Security and Reliability Council

The Security and Reliability Council provides us with independent advice on reliability of supply issues, the performance of the electricity system and the system operator.

Role

Under section 20(2) of the Electricity Industry Act 2010, the function of the Security and Reliability Council (SRC) is to provide independent advice to the Electricity Authority on:

  • the performance of the electricity system and the system operator; and
  • reliability of supply issues.

The SRC fulfils its function by providing us with advice on:

  • the system operator’s performance, including against its principal performance obligations, security of supply function and any other function of the system operator important to the performance of the electricity system and/or to reliability of supply
  • system operations issues, including industry development needs and priorities relating to system operations
  • security of supply issues, including system security assessments and security of supply forecasts
  • reliability of supply issues, including planned and unplanned loss of supply and quality of supply issues
  • any other matters that the Electricity Authority considers to be within the function of the SRC as set out in the Act.

Meeting papers

Here is a summary of SRC meetings, the papers considered and meeting minutes. Meeting minutes are published once they have been approved at a subsequent meeting.

16 March 2023

At this meeting, the SRC received presentations from the Electricity Authority, Transpower, as the system operator and Octopus Energy, Contact Energy, Simply Energy, Fonterra and Wellington Electricity, as part of its theme of Demand Response.

26 October 2022

At this meeting, the SRC received presentations from the Electricity Authority, the Commerce Commission, and Transpower, as the grid owner, as part of its theme of Transmission.

The SRC also received the system operator’s annual self-review of performance and a presentation from the Electricity Authority on wind monitoring and forecasting.

10 August 2022

At this meeting, the SRC received presentations from the Climate Change Commission on their role in the sector, MBIE on the Aotearoa New Zealand Energy Strategy, and Te Waihanga, the New Zealand Infrastructure Commission on their role in the sector, as part of its theme of Climate Change.

The SRC held their annual strategy session.

1 June 2022

At this meeting, the SRC received presentations from the Commerce Commission, MartinJenkins and the grid owner on their approach to asset management and risk.

Aurora Energy presented a case study on recent experiences with their customised price-quality pathway and the system operator shared feedback and learnings from their security of supply information industry forums.

The Electricity Authority’s strategy team gave an update on the Future Security and Resilience workstreams.

2 March 2022

At this meeting, the SRC received presentations from the National Emergency Management Agency, the system operator and MartinJenkins, as part of its theme of emergency preparedness.

The SRC discussed several cyber security topics (which are confidential and will not be published).

The SRC received presentations from the Electricity Authority and Transpower on communications plans in a supply emergency and discussed consumer demand and the Authority’s system leadership workstreams.

21 October 2021

At this meeting, the SRC received presentations from Enerlytica, the Gas Industry Co, and gas participants, as part of its theme of gas reliability and resilience.

The SRC received an update on the Dry Year Event review, the Future Security and Resilience Project workstreams and the system operator’s security of supply annual assessment and self-review of performance.

4 August 2021

The SRC met and held its annual strategy session, discussed the scope and terms of reference for the Dry Year review and discussed a range of papers, as part of its theme of understanding consumers.

27 May 2021

At this meeting, the SRC received updates on the security of supply situation, considered the scope of next meeting’s substantive papers, and considered the fitness for purpose of regulation and monitoring.

25 February 2021

The SRC met and discussed the management of short-term risk (including credible events and ancillary services).

The SRC received information on the Electricity Authority’s project to examine the security and resilience of the electricity sector, the Authority’s annual review of the system operator’s performance, and the separation between Transpower services.

Members

The SRC is made up of nine representatives who are appointed by the Electricity Authority to represent a broad array of expertise in the electricity industry.

Hon. Heather Roy

Chair - Independent Chair of Utilities Disputes Ltd

Hon. Heather Roy is a professional director and business consultant. She chairs and sits on several boards including being Independent Chair of Utilities Disputes Ltd. She is director and principal of her Business Consultancy, TorquePoint.

Heather was a Member of Parliament from 2002-2011 and was Minister of Consumer Affairs from 2008-10.

She is a member of the Institute of Directors and winner of the Women on Boards ‘Inspirational Excellence Award’ 2017.

Paula Checketts

Chief Financial Officer, New Zealand Aluminium Smelters

Paula Checketts is a qualified Chartered Accountant, Chartered Secretary and Director with over 25 years of experience in accounting and commercial services, in both chartered accountancy practice and the aluminium industry.

During Paula's career at New Zealand Aluminium Smelters Limited (NZAS), she has led the finance and commercial functions incorporating Finance, Business Analysis, Energy, Human Resources, Health Safety and Environment, Procurement and Business Improvement.

Her governance roles include company secretary for NZAS and directorship on Pacific Aluminium (NZ) Limited, subsidiary of Rio Tinto Aluminium, Electric Power Generation Limited and NZAS Retirement Fund Trustee Limited.

Barbara Elliston

Director, Elliston Power Consultants Ltd

Barbara Elliston is a Director of Elliston Power Consultants Ltd, Counties Power Limited and Easy Warm Ltd, as well as being on the Board of the Australian Solar Council.

Barbara's previous roles include directorships with Genesis Energy and Transpower, as well as directorship and management with Comalco New Zealand Ltd.

