Councillors have approved a highly critical submission on Aurora Energy's controversial $383M upgrade plans drafted by mayor Jim Boult.

The electricity lines company has applied to the Commerce Commission to upgrade its network over the next three years, a move which would result in increases in power bills across Otago.

Queenstown Lakes District Council's submission to the commission, signed by the mayor and council boss Mike Theelen, said the proposed changes are completely unacceptable.

The submission says underinvestment over the past 25-30 years has led to a situation where "unaffordable and inequitable solutions" are being foisted on a community already slammed financially by COVID-19.

The submission also rubbishes Aurora's position that the communities have enjoyed cheaper than national average line charges over those years: "No community would advocate for underinvestment leading to an unsafe network, unacceptable outages and resulting in a massive and untenable financial burden for future generations,” the submission said.

Mayor Jim Boult

Queenstown Lakes residents’ power bills would increase by about $300 per year by the end of the three-year investment programme - about $25 a month.  

Aurora then plans to spend a further $226M over the following two years, increasing bills again by about $60 per year.

QLDC's own 2019 Quality of Life survey showed 15 per cent of the community were unable to heat their homes all the time, with 70 per cent of those citing affordability.

Jim and Mike say they are caught between trying to avoid further economic hardship for the community and advocating for the need for "a safe, reliable and future-facing power supply".

Major outages have hit the district in recent years, especially during poor weather, and recently people in nearby Clyde were left without power during -10C temperatures. Yet Aurora says outages will increase over the coming years.

QLDC calls for more detail on expected outages and wants the company to figure in the electricity draw from skifields during the winter months. They are one of the biggest users and any outage can have implications for the industry, the submission said.

"Aurora should not be incentivised to invest in ways that leave the district forever on the brink of losing resilience; nor should it be allowed to create scenarios where future power-poverty hamstrings continued economic investment."

The submission calls for the company to find a viable way to reduce the financial impact on the district, “as the current plan is simply not affordable". 

QLDC also wants the price increases to be spread over five years, rather than three, and for an effective customer panel to be established.

The submission, which was approved by councillors yesterday (Thursday August 20), will go to the Commerce Commision, which is conducting consultation as part of its regulatory oversight of Aurora and the plans.  

The Commerce Commission is due to make a draft decision on Aurora’s proposal by November 12 and a final decision by March 31 2020.

PHOTOS: Supplied