Dunedin company to move to Chch

Press, 9 November 1984, Page 7

Dunedin company to move to Chch

A multi-million dollar heating business will move to Christchurch early next year. Mr William Ginivan, managing director of Ginivan Industries, Ltd, said that the business would move from Dunedin because the long-term business opportunities were better in Christchurch. Ginivan Industries has been making electrical switch gear for 14 years. When it moves to Christchurch, the business will also begin to make a new type of night-storage heater. The heaters, which had until now been made in Britain, were more compact than other brands and used electricity supplied at night at a cheaper rate, said Mr Ginivan.

Other brands required a power boost in the afternoon on cold days, which put an extra load on peaktime power use, he said. Mr Ginivan said that the company would probably

produce about 25,000 heaters a year. On a retail level, this was between $lO and $2O million, he said. Christchurch was the biggest market for the heaters, he said. They would help to control air pollution. “Electrical heating is the cleanest form of spaceheating that exists and night-storage heating makes more efficient use of the electricity supply,” he said.

Mr Ginivan said that the power generated from South Island rivers at night should be given free to South Island consumers. The heaters worked on an iron ceramic compound called feolite, which was a more compact form of heat discovered by the Electricity Council Research Centre in Capenhurst, England, said Mr Ginivan.

“It gives the best heating and the best storage capacity in the smallest volume of space — and space is at a premium in the modern

house.” he said. Feolite was made of ironsand which was plentiful on the West Coast, said Mr Ginivan.

By 1987, the New Zealand content of the heaters would be about 80 per cent, he said. The first heaters, which should arrive just before Christmas, are imported. Kitsets will be assembled in Dunedin. The Heathcote County Council was the first electrical supply authority to show interest in the heaters and would receive the first heaters, said Mr Ginivan.

The Heathcote electrical engineer, Mr lan Bywater, said that there had been a lot of interest in the heaters and there was a waiting list of about 45 people who wanted to buy them. Heathcote had ordered about 90 of the “slimline” heaters and 10 of the large central-heating units, he said.

Mr Ginivan said he was not sure where the firm would be sited. The Christchurch City Council wanted the business in the Bexley industrial estate but the Heathcote County wanted it on land in the county, he said.

The company would employ about 30 staff — half would be skilled and half semi-skilled process workers.