Huntly

But Otago University researcher Sebastian Garricker says it risks moving the conversation away from climate change altogether.

He says focusing only on energy security could mean perverse outcomes, like more coal stockpiled at Huntly.

In Aotearoa New Zealand, the Education Review Office says 199 schools need help for the sake of their students.

Its 2026 annual report says students at the schools are at risk without timely intervention.

And you know, there are places in the Waikato that could actually shift the dial a little bit.

Places like Huntly.

Um, I think Ngaruawahia is in there as well, but these are also populations that tend to have very high voter bases on the Māori role, um, and not necessarily on the general role.

So maybe that's part of the reason as well, um, that, that National keeps romping in.

And played rugby.

And it wasn't until I got serious into rugby league when my parents moved back to the farm back home in Huntly and then ended up playing league a lot more serious.

Down in Huntly?

Down in the Waikato.

Yeah,

Went to the Bulldogs at 17.

Yeah.

Left New Zealand, left Huntly and got a scholarship there with the Bulldogs.

The service has grown in frequency and the number of services since it started.

There are times when they've not been able to pick up passengers at Huntly on the way through because Hamiltonians have filled them up.

And they're using old trains for that at the moment.

What we say they should be getting up there, as well as down here for that matter, is some of the new rail car type units that the government has quite wisely ordered for the lower North Island.

What happens is that risk is actually priced into people's power bills, and that's why you've got to do what we're doing, which is foot flat on the accelerator doing as much renewables, built more in three years than the previous eight.

But you also have to have the backups in place, whether that be a strategic coal reserve at Huntly, strategic diesel reserve in Whangarei, uh, or an LNG facility as well.

Which is that happening? You know, is, is LNG a goer next term?

Yes, it's an important part of the backstop.

...

the sort of direction we should be going.

All right, so which direction should we be going in? Well, Genesis Energy is, uh, heading in one direction, right, switching on its new 100 megawatt battery at Huntly today.

Pretty major investment in storing renewable energy.