Electricity prices and demand both increase

By CHRIS DANIELS

Electricity prices went up last month, along with a 5 per cent jump in demand for power.

Electricity wholesale market operator M-Co, which collated the figures, put a slight price rise around February 20 down to outages on the high-voltage cable linking the North and South Islands.

In the lower South Island, the wholesale price of electricity went from 1.61c a kilowatt hour to 3.25c, but prices increased only slightly in the North Island.

A Transpower spokesman said the Cook Strait cable had reduced capacity for maintenance on February 20, but he was surprised that M-Co related this to a wholesale power price rise.

Water levels in the hydro storage lakes dropped by 10 per cent last month, but by the end of the month were within 95 per cent of average.

Lakes Tekapo, Pukaki and Taupo were all more than 85 per cent full at the end of the month.

The higher power prices and the risk of another dry year have caused a jump in electricity charges for many business and residential consumers in the past few months.