Aurora Energy CEO Richard Fletcher says the company has made good progress in the first year of its five-year $563M investment programme.

The substantial expenditure follows decades of underinvestment in the network and it is largely being funded largely by staged increases to electricity line charges to its 92,000 customers across Otago.

Electricity lines charges account for around 37 percent of a customer’s electricity bill on average and the most recent increase, in April, saw those charges increase by 13.7 percent for Upper Clutha customers.

Richard says that money is being put to good use: “We have made significant progress on asset renewal and maintenance work across the network during the last regulatory year,” he said. 

See also: Aurora’s proposed power bill increases draw more scrutiny 

Aurora Energy CEO Richard Fletcher

“We invested $127M across Dunedin, Central Otago/Wānaka and Queenstown Lakes - $81M on network-related capital expenditure and $46M on operational expenditure such as routine inspections and maintenance, vegetation management, systems operation and network support.”

This included a major piece of work on the electricity network that supplies Albert Town, Camp Hill, Hāwea Flat, Lake Hāwea and Makarora, replacing 35 poles and 25 crossarms, as well as performing maintenance on the Camp Hill and Wānaka zone substations.

Around Otago in the first year, the company replaced more than 1,400 power poles, 1,200 crossarms, 74km of high voltage lines; inspected almost 12,000 poles; completed maintenance at nine substations; and inspected vegetation on 1,953km of the network.

Aurora’s historic under-investment in asset maintenance and renewal led to a deteriorating network of poles, cables and transformers, and it was also subject to Commerce Commission proceedings for breaching regulated quality standards in 2016 and 2017. 

Richard says the company has come a long way in the years since. 

See also: ‘Aurora Energy has ‘come a long way’

Last year the Commerce Commission approved a customised price-quality path (CPP) for Aurora Energy that allowed it to invest $563M to address safety and reliability risk across the network. 

Richard said the company was now, as well as maintaining the network, working to “plan for the future”.

“A robust and modern network will provide value to customers by enabling them to connect to our network when and how they want to with the knowledge that the network is robust and fit for the purpose.” 

There was an unplanned power outage between 8am and 9.30am yesterday (Thursday October 6) which affected all customers across Wānaka, Lake Hāwea, Hāwea Flat, Luggate, Queensbury and the Lindis Crossing. 

An Aurora Energy spokesperson said they did not yet know the cause of the fault. 

An Aurora Energy drop-in session will take place in Wānaka on Wednesday October 19 and Richard said experts from the company will be available to answer questions.

Community drop-in events are also being held in Dunedin, Alexandra and Queenstown. 

Find more information about the events and read Aurora Energy’s first annual delivery report here.

PHOTOS: Supplied