Albert Brantley, chief executive of Genesis, told The New Zealand Herald: “Huntly is a well maintained asset built to an extremely high design standard. There is no reason it couldn’t stay in the mix for another 20 or 25 years. The Meridian deal does not solve the problem. It only buys us time.”
Huntly power station is a thermal power station that uses coal, gas or both simultaneously as fuel.
Huntly Power Station consists of six separate generating plants; Units 1 – 4, the original four separate generating units of 250MW each, which are capable of burning coal, natural gas or a combination of the two; Unit 5, the 400MW combined cycle gas turbine (previously known as e3p), and Unit 6, a 48MW open cycle gas turbine. Genesis expects two of Huntly’s four 250MW units to continue in the market for a few more years.
In order to raise the capacity of its small gas-fired peaking plant at Huntly from 48MW to around 100MW, the company is now planning to upgrade the plant to a combined cycle plant. It is also planning for a 480MW gas-fired power plant at Rodney.
