Last week we attended(and sponsored) Downstream, New Zealand's Energy Sector Strategic Forum. With energy in New Zealand ramping up to be a key part of this year's elections due to challenges around cost-of-living, security, and business viability. At the political level, this led to a lot of discussion:
- Both the Greens and NZ First are putting up serious policy plays on splitting up the gentailers or otherwise seriously intervening in the market. NZ First in particular is loud on this front(See Shane Jones continuing to tweet on the topic this week as well https://lnkd.in/ev6C9PSJ)
- I think the gentailers believe they're still in a position to minimise the issues, in reality politicians are gearing up to "do something" about our energy problems in ways that will be blunt and publicly visible.
- Simon Watts(who was energy minister that day but lost the portfolio the next), was significantly more open to the idea of a gentailer split I've seen from a National MP in a fair while. Whether that is relevant may change given him getting shuffled out of the role the following day.
- Fonterra made an interesting comment that gas supply challenges are accelerating their migration off gas, potentially at the cost of their migration off coal. This raises some interesting questions around which fuel is easier to guarantee security and pricing around in comparison to environmental priorities.
- Shane Jones explicitly said that he intends to negotiate for Minister of Energy if NZ First is part of the next government(On current polls, there is a solid chance of this), and if he finds out who lobbied National not to let him be Minister of Energy in the current government he will "make them pay".
On the technology front, there was good stuff and fixable challenges:
- Innovation is carrying on, and pilots of new efforts around flex, better handling of distributed generation, etc., are going in a good direction.
- Data remains the building block for most of this new technology, and most energy organisations at the tables I was at are putting a lot of time and energy into upgrading these systems.
- Most people are excited about better open data in the future and the many processes that will get just a little bit better and more seamless.
- AI remains exciting at multiple levels: Day-to-day operations support, increased ability to build and test new solutions quickly, and a future with more agentic approaches.
- Legacy systems are increasingly challenging as they get left behind by new technologies. There are a lot of "chicken and egg" problems where the highly integrated nature of systems across the industry and between participants requires coordinating sequenced upgrades.
The good news is that Ackama can help you with innovation, technology, and data problems. The bad news is that if Shane Jones is hunting you through parliament with his Patu, then, unfortunately, we cannot help you.
