Spot Market electricity prices increase again

Spot Market electricity prices increase again over June

Spot Market electricity prices increased in June with the higher demand resulting from the onset of winter coupled with the continuation of weak inflows being the main drivers. The high output of the upper North Island thermal generators can be seen by the lowest reference node average monthly price being at Otahuhu.

Average monthly prices at the Haywards, Otahuhu, and Benmore reference nodes increased in June from their respective May figures by between 11% and 15%. The average Haywards prices increased from 7.03c/kWh in May to 8.01c/kWh in June, Otahuhu prices increased from 7.09c/kWh to 7.89c/kWh, and Benmore prices from 6.89c/kWh to 7.91c/kWh.

There were 3 unplanned and one planned outage of components of the HVDC inter-island link during June. These outages did not result in any price impacts due to the transmission flows in effect during the outages being less than the revised limits. Southward flows over the HVDC occurred daily in June. The total daily amount of electricity flowing south over the HVDC varied from 61MWh to 4494MWh, the average northward flow over the HVDC during May was 3349MWh. Southward flows occurred mainly in the early morning and late at night trading periods.

New Zealand hydro inflows over the month of June were 81% of average. National daily inflows were above average on only 5 days during June. National hydro storage in June was below average for the entire month, decreasing from 97% of average at 01 June to 85% of average at 30 June.

Daily demand in June was at a higher level than that recorded during May 2005 and June 2004. Average daily demand in June 2005 was 114.4Wh compared to 105.8GWh in May 2005 and 110.5GWh in June 2004.

For more information on electricity prices and hydrological conditions, visit: www.comitfree.co.nz

ENDS

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