Transpower NZ

30/05/2026

2.45pm Update: Thanks to the quick work of The Lines Company, lights are coming back on in Waimarino. Apologies again to those affected for the inconvenience.

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2.30pm Kia ora - Apologies to those in and around the Waimarino (formerly National Park village) area who are without power at the moment. We’re investigating the situation and will provide an update here when we have one. Thanks for your patience.

28/05/2026

We’re a few days out from winter 🥶 – and it’ll come as no surprise to you that New Zealand’s electricity use peaks on cold winter mornings and evenings.

Our friend Volt is back to explain how Kiwis help to flatten those peaks and save money in the process! Take a look ⚡️

27/05/2026

The My Marathon challenge has taken over the Transpower offices this month, with 150+ participants and more than $11,000 raised for the Heart Foundation. 🥰♥️

Heart disease is something many kiwis will be familiar with through personal experience or that of friends and family. Run by the Heart Foundation, MyMarathon is an opportunity to raise funds for life-saving heart research by challenging yourself to walk or run 42 km over the month of May.

All the money raised goes to the Heart Foundation to fund research that will help to save the lives of kiwis affected by heart disease.

Transpower's staff were keen to get involved in the challenge, and across our offices in Palmerston North, Hamilton, Wellington, Auckland and Christchurch we have beaten our record for the most amount of money raised for any donation campaign in our history! 🙌

Our people have challenged themselves to run and cycle marathons, lots of 5ks, walk A LOT around the hills and streets of their cities, row, and even take it to the next level and complete 42km of vertical elevation. 🏃‍♀️‍➡️🚴‍♂️

In total, we've travelled 10,000 kilometres. That's almost as long as all our transmission lines put together (11,000 kilometres) and almost six times as many kilometres as the distance between Kaikohe and Tiwai Point - the Northernmost and Southernmost ends of the national grid (1890 kilometres).

Ka pai to everyone who has gotten involved in the MyMarathon challenge - you're making a big difference. Learn more about the challenge here: https://www.mymarathon.co.nz/

Heart Foundation

26/05/2026

Big things are taking shape at Te Rahui 🌞

There’s something special about milestones - seeing plans turn into progress.

At the 400MW Te Rahui Solar Farm, the first solar panels have been installed. We’re working alongside our partners Nova Energy and Meridian Energy to connect their major new renewable project onto the grid, helping bring more clean energy to homes and businesses across Aotearoa.

Projects like this take careful coordination behind the scenes to build the grid connection. From engineering and construction through to data and commissioning, we make sure everything connects safely and reliably.

It’s another step forward in building the generation Aotearoa needs for an electrified future, and a great example of momentum building across the sector. ⚡️

24/05/2026

It's the kind of story that has the makings of a Michael Bay movie... 'Scientists warn of a huge plasma blast from the sun which will cause extreme geomagnetic storms on Earth and risk major damage to electricity grids across the globe'. 🎬😳

However, this is the very real risk of something called 'space weather', and in the absence of a Hollywood action hero, we've been preparing for this over several years, developing our own response plan with science experts and industry partners. 🫡🤝

We put this plan through its paces last week for our annual pan-industry exercise, where 300 people across more than 50 organisations came together to simulate an extreme space weather event. ☀️⚡️

It was a great opportunity for the electricity sector to practise working together in a complex scenario which helps us strengthen our collective readiness to save the power system and all the Kiwis that rely on it for their wellbeing and livelihoods. 🙌

It's work like this that has New Zealand leading the world in preparedness for large solar storms - and we're not done yet, as we'll continue to enhance our plans the more we learn from these large simulations.