Her background includes corporate governance, strategic development and distributed generation - photovoltaics.

Barbara earned a Bachelor of Engineering (Electrical) with honours from the University of Auckland.

Chris Ewers

General Manager Wholesale, Meridian Energy

Chris Ewers is responsible for leading Meridian's wholesale, planning and generation control functions. He's also a member of the Electricity Engineers Association Executive.

Chris has worked all of his career in the electricity supply industry and brings a well-rounded set of experience and knowledge. He spent 26 years working in a wide range of operational roles, including generation control, financial and spot trading, transmission connection and coordination, outage management, governance, policy, various industry working and advisory groups, and process safety.

Prior to this, Chris worked for the Electricity Corporation of New Zealand at various thermal and hydro assets around the country.

While undertaking his BE (Hons) at the University of Canterbury, he worked summers at the Tasman Electric Power Board in a wide range of roles, including transformer refurbishment and network planning.

Ben Gerritsen

General Manager Customer and Regulation, Firstgas

Ben Gerritsen leads the commercial management of Firstgas Group’s regulated gas and electricity networks, and has responsibility for policy and regulatory engagement, marketing, and external communications.

Ben is on the Board of GasNZ and the Bioenergy Association of New Zealand.

Ben has undergraduate degrees in law and economics and holds a Masters’ degree in Public Policy from Georgetown University in Washington, DC.

Phil Gibson

General Manager Portfolio, Mercury Energy

Phil Gibson is responsible for managing Mercury’s fuel portfolio, generation development, portfolio strategy, wholesale market activities and sales to large commercial and industrial customers.

Phil joined Mercury in 2004 and has held a number of roles across the business, including General Manager Hydro & Wholesale, Wholesale Markets Manager and Head of Technology & Innovation in Consumer Markets.

Prior to joining the electricity industry, Phil spent six years in structural engineering roles in Auckland, Wellington and London.

Rebecca Larking

Chief Operations Officer, Genesis Energy

Rebecca Larking is Chief Operations Officer at Genesis Energy, leading Genesis’ Generation and LPG Operations, Generation Development and Safety and Wellbeing. She has led Digital Transformation, Customer Operations, SME and Commercial and Industrial Customer engagement and partnerships in energy management and energy supply (LPG, Natural Gas and Electricity), with accountabilities for EBITDAF and delivery of products to market.

Rebecca is an experienced and holistic senior leader with 23 years’ experience across Iwi, community and partner engagement, strategy development and implementation, operations and infrastructure management, the electricity market, and environmental and water management.

Allan Miller

Co-founder and Director, ANSA® and Director, Allan Miller Consulting

Allan Miller is an executive Director of ANSA®, providing modelling and network planning insights for the growing connection of distributed energy resources (DERs), such as photovoltaic solar (PV) and electric vehicles (EVs), to low voltage distribution networks. ANSA also models solar farms and commercial solar and industrial decarbonisation. He is also Director of Allan Miller Consulting and a Director of Network Tasman.

Allan's experience includes leadership and technical roles in the electricity and international high-tech industries. He was Director of the Electric Power Engineering Centre, University of Canterbury, from 2011 to 2017, where he established and led the GREEN Grid research programme. GREEN Grid research investigated the integration of DERs into low voltage distribution networks, and the integration of more variable renewable energy into the electricity system. During and after this time he was also a consulting engineer, providing independent expert advice to the electricity and technology industries.

Prior to that Allan was a Product Manager, followed by Managing Director, of Allied Telesis Labs Ltd, a product development centre for the Japanese computer networking company Allied Telesis. He has worked as a hardware and software engineer, as an analyst for Transpower during the establishment of the wholesale electricity market, and Western Power in Perth, Western Australia, where he led a demand response programme.

Allan holds a Ph.D. and B.E. Hons in electrical and electronic engineering.

Nanette Moreau

Ex Commissioner, Utilities Disputes Ltd

Nanette Moreau is a highly experienced lawyer and mediator.

Nanette joined the Electricity Complaints Commission when it was established in 2002, becoming the Commissioner in 2016 until retirement in 2020.

Nathan Strong

Associate Commissioner, Commerce Commission

Nathan Strong is a qualified economist, with over 20 years of experience focusing on applied competition and regulatory economics, including at senior management levels in regulated companies.

Nathan was the General Manager (Commercial) at Unison Networks having first been appointed to the executive team at Unison in 2010. He was also the Chair of the Electricity Networks Associations’ Regulatory Working Group and has been a member of several Electricity Authority Advisory Groups.

Mike Underhill

Director, The Lines Company, Network Waitaki, Electra and Wellington Water

Mike Underhill is a Director of The Lines Company, Network Waitaki, Electra and Wellington Water. He is also a director of Herbert Gardens Ltd, a high rise apartment block on the Terrace.

His 25 years as a Chief Executive included WEL Networks, TransAlta NZ, EnergyDirect, and EECA.

Mike has had a long involvement with all sectors of the industry and was a member of the original Electricity Industry Task Force and a Board member of the Transpower Establishment Board

Mike has a B.E. (electrical); MCom(hons) in economics. He has completed the Advanced Management Programme at Harvard and completed a 3-year term with VSA in the EPC in Samoa.

Mike is a Distinguished Fellow of Engineering NZ.

Key documents