The Commerce Commission has warned power lines company Aurora Energy Limited for an excessive level of power outages in 2020. The warning relates to the last of a series of breaches of its network quality standards relating to historic underinvestment in the replacement of assets and maintenance on the network.
Aurora owns and operates the poles, lines and other equipment that distributes electricity from Transpower's national grid to over 92,000 homes, farms and businesses in Dunedin, Central Otago and Queenstown Lakes. Aurora is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Dunedin City Holdings Limited, owned by the Dunedin City Council.
Aurora was previously penalised almost $5 million by the High Court for breaches of its network quality standards across 2016-2019. The Commission considered the full range of enforcement responses, including seeking further penalties, but ultimately chose to warn Aurora for its breach in 2020 noting:
- Aurora's 2020 breach was largely inevitable due to its conduct in the years leading up to its earlier breaches, for which it had already been penalised;
- the previous penalties against Aurora act as a deterrent to similar underinvestment by Aurora or other suppliers in the future, and an additional penalty would not significantly strengthen this deterrence; and
- Aurora had already made significant investment to remedy the situation and committed to continuing to invest in its network supported by its June 2020 application for a customised price-quality path.
