{"id":578472,"date":"2026-08-24T04:40:12","date_gmt":"2026-08-24T04:40:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/578472\/"},"modified":"2026-08-24T04:40:12","modified_gmt":"2026-08-24T04:40:12","slug":"growth-nz-energy-plan-proposes-eight-steps-for-cheaper-cleaner-electricity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/578472\/","title":{"rendered":"Growth NZ energy plan proposes eight steps for cheaper, cleaner electricity"},"content":{"rendered":"
The former Meta executive is co-chair with Anna Kominik, a former Electricity Authority chairwoman.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe bills are high because our energy system kind of persistently runs on shortages,\u201d Pan says.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur back-ups are really expensive, and they tend to set the price, at least the wholesale price.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt doesn\u2019t help that the plans keep changing, so what we are really proposing is this long-term package that incentivises folks to actually build more cheap, clean power.\u201d<\/p>\n
Growth NZ co-chair and NZME director Bowen Pan. Photo \/ Cameron Pitney<\/p>\n
Changing those incentives comes at steps two and three of a five-year, eight-step plan, \u201cPowering a prosperous New Zealand\u201d.<\/p>\n
Step one is agreement of the kind that has eluded successive governments and opposition parties.<\/p>\n
Steps four and five are a major regulatory overhaul.<\/p>\n
The report notes energy regulation is split across four bodies: the Electricity Authority, the Commerce Commission, the Gas Industry Company and the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment.<\/p>\n
Growth NZ suggests merging those functions to create one super-regulator made even larger by splitting grid owner and system operator Transpower to divide its dual roles.<\/p>\n
It suggests that might promote investment in batteries, demand responses and non-transmission solutions rather than yet more poles, pylons and wires.<\/p>\n
It also suggests mandatory consolidation for the distribution companies that connect to the grid.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have 29 lines companies, and Australia has 10; we\u2019ve got four regulator-policymaker entities,\u201d Kominik says.<\/p>\n
\u201cEveryone\u2019s got a job, and nobody\u2019s accountable for a better outcome for consumers.\u201d<\/p>\n
Anna Kominik is co-chair at Growth NZ and a former Electricity Authority chairwoman.<\/p>\n
Growth NZ\u2019s energy plan also points out a conflict successive Governments have struggled with: regulating with one hand while collecting half a billion dollars a year in dividends from Genesis, Mercury and Meridian.<\/p>\n
It proposes establishing a \u201cclear institutional wall\u201d and placing the Government\u2019s gentailer shareholdings in \u201ca Temasek-style holding company\u201d, referring to the sovereign wealth fund of the kind Singapore runs with a commercial mandate, transparent reporting, and no role in energy policy or regulation.<\/p>\n
Growth NZ also supports a proposal similar to one put forward by Contact Energy five years ago and by the Frontier Economics review of the energy system published last year.<\/p>\n
It wants a Government-owned \u201cThermal NewCo\u201d that would own or contract the remaining thermal fleet and its fuel supply, such as Huntly power station, where Genesis maintains a coal-fired back-stop to the electricity system under contract with Contact, Mercury and Meridian.<\/p>\n
That new company would sell firming cover to all buyers on equal terms, and retire that fleet as renewables, storage and demand flexibility take up the slack.<\/p>\n
The Growth NZ plan addresses more competitive pricing and proposes a national financing platform that tags the cost of home solar installations to a meter rather than a customer, so any obligation stays with the occupant of a home.<\/p>\n
Growth NZ\u2019s plan has one more back-stop \u2013 structural separation of the retail and generation parts of those four major players, which it says is \u201ca serious tool, not a slogan\u201d and would be more complex than the break-up of Telecom into Chorus and Spark.<\/p>\n
\u201cResearch suggests that, regulated well, vertical integration can be efficient and even cheaper than broken-up firms,\u201d the report says.<\/p>\n
For that reason, it argues for levelling the playing field and allowing and promoting open entry to new generators and retailers first, and resorting to break-ups only as \u201ca credible, pre-designed escalation\u201d with the triggers agreed and published.<\/p>\n
For a civic movement, it certainly reads like a political or lobby group manifesto, so who is Growth NZ and why should anyone pay attention?<\/p>\n
A look at its website shows a cross-section of New Zealand entrepreneurship.<\/p>\n
Venture capitalist Rob Coneybeer, who has made New Zealand a second home; those who\u2019ve come home again such as Pan and wife Maya, or Nuvocargo founder Sam Blackman; local entrepreneur Cecilia Robinson, angel investor Suse Reynolds and many more.<\/p>\n
Pan says Growth NZ has more than 200 people involved directly with policy, operations and marketing and a wider circle of about 1000 supporters engaged across the country.<\/p>\n
That\u2019s more than enough to start a political party, and despite sounding like they\u2019re running the policy formation for one, Pan and Kominik don\u2019t want your vote, just your attention.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur only goal is for New Zealand to be broadly prosperous for every New Zealander,\u201d Pan says.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo that we can actually get to a better place for all of us and it\u2019s not just concentrated in one part of the community,\u201d Kominik adds.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe have the capacity to be one of the world\u2019s renewable energy superpowers,\u201d Pan says.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe are very far away from that right now, but if that\u2019s something we want, we certainly have the natural endowments to actually achieve that.\u201d<\/p>\n