MCY Mercury NZ ( MRP Mighty River Power)

[Snoopy]

This article http://www.3news.co.nz/Labours-power...4/Default.aspx published in mid April is on the mark. In the article, David Shearer is quoted as saying "I'm not going to talk about the policy at all...I'm not going to give an explanation of the policy. We are working...according to our own timetable."

and I have not seen a shred of clarification from Labour since on how they might do this. Until they come out with something, Labour's 'policy' cannot be deemed to be any more than empty political posturing.

You well know that the finer details of substantial policy changes such as this will be legislated after the election. There will be time for submissions from affected parties and all this will have to go to the select committee stages before finally something workable is drawn up.
To expect all this finer detail to be drawn up before an election is unreasonable and it never happens.

What you do have in the public domain now is a 'theme' of lower power prices for voters, as a promise by Labour/Greens (The actual detail does not matter, from a political perspective). I was going to say lower power prices for everybody. But if you are an industrial or commercial consumer the power reforms have already delivered lower prices. It is only the poor old private consumer that has missed out.

With Labour/Greens in government, they will certainly have the power (sic) to push through whatever changes they need do to achieve their objective. Of course it will be difficult, and tweaking will be required. But to say that you can't see how it will be done so therefore it can't work is the head in the sand position from my perspective.

SNOOPY

[Snoopy]

Given the variables of weather, seasons, demand, outages, and growth, dictating electricity grid injection prices by way of any mechanism other than natural competition and supply-demand forces utterly defies logic... well, unless we resort (by definition) to a dictatorship/communist regime.

The old Electricorp managed to do it, and it wasn't aligned to the communist party as I recall. One thing Electricrop didn't do so well was build a robust enough grid of new power stations to avoid the odd official power cut. I believe that a new central authority like NZ Power may have the same problem. But not for a while, maybe not for ten years. The Labour Green coalition will be out by then and will no doubt blame such future 'NZ Power' failures on National Party lead mismanagement.

SNOOPY

[Snoopy]

When I think about the Labour/Greens sitting around trying to reach agreement with each other and nut this 'policy' out in the event they are voted in, I laugh so hard as to nearly wet myself.

Labour/Greens have already agreed on the 'NZ Power' policy. Russell Norman will be writing it for the Labour party. So no laughing will be required.

SNOOPY

[Vaygor1]

Labour/Greens have already agreed on the 'NZ Power' policy. Russell Norman will be writing it for the Labour party. So no laughing will be required.

SNOOPY

I have seen no official policy, and neither has anyone else I know with perhaps the exception of yourself, and assuming it exists, you won't direct me to it. If it is not written up yet, as you state, then it cannot yet be agreed.

[warthog]

The old Electricorp managed to do it

And the NZED before them.

[Vaygor1]

Without quoting the above source, I can't gauge the credibility of its originator, and it follows that I cannot therefore gauge the credibility of the content.

Translation: I don't like the message even though I can't see anything obviously wrong with it. Therefore please provide me the name of the messenger that I don't like so that I can shoot him.
SNOOPY

My statement is a logical argument based on the common desire of most people in the world to not want to waste their time analysing hearsay. Without knowing the origin, I can't determine the accuracy of the information.

[Vaygor1]

You well know that the finer details of substantial policy changes such as this will be legislated after the election. There will be time for submissions from affected parties and all this will have to go to the select committee stages before finally something workable is drawn up.
To expect all this finer detail to be drawn up before an election is unreasonable and it never happens.

What you do have in the public domain now is a 'theme' of lower power prices for voters, as a promise by Labour/Greens (The actual detail does not matter, from a political perspective). I was going to say lower power prices for everybody. But if you are an industrial or commercial consumer the power reforms have already delivered lower prices. It is only the poor old private consumer that has missed out.

With Labour/Greens in government, they will certainly have the power (sic) to push through whatever changes they need do to achieve their objective. Of course it will be difficult, and tweaking will be required. But to say that you can't see how it will be done so therefore it can't work is the head in the sand position from my perspective.

SNOOPY

You are correct in saying the devil is in the detail and Labour/Greens announced their policy driven by a timetable coinciding with the same day that the MRP shares went on sale, and without giving themselves enough time to think through the 'how'. Without the 'how' the Labour/Greens have opened themselves up to wide criticism and are now in a position they will find it difficult to move away from if they are elected.

The main point of difference between you and I is that you state that Electricity injection prices will be dictated with NZ Power in the loop and I have never heard anything from Labour/Greens about this and you won't provide the source. Labour/Greens have only ever referred to bulk-buying (not forced-selling) with NZ Power becoming one of the many non-residential bulk-buyers, so competition would still exist.

That aside, either NZ Power insert themselves as middle men thus adding to the contracting complexity and cost of the whole set-up which already includes Transpower and the Lines Companies in addition to Generators and Retailers, or NZ Power replaces the retailers thus removing Generator-Retailer swaps and adding huge risk to both themselves and the Generators, and both will need to price in this risk accordingly. My view is that economically, either approach is self-defeating.

[Vaygor1]

The old Electricorp managed to do it, and it wasn't aligned to the communist party as I recall. One thing Electricrop didn't do so well was build a robust enough grid of new power stations to avoid the odd official power cut. I believe that a new central authority like NZ Power may have the same problem. But not for a while, maybe not for ten years. The Labour Green coalition will be out by then and will no doubt blame such future 'NZ Power' failures on National Party lead mismanagement. SNOOPY

And the NZED before them.

Neither of those models were sustainable. That is why they don't exist anymore.

[GTM 3442]

Neither of those models were sustainable. That is why they don't exist anymore.

Not quite. Those models don't exist because of conscious policy decisions.

Just as "Kiwipower" is a conscious policy decision.

[Vaygor1]

Not quite. Those models don't exist because of conscious policy decisions.

Just as "Kiwipower" is a conscious policy decision.

The reasons for Electrocorp's and NZED's non-sustainability can be subjective. Policy for the sake of it is not normally the root cause of a policy change. Policy Change is something us humans do in our efforts to try and improve something, or to try and stop an untoward occurrence from repeating itself.

Whether the non-existence of the old Electrocorp or NZED was due to any cause or combination relating to commercial reality, system integrity, reliability, technical constraints, inefficiencies, contractual/accountability issues, legal enforcement etc is wide open to debate.

Us humans are all too quick in identifying a problem and then implementing a solution to it without knowing or being aware of the new (sets of) problems we will be introducing by doing so, and I believe, as many do, that this is the case with the bulk-buying concept.

Either way, the upshot is that Electrocorp and NZED were not sustainable or else they would still be with us today. If government dictatorship of electricity prices wasn't sustainable then, then why will it be sustainable now? The natural laws of supply and demand haven't changed since NZED ended have they?