Pattrick Smellie: North v South in never-ending grid stoushROBERT CHARLES/FAIRFAX NZOPINION: Last September, the national grid operator Transpower made a small but important change to the way it charges to get electricity across Cook Strait. In the north, they've scoffed that South Island hydro generators need the grid to get the juice north to where most of their customers are. The national grid makes this possible, carrying electricity from the far south to the far north, but it costs serious money to build and maintain. It realised South Island hydro generators faced a perverse incentive to withhold electricity for the North Island from time to time, for no reason other than high cost. That meant more use of North Island gas-fired power stations than was necessary.

Source: Stuff August 10, 2016 17:01 UTC