MCY Mercury NZ ( MRP Mighty River Power)

[Snoopy]

maybe I am missing something.I have just checked atm power prices-bream bay $125 ,invercargill $105 approx.
Power companies- lose power in line losses.
Hence mercury would make a lot more profit selling electricity to say Whangarei,North than contact selling anywhere in the country

Updated as I write on the electricity info dashboard:

https://www1.electricityinfo.co.nz/

Bream Bay (northernmost node) $104.21
Invercargill (southernmost node) $77.98

Could you be missing that the spot price represents the marginal price of incremental power that wholesalers must pay to 'top up' to meet incremental retail demand? It does not represent the wholesale cost of generation for power gentailers already set aside to supply their base load demand? And it does not represent the pre-contracted retail price purchase rate already guaranteed to retail customers?

To sell to those northernmost customers, Mercury would have to pay the Transpower costs and local line company costs of getting their own generated power up there. And presumably these costs are well known and taken into account by those bidding on the spot market. That means the difference in node price is largely reflects the difference in line charges. As a result I would expect Mercury to receive the same profit margin for whatever electricity they chose to sell no matter what part of the country they chose to sell it to (assuming the Cook Strait cable is fully functional)?

SNOOPY