Read our new Electric Homes and Vehicles report
Electrify everything. Electrify everyone. Electrify New Zealand. That's Rewiring Aotearoa's vision and our CEO Mike Casey gave a condensed version of what we've done and what we're doing at our Electric Christmas party recently. As he said to a large crowd at Ecotricity, which kindly hosted the event and provided the excellent electric cake, 2024 was the year of the thinking, 2025 was the year of the doing, and 2026 will be the year of mass adoption.
This year, we counted all the country's fossil fuel machines (there are around 10 million of them and seven million are ready to electrify right now); we launched our policy manifesto and presented an achievable, affordable plan to create the world's most electric economy; we took the Kill Bills tour across the country and now have 36 community electrification groups; we've started an electrification accelerator in Queenstown that aims to become a demonstration project for the world to follow; and we have worked closely with a range of partners on the Ratepayer Assistance Scheme to ensure more New Zealanders get access to low-interest, long-term loans for electrification upgrades.
We're always fighting for the customers in the energy system (and they need more help than ever), but we're also fighting for New Zealand and we firmly believe that going electric is a massive win-win-win-win for the country. It could save us billions, slash our emissions, provide much greater resilience in emergencies and improve our energy security and we will continue to push for more ambition from our politicians as we head into next year's 'electric election'.
Thank you to all those who have chipped in to help us do this work. And thank you to all those who have electrified their own lives, attended one of our events, shared our posts, or used our information to try and educate others. It's been a real team effort.
If you'd like to donate, you can do so here.
When Mike Casey bought his house near Cromwell, it came with gas bottles on the side of the home for water and an expensive diesel system for the underfloor heating. He replaced both of them with a Steibel Eltron system and it's been saving him money ever since. As technical manager Bhawesh Singh told him at the Electrify Queenstown conference, there has been a big influx in enquiries from homes looking to get off the molecules and onto electrons.
Read moreDownloadConfidence that cutting regulations to make solar power more accessible - won't jeopardise people's safety. A new Regulation Ministry reports laid out a potential blueprint to legalise plug-in solar and reduce the time and cost of panel installation. Rewiring Aotearoa CEO Mike Casey shares his thoughts with Andrew Dickens.
The burgeoning demand for solar was also a chance to address a mismatch between the numbers of training opportunities available and young people searching for work, Casey said. "The mums of New Zealand are telling me that there's not enough apprenticeships for their kids and the solar installers of New Zealand are telling me there's not enough trained people."
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