• See Rewiring Aotearoa's full submission here

We pushed our submission guide out five days before the deadline. It was sent to leaders of our emerging electrification communities around the country on Monday, an email sent out, and two social posts encouraging people to have a look and have their say. We expected maybe a dozen responses given the late release and the busy lives so many of us are living. We were stoked when 15 community leaders told us they’d submitted!

Our Policy Director Dave Karl almost fell off his chair on Friday night when he realised more than 150 organisations and individuals had submitted. More than two thirds of all submitters put forward similar arguments to us, with many of these building on the content we provided. The Electricity Authority received around 20 for its last consultation.

When you take away the electricity retailers and distribution companies with deep vested financial interests of their own, close to 90% of submitters were askiing for what we are asking for (or very close to it).

While some individuals copy and pasted content, they took the time to do so and have their voices heard. As one submitter said “I am submitting these points - you may see them in other submissions. I would urge you not to minimise them, even though they are collectively developed and submitted by many people, I wholeheartedly agree with and endorse them.”

The real insights these emerging participants in the energy system provided are incredible:

• As a prosumer, a symmetrical rate would be far easier to understand, and a more fair way to price electricity, where my electricity is treated as just as valuable as an energy company's energy export or reduction… With a fairer system in place, I may reconsider my decision not to invest in a battery or upgrade my EV battery to one that can act as a storage facility when I have significant excess power.
• We would reconsider [our decision not to get a battery] and add a battery (or even 2) if there was a strong, symmetrical export tariff that provided the prospect of savings over time to offset the considerable upfront cost.
• But due to lack of incentive, I will not be paying for a grid connection [for my new home being built] as it is not worth my while compared to investing in my own storage and not be tied to the grid fees I currently pay (usually two-thirds of my power bill).
• I would definitely have considered increasing the size of my solar array and installing a battery if the export regime had been more supportive to my calculated payback period. The installation of a battery would also have made my installation more resilient in the event of power cuts and would have reduced my requirements for grid consumption at peak times.
• We are also living in a region that is expecting a large earthquake in the coming decades and large solar systems will literally be life saving systems when this happens.

To those of you who submitted, thank you! You have inspired us to push even harder for all the participants in the system.

While not surprised, we are nonetheless disappointed that distributors are trying to largely preserve the status quo. They are leaning heavily on their lack of progress over the years to put in place good cost reflective consumption tariffs and misplaced concerns around wealth transfers. They are requesting maximum flexibility, and an extra year before they need to have new tariffs in place. That would mean nothing will change for consumers until 2027!

We are working on a cross-submission to further build the case and will be contacting some submitters who have the opposite view to us to make sure we aren’t missing something. While we can’t spend the time required to argue every point we think is factually incorrect in these submissions, we will give it a go!

The consumer has spoken. They want to be fairly rewarded, including through Symmetrical Export Tariffs.

We implore the Task Force to listen not only to us, and not only to the individuals and community groups that took the time to ask for more to be done, but also to listen to themselves:

"We’re proposing three changes to help support this consumer empowerment and decentralisation of our energy system. Over time, this will increase community resilience and lower power costs for everyone.” Ana Kominic, Chair of Electricity Authority, 12 February 2025

“Over the coming months, it will become increasingly clear that we are absolutely determined to ensure everyday New Zealanders get their share of the benefits our system can provide.” Ana Kominic, Chair of Electricity Authority, 3 February 2025

‍“We will not be deterred or distracted by the efforts of vested interests hoping to preserve the status quo,” Sarah Gillies, CE, Electricity Authority.