Power company Meridian Energy has posted a lower underlying half year profit on the back of lower sales and electricity generation, as it announced a major new wind farm.
Photo: 123rf
The bottom line profit was $227 million compared with $191m the year before, but it contained nearly $100m in gains in the values of various instruments to protect against power and financial volatility.
Stripping out the one-offs the underlying profit was $156m against $184m, with the amount of power generated down 7 percent and revenue down nearly 10 percent.
Meridian is a totally renewable energy supplier and said it would build a wind farm in Hawke's Bay.
"There's a massive clean energy transformation underway in the New Zealand economy and now is the time to tackle climate action to support Aotearoa accelerate its transition away from fossil fuels," chief executive Neal Barclay said.
The Harapaki Wind Farm will be the country's second largest windfarm with 41 turbines generating 176 megawatts, big enough to power 70,000 households. It was expected to cost $395m.
Meridian is the main power supplier to the Tiwai Point aluminium smelter, and Barclay said the recent deal to keep supplying until the end of 2024 had brought greater certainty to the Southland region and electricity sector.
"Meridian is committed to working with a range of parties who are progressing some exciting new opportunities in Southland, from mega scale data centres to hydrogen production at scale," Barclay said.
The company is currently working on a study into green hydrogen with Contact Energy.
Meridian gained retail customers during the period, but low hydro lake levels and inflows reduced the amount of power generation.