Full or partial closure of the Tiwai aluminium smelter

Wouldn't NZ get better value for $$ by making start-up funding available for Tiwai workers wanting to set up their own businesses?  Or indeed anyone wanting to set up a business that would employ them... or funding education/training to let them change careers.

'Surplus' power from smelter could be freed-up for South Island in 2022

Tom Pullar-Strecker11:11, Dec 03 2019

 

Contact Energy and Meridian Energy have agreed to chip in $10 million to bring forward the date by which South Island power users could tap into electricity generation freed-up by the full or partial closure of the Tiwai aluminium smelter.

The funding may increase the prospect of at least of one of the smelter's four pot lines being shut down by 2022.

Transpower, which owns the national grid, said Contact and Meridian had each agreed to contribute $5m to accelerate the upgrade of the transmission network between Clutha and Upper Waitaki....

......Rio Tinto is understood to be lobbying for a reduction in its lines charges, arguing that would be required to keep the smelter evenly partially open.

Energy Minister Megan Woods has asked officials to examine proposals which Rio Tinto put in writing late last month.

Simon Mackenzie, chief executive of Auckland lines company Vector, has questioned the justification for concessions on the basis that – putting transmission charges aside – the smelter only pays about a quarter to a third of the price that residential households pay for the power it consumes.....

https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/117888748/surplus-power-from-smelter-could-be-freedup-for-south-island-in-2022