Mr Birch ‘advocate for S.I. development’

Press, 28 August 1982, Page 12

Mr Birch ‘advocate for S.I. development’

Parliamentary reporter The second Cook Strait cable would be deferred for as long as the South Island wanted, the Minister of Energy, Mr Birch, has said. As long as there was sufficient demand in the South Island for the electricity generated, there need be no cable, he said. “I have always been an advocate' for South Island development. I say, for goodness sake get your growth going so we can develop the hydro for use in the South Island,” Mr Birch said. Some critics of the planned second cable havesaid it is intended to take from the South Island surplus power produced by the six dams scheduled for commissioning in the next 15 years, and send it north. Mr Birch said the stations could be built without any second cable, if there was sufficient South Island demand to absorb the energy produced. There was “not too much” in the argument that South Island demand for power would compete unsuccessfully with the economic need to keep costs down, by avoiding use of the more expensive North Island thermal and oil-fired stations, and using the cheaper. South

Island hydro source. Mr Birch said.

Loss in transmission of South Island power north through the Cook Strait cable was high, and the added cost of laying a second cable brought the cost almost level with that of using the thermal, gas and oil-fired stations in the north. Mr Birch said there would be a surplus from the Clyde high dam if the smelter did not go ahead, and no other large energy user replaced it, and the country did not have dry years. The surplus theoretically would exist from 1989 to about 1994.

However, talk of surpluses in relation to one dam finally became hypothetical, he said. Many variants in load, weather, and demand meant that a projected surplus could disappear. Growth in the South Island in the next five years would rise at a rate sufficient to absorb 2000GWh of electricity — or one Clyde dam — each year, Mr Birch said. The Clyde dam, when it was commissioned in 1987-88, would produce a block of power essential to the South Island. Some of that power would not be used because a block of power suddenly coming on stream could never be matched with equal demand, Mr Birch said. “I have always believed

that the South Island should use its own energy and not' send it north. They have the ability to do so now.” . One of the projections in the 1982 energy plan expected to be released late next week was that a second electricity cable would be built in the mid-19905, given that there was no smelter in the South Island, no use of the North Island thermal stations, and that South Island stations proceeded on schedule, and growth in demand was as predicted, he said.-