21/05/2026

Welcome to the power system Glenbrook Ohurua Battery!⚡️🔋

The official opening yesterday of Contact Energy's first grid-scale battery at Glenbrook, south Auckland, is great news for the power system and for all of New Zealand. 😄

The 100MW Glenbrook Ohurua Battery 1 delivers fast, flexible electricity and can power the equivalent of around 44,000 homes for up to two hours when it’s needed most. This will help Transpower manage New Zealand's power system on our coldest mornings and evenings when demand is highest and the wind is not blowing and the sun is not shining.❄️

Contact is also progressing Glenbrook Ohurua Battery 2, a 200MW project alongside the first battery. Together, the batteries will provide up to 300MW of capacity, enough to power the equivalent of 132,000 homes for up to two hours during peak demand. 💪🏠

With these and other batteries in the pipeline, installed battery capacity is expected to increase from 230 MW now to 930 MW by 2028. That will be enough power to meet more than 10% of national demand as we navigate through our biggest winter peaks!

20/05/2026

Let it grow! 🌱

Tanera Gardens Trust run a community garden in the suburbs of Wellington, near our Central Park Substation.

In 2025 Tanera Gardens applied to our CommunityCare Fund for some money to reinvigorate their community garden.

Tanera's members grow vegetables in 30 garden plots, and they wanted to increase how much space and soil was available to be actively gardened by their community. 🍎🍐🥬

At the time, there were several sycamore trees that shaded large areas of land, making it difficult to set up flourishing new plots for growing food.

Once their application was approved, Tanera's volunteers got stuck into the work required to create more space for new garden beds.

That work included repairing the fence around the garden, creating a new Hugelkulture garden bed and, after felling the sycamores, treating the tree stumps to avoid re-growth. The wood from the trees was used as firewood or put to use around the garden. 🌳🪵

The rising cost of food has seen an increased interest in vegetable growing, and having more space means this community garden will be able to involve more people who would like to grow their own food for their families. 🌻

The funding for this work at the Tanera community garden came from our CommunityCare Fund. This fund exists to support community groups in areas impacted by our overhead transmission lines and substations through investing in local projects that add real value to these communities. 💚

The current funding round has closed but the summer round will open in October. You can find out more on our website: https://www.transpower.co.nz/communitycare-fund

18/05/2026

There’s a 40km energy highway beneath Cook Strait — here’s how it works!

The HVDC link is an important part of the national electricity grid. HVDC stands for high-voltage direct current and refers to the transmission line that connects the North and South Islands, including over 500km of overhead lines as well as the undersea cables. 🌊⚡️

Running beneath the sea all the way across Cook Strait, the cables have the mighty job of moving power between the islands, most often south-to-north from large South Island hydro dams up through the central North Island, but also north-to-south sometimes, like when hydro lake levels are lower.

In the footage you can see here, our teams from the 1990s are laying the HVDC cables that are currently in service - our health and safety techniques aren't the only thing that has advanced, check out those outfits! 🧐🩳

A few things you might not know about the HVDC link:

🛳️A patrol ship runs 24/7 protecting the undersea cables from hazards like fishing boat anchors

😮The entire HVDC link stretches between Benmore in the South Island and Haywards in the North Island

⚡️The link carries different amounts of electricity at any one time depending on weather patterns and electricity supply and demand. At the moment it can carry up to 1200 MW of electricity.

The undersea cables currently moving power between the islands are approaching the end of their life, and we're working to replace them with new cables in the early 2030s.

The Commerce Commission has given draft approval for this work with a final decision anticipated later this year. You can check out our website for more information on the HVDC link and how the cable replacement is tracking: https://www.transpower.co.nz/hvdc-upgrade

15/05/2026

Together with Powerco it's great to serve the people and businesses of western Bay of Plenty to plan and deliver the electricity infrastructure upgrades that will power communities and growth, and enable this 'economic powerhouse' to thrive now and into the future 💪⚡️

It is the second regional deal signed after Auckland's last month.

14/05/2026

It's always the ones closest to you, the ones you don't expect...

13/05/2026

Kia ora Central and Lower North Island 👋

Between 25 and 26 May we’ll be carrying out helicopter inspections of some of our lines and towers in your area.

While we’re doing this work, you may notice a helicopter flying low near our transmission lines. We use them to get an up close and highly detailed look at our assets, which helps us to forecast future maintenance and investments. 👷‍♀️

For more information about these inspections and why we use helicopters, have a quick read on our website https://www.transpower.co.nz/helicopter-survey