NZ Engine

Source: Radio New Zealand

Thousands of New Zealanders have borrowed from their banks to put solar power systems on their houses, but advocates are calling for more help for people who don’t have a home loan.

The main banks all offer low-or no-interest loan options for people who want to invest in solar power for their homes, often by extending an existing home loan.

Westpac’s managing director of product, sustainability and marketing Sarah Hearn said the bank had approved more than 1000 “greater choices” loans for solar panels or batteries in the past two years, as well as a small number of personal loans.

The total amount lent was $30 million.

ASB said its Better Homes Top Up lending balances were $327 million, and around 4500 customers had used Better Homes Top up in the previous 12 months alone.

ANZ had a similar offer that had been taken out by 21,000 households to a total of more than $850 million.

‘Super excited’ about New Zealand’s energy transition

Chief executive of Rewiring Aotearoa Mike Casey said he was “super excited” about what was happening in New Zealand’s energy transition.

“A lot of the time we talk about moving from fossil fuels over to electricity, but I think there’s a bigger energy transition that’s going on here, which is also moving away from traditional energy landlords and towards customers of New Zealand taking a lot of energy sovereignty into their own hands.

“Being able to generate and store energy, it’s a whole new dynamic to the New Zealand’s energy system that we haven’t seen before.

“And while the price of all forms of energy, whether it grid electricity or diesel or petrol or gas, continues to go up at, I think, quite an uncomfortable rate for many New Zealanders, the price of solar and batteries seems to keep coming down.”

A typical system can cost between $9000 and $15,000 installed, although some systems are much larger.

Casey said while taking on a loan to pay for it was a form of debt that some people found uncomfortable, “choosing not to generate your own electricity on your own rooftop is another form of debt because you have to just keep paying someone else for the energy that they can provide you”.

He said a conservative estimate was that a system would pay itself back in seven or eight years.

“It really comes down to the number of people that are in your home, how much of that solar you generate you can self-consume. And a lot of it comes down to making sure all the machines in your home are electric.

“The more electric machines you have, like your hot water and your spatial heating and all of those kinds of things, the more of your own power that you use, the faster the payback on the solar is.”

Electricity comparison site Powerswitch tracks the buy back rate that companies pay for solar power that is generated, but not used and sent back to the grid.

It varies from 23c/kWh during peak period from Octopus through to 8c from Contact.

Casey said the next step should be support for batteries.

At present, many households do not opt for battery storage of the power generated because the cost makes it uneconomical.

But Casey said it could be part of helping the country shore up its defences against things like natural disasters.

“I would love to see the government come out and say, you know, we think a massive roll out of solar batteries and electrification in the homes of New Zealanders is the best way to bring down our cost of living because it genuinely is.”

Australia has about 40 percent rooftop solar covering compared to 3 percent to 4 percent in New Zealand.

That has been driven by government subsidies, including for batteries.

“They’ve seen 200,000 home batteries get installed in the last six months. It’s bigger than the peak response of Manapouri. It’s like building another entire dam.

“And at the moment, the energy system in New Zealand doesn’t recognise or reward customers from having batteries.”

But he said people who did not have mortgages or own their own homes were being left out.

Long-term low interest loans

Rewiring Aotearoa is working on a Ratepayer Assistance Scheme that would offer long-term low interest loans tired to a property with flexible repayment terms, building on the New Zealand Local Government Funding Agency.

These would have longer terms than the bank options, making them more manageable for people on lower incomes.

It said eight councils, plus EECA, had committed the further funding required to get the scheme ready for final equity investments from councils and central government.

“There’s a big problem here with equity and that not all New Zealanders have access to a mortgage.

“Pensioners, renters – we’re looking at what else can we do outside of mortgages for people to have the upgrades on their homes that allow them to start saving money.”

He said the ratepayer assistance scheme would be good for pensioners who had cleared their home loans and did not have the income to service the sort of loan that banks would offer them.

Rewiring Aotearoa is also working on a trial to look at solar for renters.

“How do you get the landlord to spend the money and how do you split the savings between the tenants and landlords?”

How long to pay power system off?

Investigative writer at Consumer Chris Schulz said it would take seven to nine years for a solar power system to pay for itself.

People who were high energy users, such as those with an electric vehicle, would see a quicker return.

He said it was likely that when New Zealand reached 5 percent coverage, it would be a “tipping point” for the new technology.

“People start seeing it when they’re out walking or on their neighbours’ roofs and start thinking oh yeah, okay – now might be a good time to look at this.”

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

A University of Auckland researcher says there may be a way to turn Lotto into a new type of Bonus Bonds, to leave players much better off.

Senior finance lecturer Gertjan Verdickt and co-author Amaury De Vicq from the University of Groningen, studied what happened after the Dutch government banned the sale and purchase of traditional lotteries in 1905, but allowed lottery bonds as an alternative.

These were a fixed-income product that let people invest while also going into a prize draw.

People were guaranteed their money back plus interest, with the additional chance of winning a big prize.

“Lotto is often defended because it funds community projects, which is fantastic, but it can disproportionately draw spending from people on lower incomes,” Verdickt said.

“Maybe the government could move towards supporting people to put money into something where they get a safe return, and the chance for a big win.

“A premium government-led bond-style product could fund public projects, while allowing New Zealanders to grow their money rather than lose money week after week.”

The researchers found that overall, people who were less wealthy put more money into lottery bonds, while wealthy individuals decreased their holdings.

