$500m Waikato power line may face delay or veto

Roy Hemmingway

The head of the Electricity Commission has strongly hinted it may veto or delay Transpower's planned $500 million power line from Waikato to Auckland.

Chairman Roy Hemmingway criticised the national grid operator for not looking carefully enough at alternatives.

The commission's draft decision on Transpower's giant 400KV transmission line - designed to prevent future blackouts - is due on April 27.

Mr Hemmingway yesterday outlined alternatives the commission had been looking at which would at least delay the need for the new line until 2017 or possibly 2021.

"I believe it was Transpower's responsibility to fully develop alternatives to its own proposal and ... consult the public on them," Mr Hemmingway said. "They didn't do that."

The comments will be a boost for the hundreds of landowners who have fought a bitter battle to stop the 400KV line, which will need 430 giant steel towers and stretch 186km from Whakamaru in the South Waikato to Otahuhu in South Auckland.

Rob Storey, a Waikato spokesman for the New Era Energy group which has opposed the new line, said landowners believed Transpower had not looked hard enough at other options.

"Certainly Mr Hemmingway is not being brow-beaten by the considerable pressure coming from industry interests," he said.

But Transpower was quick to react, taking a swipe at the commission in turn.

"Whether the comments were intended to come out the way they did or not, they certainly were not very helpful in terms of the relationship between Transpower and the Electricity Commission," said spokesman Chris Roberts.

"We have been looking at alternatives since 2003 and all of our reports - there have been 25 of them, thousands of pages - are on our website and have been provided to the commission."

Some of the alternatives the commission was examining had been considered and rejected as too costly, Mr Roberts said.

Discussions with the commission had left Transpower struggling to understand how it was applying the cost/benefit test.

Mr Hemmingway said he accepted the need for extra investment to get power to Auckland but the question was whether upgrades to existing lines had been looked at carefully enough.

The commission had made no decision and speculation based on its consideration of alternatives was premature.

"There's no question something must be done, we think before 2008. And if no generation is built in Auckland or north of Auckland there will need to be additional major investment," Mr Hemmingway said.

The commission will have another round of public consultation on its draft finding before issuing its final decision in July.

- Additional reporting NZPA