Geothermal station lifts Mighty River Power earnings

Taupo's Nga Awa Purua geothermal power station has made a significant contribution to a 22 per cent increase in earnings for Mighty River Power.
Mighty River Power has announced earnings of $233.6 million for the six months to December 31 - up 22 per cent on the previous period.
The rise has been driven by increased generation, primarily from additional geothermal capacity. Mighty River's geothermal operations are now based in Rotorua and chairman Joan Withers said the overall result reflected the company's $1 billion investment in new geothermal plant during the last five years.
Nga Awa Purua, a joint venture with the Tauhara North No2 Trust, opened in May last year, capable of producing up to 140MW. This, and other geothermal developments, have seen hydropower slip back to 63 per cent of Might River's overall domestic production as geothermal power increases its proportion.
"We've really seen the contribution from ... Nga Awa Purua ... show through in these results - a 69 per cent increase in our geothermal generation on the same period last year, with geothermal now more than 30 per cent of our total generation."
The six-month period also saw a 15 per cent increase in Mighty River's net profit after tax, which rose to $85.2 million. Higher interest expenses and depreciation charges and the capital investment programme did have an impact on this result.
An interim dividend of $64.7 million was announced - up 15 per cent on last year - to be paid out this month.
Chief executive Doug Heffernan said the six-month results highlighted the considerable investment in base-load geothermal capacity and optimisation of Mighty River's gas-fired Southdown facility.
"The increased total capacity and balance of our portfolio enabled an 18 per cent lift in generation volumes to 3504GWh. This cushioned the impact of weather extremes - ranging from drought to some of the highest inflows in the Waikato."
Mighty River Power continues to advance its international and domestic generation development.
"We have made good progress in the period on our international geothermal investment programme in partnership with GeoGlobal Energy (GGE) in the US and Chile and its extension into Germany."
In New Zealand, Heffernan said Mighty River was working with the Tauhara North No2 Trust to build a  power station on the Ngatamariki geothermal field. He indicated the earliest this  would come to market would be late 2013.