“The magnitude of the move towards lottery bonds indicates that these bonds could be considered a substitute for gambling.”

The researchers found younger people were less likely to take up lottery bonds, while older individuals showed a stronger move into them after the policy change.

Verdickt said the regulation of gambling had always been a challenge for governments.

“Our study shows the Dutch government’s lottery bonds were helpful; they channelled people’s urge to gamble into an instrument that also encouraged saving.”

He said governments like New Zealand’s might introduce a lottery bond as a safer alternative to playing Lotto.

“Of course, these days people have so many options online and in-person when it comes to gambling. You can’t ban the urge to gamble, but you can guide people towards safer channels.

“The lottery bond offered by the Dutch government, for example, wasn’t a perfect investment, but it did provide a better option for many people.”

ANZ offered Bonus Bonds in New Zealand until 2020. When the scheme closed, it had more than $3 billion invested.

Investors had one entry per bond into a monthly $1 million prize draw.

But at the time the decision was made to close, ANZ said low interest rates had reduced the investment returns of the scheme and the prize pool available.

Verdickt said the sort of scheme he had researched was different because it was issued by municipalities and governments, not for-profit companies.

He said the scheme was also different because the Bonus Bonds payout was drawn randomly.

“Lottery bonds have a guaranteed payout and the additional lottery aspect is drawn randomly. So, 99 percent of bonus bonds holders got nothing, while 100 percent of lottery bond holders get something – interest and principal – but only a small percentage get the large prize.”

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

The EV slowdown: How government decisions changed the road ahead.

For a while there, electric vehicles felt inevitable in New Zealand, attracting a growing number of Kiwi drivers.

The future, humming quietly along city and rural roads, was silent, clean, and cheaper to run.

Then the brakes went on.

The Detail looks at why, talking to long-time EV-user Ed Harvey, founder and CEO of Evnex – an EV smart charging company in Christchurch.

He says in the space of a couple of years, electric vehicle sales have slumped, with the blame trail leading straight to Wellington. The government scrapped the clean car discount, introduced EV road-user charges, and, most recently, weakened the clean car standards.

“They [government ministers] would say they didn’t think it was working – they would probably say, look, the market share is way down, that’s proving Kiwis don’t really want electric vehicles, but I think the government has… really leveraged the politicisation of EVs to their advantage,” Harvey tells The Detail.

“And they haven’t shown leadership in a technology that is actually going to save kiwis money.”

Harvey built his own EV car, converting his Honda Accord, while at university in 2013.

He’s since sold it, upgrading to another EV.

But he says fewer Kiwis are joining him for the silent drive on New Zealand roads.

“We are definitely not soaring. 2025 was not the best year; I would say it was sort of flat, if not a very moderate growth.”

In terms of pure B-EVs (battery electric vehicles rather than hybrids) just over 9000 were sold in the New Zealand market last year. That’s just over a four percent market share, a slight increase on 2024 but a big dip on the year before. In 2023, which was the last year of the clean car discount, B-EVs had a 10 percent market share, translating to 26,000 sold.

“And even the year before that, in 2022, we had just under 20,000 [sold], and, again, compare that with just over 9000 last year, it’s a huge drop, which is really disappointing for those of us in the industry,” Harvey says.

After the government scrapped the clean car discount – the rebate that knocked thousands of dollars off the price of an electric vehicle – EVs were brought into the road user charge net.

For years, EV drivers had been exempt – a deliberate incentive to encourage uptake. That advantage disappeared – fairness, the government argued. Everyone pays their way.

Then late last year, penalties under the Clean Vehicle Standard – designed to push importers toward low-emission cars – were slashed, and the pressure to prioritise cleaner vehicles eased.

The government insists the slowdown reflects global trends and tight household budgets.

But Harvey says it has come at a devastating cost to the environment and for EV businesses.

“It’s done huge damage to the industry. There were a lot of fledgling businesses that were building, whether it be EV charging infrastructure, like us, or battery recycling, or EV service specialists that were starting to grow quite well back in 2022/23. It’s done a huge amount of damage to those businesses, and they have lost a lot of confidence.”

It prompted him to write opinion pieces for The Post and on LinkedIn, saying “the New Zealand government’s lack of strategy and ambition around electrification is nothing short of embarrassing. Our transport minister is capitulating to the interests of lobbyists and short-term political gains”.

He tells The Detail that transport remains a large source of emissions in New Zealand. And EVs are an answer to reduce this.

The Port of Auckland has noticed a drop in the number of EVs arriving in New Zealand.

Between 15,000 and 18,000 vehicles – a mix of EVs, hybrids, petrol, and diesel – arrive in Auckland every month – that’s about 200,000 a year.

But for December last year, only 600 vehicles were EVs.

“A year before that, December 2024, that was over 800, so we are talking about a decrease of around 30 percent for EVs,” Chris Mills, general manager, marine, multi-cargo and cruise at Port of Auckland, tells The Detail.

“And we are also seeing similar numbers, in terms of reductions, around plug-in hybrids.”

He says he’s seen a bump in non-plug-in, self-charging hybrids – the petrol-hybrid equivalent.

“We have seen those numbers really boom. In December, there were 2700 units registered in New Zealand.”

Ed Harvey doesn’t mind hybrids but would still prefer drivers committed to full electric vehicles.

He says they are the future ….. the technology is there, the chargers still work, it’s just that the road ahead is a lot less clear.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand