The whole operation is owned by the state government, and electricity prices are set by the state government.
New subscriber here glad I came across this and wish you the best with your channel you deserve it
Much gratitude for making this video. It was really interesting. :) Wow it's all a lot more complicated than our off-grid setup at home. We just make the power, store it, use it, and buy gasoline if there ain't enough Sun! lol
Underrated content. Keep it up!
If only electricity was still treated as a basic human right and hadn't been privatised so that we don't have a small number of companies monopolising and constantly hiking prices :(
Yes exactly. They always bang on about privatisation and the free market doing it better but it never works. We just get fucked.
Private companies can run down assets. public organisations have to follow the motivations set by politicians. Public organisations are bad at trimming fat for efficiency, private ones bad at actually competing without forming big monopolies. Presumably the balance is to have a few of both. government organisms that keep the private ones honest, and private companies that seek to attract customers by being efficient and deploying new technologies effectively.
@@glenmcgillivray4707 In physics, it is impossible to have true efficiency. I'm not an economist or accountant but why would organisations, companies, SOEs be any different. Perhaps people have to accept that things cannot be run perfectly efficiently and do need some "fat". Maybe we need more engineers running the show and less bean counters lol.
Yea price controls and more regulations are whats needed derp derp derp
@@dsndicmsa7141 Yes exactly, that would help too.
Very well done, thank you
Thanks for the great video!
Some feedback if you don't mind: Try speaking to the camera a little more like an announcement to an assembly or other large group, with slightly slower line delivery and some words being enunciated more firmly. You have such a wealth of information to present and it would be a shame to miss it, as sometimes it can slightly jumbled together (This is something I am very guilty of some times, specially when I am talking about something I am passionate about! :P ). I found myself adjusted the speed setting to 0.75 on YT. While it made it a bit slow, it allowed my to process you content better.
Anyway, just my thoughts, feel free to do with as you wish.
The title is pretty accurate by the sounds of it
Well done Lad.
Great video, thank you welldone.
Very well put together.
prices are also insane......and criminal.
I love the grid, especially the old highly customised components. Especially vacuum fuses, transformers, common mode noise rejection filters, glass insulators, hall effect resistors and the sound of it. I've never ever heard not seen a switching station ever switch, although I suspect sometimes I see it in my light bulb. If you ever do a piece on switching.... can they swap phases and is that ever done? In this country, it's likely done once or twice in the life of any switch yard (swap phase X with Y etc). That's the main benefit of switch yard right? Other than on/off or redirection.
Great video mate! More people should learn about these kind of things so they have an informed decision when it comes to policy or regulation. Sadly most people would invest a lot of their time into distractions and knowledge that does not benefit them.
A video i didnt know i needed to watch. Thank you.
Oh yes you did!
Well done mate
To catch a broader audience try to slow down just a pinch - beyond that, excellent work.
Thank you
I don't think anyone in NZ realised (until you made this) why it was. Surely removing the layers will make the entire system less expensive.
When I worked for Transpower (92-03) I was one of a 2 man team who toured NZ on a 'common Interest drawings' project. To cut a long story short some old NZED drawings had 'Proposed Nuclear Power Station Site'. These drawings were classed Cat 1 during the project. (Of no interest to Transpower). Oh and I saw most of NZ for free.
Absolutely amazing video! What a mess of a system we have!
Thanks for the video - you have no idea how it helped me understand how screwed we are... lol
great job thank you
Great job on the video! NZ could have one entity called the Ministry of Electricity, with district offices. The ministry would be responsible for supplying electricity throughout NZ. They would also build new power plants, build wind turbines, build solar farms, build new hydro, maybe build small nuclear plants, maintain power plants, build and maintain lines, & bill customers directly for the electricity. Everyone would be billed the same price per unit whether they lived in central Auckland or on a remote West Coast farm. Sure, the Ministry would be bloated but would it be any worse than the screwed up system we have now?😂
Excellent presentation. Not all smart meters are cellular comm based; many (Metrix & SmartCo) are RF mesh comms.
Well done Limi, good to see a fellow Kiwi on YT. Having done all that work, maybe now you do a follow up on any ideas you might have on how to fix this convoluted mess, but with so many separate interested parties it might be impossible to fix, maybe. I saw a thing saying we are paying ten times what they pay across the ditch for power, that's insane and needs some kind of silver bullet for sure. I don't claim to understand even half of it, but it looks like far too many fingers in that pie. For a nation that is blessed with rivers and lakes galore, you'd think hydro even alone should be more than enough to supply our needs, and don't even get me started on green energy etc. Right now all the efforts and financial sacrifice that we make seems kind of pointless when we have the likes of China that spews out more CO2 than all other nations combined , opens a coal fired power station at a rate of about one per week and is not slowing down.
No wonder we have the most expensive power in the Western world, everyone is clipping their ticket on the way.
do we?
It's ridiculous. We have a huge amount of renewable energy coming from a majority of stations that were paid off in the 80s. Looking at world tables nz is the 3rd cheapest to produce energy however in the top 5 for cost. Power companies are printing money..
really?? - "we have the most expensive power in the Western world" - please cite your sources. (also "western world" ?! - really) -
I didn't want to spent too much time & energy on this - one source has a map of the world with 12 ranges -
Aotearoa/New Zealand is on the LOWER end of the scale - looks to be on par with countries such as Australia, Canada, Japan -
10 Countries with high prices for electricity are:
Denmark
Germany
UK
Austria
Italy
Belgium
Bermuda
Spain
Cayman Islands
Czech Republic
Rwanda
8 of these 10 ARE "western" -
"Denmark pays about $0.54 USD
Germans pay approximately 53 cents"
NZ $0.19
this source - World Population Review - prices as of March 2023
@@brenthargreaves7085 We don't. We perform quite well to peers on prices, especially residential.
The complaints of late are from a very small number of large industrial users who gambled, took on too much risk, and eventually lost.
@@juliaconnell thanks for the summary! unfortunately it looks like a lot more people will read and believe the original comment than yours.
“A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes.” - Mark Twain
When it was owned by the State and Local Bodies we did not have the current situation, in fact the legislation required specifically the delivery of an efficient supply of energy, and it said energy because some local bodies supplied gas as well as electricity. All was removed by the populace accepting the lie that private was more efficient than public. And it is a lie any secondary school physics student should be able to tell you the manner in which it is a lie. That we are talking commerce and not science is irrelevant for there is but one formula for establishing efficiency.
Determining efficiency isn't the issue, achieving it is. And govt depts are almost by design immune to being efficient due to how they get paid (Ie not by their customers who have real alternatives to choose among). Private corps can have the same issues, but in general the complex structure has worked tolerably well for several decades. Now if only we had a couple of GW range 4th gen nuclear plants to take away the high price spikes.
@@phillipshorter7751 My point is the manner in which the lie is broadcast that private is more efficient and the manner in which the lie is used to convince a trusting population that something is true when patently not is my issue. And people often lie to gain some advantage that becomes unavailable with the truth. As was the case with the Power Board and electricity supply structures in the 1990s. The detail in the differences are largely irrelevant because the purposes are different. Let’s create a pigs ear out of a silk purse but lets not present in that manner the populace wont buy it.
@@phillipshorter7751 Given the manner in which electricity is currently priced any continuance is only going to continue to profit those it currently serves and domestic consumers needs and wants will be a consideration of the lowest order. Previously, pre 1990s restructuring there was assurance of supply within the nations capacity to supply because it was managed in the interests of everyone, now it is managed in the singular interest of the economic right wing. If there is nothing to be embarrassed by it simply admit it.
@@phillipshorter7751 How can not determining efficiency not be an issue but achieving it can? I have worked in Central government, Local government, and the Private sector. NZs biggest employ, the Govt, NZs largest f private company in its day, Fletchers (twice) NZs wealthiest man at the time John Spencer right down to a little provincial contracting firm. They all have there reason to be and means of achieving it but to say that the manner in which payment is made makes one any better than another is beyond me, little of what you say coincides with my life experience., Not that my experience is in any way superior simply different.
@@phillipshorter7751 Ithink you need to research how efficiencies are determined, it is not a difficult but it is a disciplined process. You say determining it is not important but achieving it is, how do you determine if you have achieved it if you are unable to measure it. How many businesses do you think might have to shut down overnight if the govt said no more tax write offs for leases, rents and rates. I would think rent, in any provincial city in NZ is unavailable for under $1000/week, that is is two persons basic wage. Does the vaunted private enterprise efficiencies come from that level of subsidy, and those two wages are also a tax write off.
Well done! Very informative video.
Bloody awesome work mate
This is how things work in most countries. User pays, 100% availability, the physical world, and complex maths to compute efficiencies and demand prediction. Not to mention opaque politicians family trusts making a few bucks here are there.
Excellent video. Sequel could expand on gentailers and how they sell power to themselves, side-stepping the wholesale market.
This is so great, please do more explainers like this. A pretty boring subject explained in an entertaining way 😁
Nice work. I think the reasoning behind customer-owned distributors not requiring the same Quality checks is that they ultimately answer to their customers through a Community Trust. There's a democratic means to complain about and address a bad distributer.
The for-profit distributors need some similar check, else they are just a monopoly that can cut as many corners as they want and screw over the customers.
And none of these companies raised capital and built the resources they now collect rentals on - instead they persuaded corrupt MPs to privatize public resources, which is why our power prices are not competitive. There is a great injustice here, and the power companies must be made to pay for it.
A great effort.
O what a tangled web we weave! Long before you or your parents were born we had a much simpler system called the New Zealand Electricity Department with more stable and cheaper power.
Finally, someone who doesn’t waste time talking slowly
You gabble so damn fast I can't understand a word of what you say.
7 months! solid effort! im pretty sure meridian retail and meridian generation are seperate companies, had an issue working at manapouri where we couldent charge realjourneys for their power use because the station is owned by meridian generation, not meridian retail and meridian retail still has to buy its power wholesale or some shit so they dont have a monopoly on the retail market in places where the distributors dont charge a higher price than the average wholesale price (aurora charge like 21c/kwh distribution, so of the 32c/kwh you pay on the aurora network 21c goes to aurora, 7-8 cents go to the generator and 3-4c/kwh to the retailer)
*Just came here for knowledge and boy i got it*
have to give you a like for 7 months of hardwork
I felt called out when you pointed at us and called us consumers
Great effort in your research, however your delivery left a lot to be desired. (I sound like a teacher ( 😀 )
Invest in a good microphone and recording area, then we could hear what you were saying.
Take note that there a a significant number of people have also commented that your were speaking way to fast, focus on that as well.
The standing and delivering of the content clearly showed that you worked hard to research the data you have, great job.