Northland power cut: Business Chamber unimpressed, failure 'not fair'

There is a "huge infrastructure deficit" in Northland and recent failures were "just not fair" on the region, Northland Chamber of Commerce chief executive Darryn Fisher says.

Thousands of households lost power on Thursday after a tower fell near Glorit.

Transpower has reconnected one of the region's two 220-kilovolt circuits, propping it up with a temporary pylon. The other line remains trapped under a fallen tower.

As a result, the risk of short power cuts was higher than usual, a Transpower spokesperson said.

The power outages were the latest in a series of infrastructure failures, including major road closures after Cyclone Gabrielle, Fisher said on Morning Report.

"It's still an ongoing concern. Our larger members and businesses are not going to be fully up and running at least until tomorrow.

"They were reconnected yesterday, but these operations are not just a 'flick the switch and you're back into full production mode'.

"I just went past the Fonterra factory there, actually. It's a foggy morning and [there's] no lights on, so we know it's an ongoing issue."

There had been little communication from Transpower over the power outages, Fisher said.

"Very quiet over the weekend. I can only assume that they were fully consumed with trying to get things back on track."

The Northland Business Chamber would be meeting with power providers and Northland MP Grant McCallum this morning, and having a "holistic conversation" about the region's infrastructure woes.

"We're really looking forward to hearing an update on what the cause of the issue is and how we can get some certainty in the future.

"This power issue has been the one that's brought things to light this week, but transport and infrastructure has got to be the number one.

"It's a pretty significant deficit we have in infrastructure here in Northland. It's not just power: the airports, internet connection, phone connection, roads - all those things combined.

"We're in a huge infrastructure deficit here in Northland and these issues just don't happen in other areas of New Zealand and quite frankly it just seems a little unfair on the region."

On Friday, economics consultants Infometrics put the cost of outages in the region around $60 million.

The full cost was yet to be tallied, Fisher said, but it was small- to medium-sized businesses who would bear the brunt, he said.

"Our members don't necessarily get into business for massive profits ... they want to fit their lifestyle [and] employ four to five other people in the community... so the motivations up here are slightly different, [and] that makes us slightly fragile.

"We feel the impacts of any increases in cost or downtime in infrastructure because these aren't massive, 50 percent-margin, profiteering-type businesses - they're community members - so those are the conversations I think we need to have."

It was too soon to tell whether the outages would be the final straw for some business, Fisher said.

"Today and throughout this week we'll get a feel for how many, I'm sure there'd be some that were already feeling the pinch of being disconnected from our roads.

"But thankfully, we'll have those open this week, have a good Matariki weekend and that will certainly help."

Morning Report approached Transpower for an interview but no one was available.

However, local lines company Northpower chief executive Andrew McLeod told Morning Report supply was "business as usual", they had "all the energy we need", and local networks were back to normal.

Because the electricity was being transmitted through a single circuit, there was a higher risk of outages than normal, but each circuit could provide the load the region needed and it was "unlikely" there would be further power cuts this week, he said.

"I think for people at home and businesses, we will just get on with it and assume that Transpower will finish the work on time."

Repairs to the other line were likely to be completed before next week, he said, and it was "not abnormal" to rely on a single line, particularly for regions "out on a spur" like Northland.

"That's a big, modern line. Pylons falling over [is] pretty unusual, but while the pylons are standing that's a very certifiable line for Northland. That's a fairly normal configuration ... and it can give us a fair amount of energy when we need it."

McLeod would not be drawn on speculation that Transpower contractors had removed bolts from the pylon before it fell on Thursday, except to say that Northpower had helped with some of the repair work afterwards.

"Our focus has been on the repair. Clearly, we've asked them what's happened, what they'll be doing about it.

"Their message has been same to us... they'll want to investigate [the fallen pylon], they'll want to understand it... [to ensure it] doesn't occur again. That's fine with us. We really do want to understand what's happened and make sure we can rely on the Transpower service into the future."

McLeod thanked households and businesses that had been affected by the power outages.

"It was an unusual situation. We had a lot of our large industrial companies down ... and the local communities had a fair amount of disruption ... they've had to manage energy through the evening and through the morning. They've been phenomenal at that.

"We realise it's just a big disruption, they just want to get on with their lives and know that power's reliable. They don't want to have to muck around too much ... just a big thank you for our community."

Industrial users operating again

Power has been restored to Northland's biggest industrial users on Monday morning.

Fonterra's dairy plants at Kauri and Maungaturoto, plus Golden Bay Cement and the Marusumi mill at Portland, were among the major industrial users that agreed to suspend operations during last week's region-wide power outage.

Northpower spokesperson Rachel Wansbone said all four plants now had sufficient power to operate, though some would take time to ramp-up to full production.

She said Fonterra took the opportunity to carry out maintenance at Kauri, north of Whangārei, while the plant was offline.

Milk was trucked to Auckland while the two dairy factories were closed.

Wansbone said the companies involved had been "amazingly supportive" in helping the region get through the weekend's precarious power situation.