Petrol prices rise 2c/litre
Petrol prices have risen for the second time in two weeks, with the AA labelling today's increase to diesel prices "completely unjustified".
Z Energy raised petrol and diesel by 2 cents a litre today, having done the same less than two weeks ago.
A litre of 91-octane rose to 218.9c, while diesel was up to 151.9c.
AA PetrolWatch spokesman Mark Stockdale said the imported cost of petrol had risen, but importer margins had fallen, while the New Zealand dollar had dropped 1c.
Despite this the cost rise was not high enough to justify a price rise at the pump, though companies had been raising prices at these margins recently.
For diesel, however, the commodity price had not risen, meaning diesel margins were above average.
"Therefore, the 2c price in diesel pump prices is completely unjustified," Stockdale said.
"If anything diesel prices should be falling."
The last time commodity prices were this high consumers were paying 1c less for petrol and 2c less for diesel, while the exchange rate was the same as today, he said. http://www.stuff.co.nz/business/10085802/Petrol-prices-rise-2c-litreﾧ Opposition’s new plan for power
Labour and Greens want Crown-owned single buyer to set prices for generators.
Declaring the electricity market a failure, Labour and the Greens plan to replace it with a model where a Crown-owned single buyer sets prices for generators, but one which they hope will maintain competition and innovation on the demand side.
While there are some differences between the two parties' policies, they both interpose a Government monopsony (monopoly buyer) called New Zealand Power between the supply and demand sides of the industry.
They say this will lower prices to consumers, echoing claims made for the market model when it was introduced in the 1990s.
Each generator would be paid a "fair return", calculated by NZ Power on the basis of their historic capital costs, possibly adjusted for inflation, plus operating costs like fuel, depreciation and maintenance, Labour said.
That would replace the current market where the marginal generator - the most expensive generation which needs to run in any given half-hour to ensure that demand is satisfied - sets the spot price which all the generators dispatched receive.
In practice, as the same companies are on both sides of the market, how much they are exposed to the spot price depends on the extent to which they are net buyers or net sellers of electricity in any period, and have managed the exposure through various hedging options.
The existing vertically integrated generator/retailers will have to separate their retail arms into standalone companies with their own boards and management. Whether full divestment is required would be determined later.
Something like the existing spot market would remain, Labour's finance spokesman David Parker, a former Minister of Energy, said.
"Not all contracts between the single buyer and those who buy from it will be at a fixed price. Not all of them will have a fixed quantity. You would not want that, because you have to be able to deal with what happens in a dry year," he said.
"There will be between the single buyer and those who buy [from it] a market, some of which will not be at fixed price or for a fixed term. We want competition between retailers. I wouldn't want to speculate how much of [their purchases] will be on spot."
He would not be surprised if some of the lines companies re-entered the retail energy market, reversing another of the 1990s reforms.
"We used to have monopolies before the Bradford reforms, in local electricity companies, but they were not profit-maximising monopolies. And that's the difference. If you have a monopoly which is trying to run fair prices, rather than maximise price, you will have a different outcome to an oligopoly which is price-maximising."
The proposed regime would also mark a return to central planning for new generation investment,
