Source: Radio New Zealand
Lake Onslow.
A prominent backer of the Lake Onslow pumped hydro scheme says he’s already fielding interest from international investors.
It is a project that has been around for years, picked up by the last Labour government, but then scrapped after the election amid strong criticism from National.
Now it is being backed by a private-sector firm, The Clutha Pumped Hydro Consortium, and the government has agreed to refer the scheme for possible fast-tracking.
Consortium member and also former Meridian Energy chief executive and Transpower chairperson Keith Turner told Morning Report the large infrastructure project was perfect for fast-track consideration.
He said the group was pleased to finally see some momentum and others were taking an interest.
“Projects like this have got real appeal to big international investors that want long-dated revenues.
“I’ve been working in Australia with the New South Wales government doing big renewable energy zones. Global companies from all around the world have turned up for that and they’ve all been whispering in my ear that they’d love to do business in New Zealand.
“So we’ve already got interest from some pretty big companies from overseas and believe it or not a lot of support in New Zealand too.”
He said the group had been in regular communication with local iwi and would be happy to have them on board.
Turner estimated the build would cost around $8-10 billion and if successful, could be up-and-running by 2035.
He said the project was similar in scale to the Manapōuri Power Station and could generate a lot of power for a relatively small lake.
“It can store about 5000 gigawatt-hours and that’s enough to cover a dry year-and-a-half so it’s a very important feature for the future.”
One gigawatt-hour can power roughly 10,000 homes for a year.
Turner said the plant could work as a battery – water could be pumped back into the lake during periods of low energy demand.
“When the prices are low it usually means there’s a lot of spare power … so we would pump the water up to Lake Onslow.
“It can do several things. It can deal with these dry years because it stores a lot, but it can also do this on a daily cycle. So it could generate when every body gets up for breakfast and it can pump overnight when the prices are low and there’s not much demand.”
Turner rejected concerns that the project would undermine energy companies’ long-term planning.
“When you build wind farms they don’t match up to the demand profile. You need something else to help when there’s no wind. A project like this actually provides a floor in the price because it’s going to be buying power to pump and it will provide intermittency support for wind.”
He believed the project would “unlock some very big wind development in Southland”.
A spokesperson for the Ministry for the Environment said the Minister for Infrastructure had issued a decision to refer the project to the Fast-track approvals process.
“It is eligible to lodge a substantive application to be considered by an expert panel.
“Information on the referral decision is available on the Fast-track projects website here: Clutha Pumped Hydro.
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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand
