Mr STIRLING - 2000-08-16
The last few wet seasons in Darwin have been characterised by chronic outages of power supplies as a result of lack of maintenance, costing the Power and Water Authority more money in downtime and repairs than a regular maintenance program would have cost. Can the minister detail for us and produce the documentation of the Power and Water Authority’s regular maintenance system that informs staff when inspections and service of plant and equipment are to be carried out? If he cannot, how can the absence of a committed preventive maintenance program for the Power and Water Authority protect Territorians’ lifestyle when all they have to look forward to is predictable and preventable blackouts in the forthcoming Wet?
ANSWER
Mr Speaker, it is a difficult thing to run power reticulation in the tropics. We have very high rates of lightning strike, we have difficulty with animals - particularly flying foxes as was evidenced in Katherine recently. Also, because we live in an area where we get a lot of rainfall, foliage is abundant and trees grow well and quickly. Lovely little mahoganies turn into giant mahoganies.
We measure our outages - we have been doing that for some time now - so that we can benchmark against other tropical jurisdictions with the problems of flying foxes and trees and lightning strikes that we have here. We are able to demonstrate that we are making marked improvements in our system average outage duration. It is something we look at very closely and it is something that the staff are all aware of.
I am able to proudly proclaim to this House that our additional funding in repairs and maintenance - no cut, additional money in repairs and maintenance - has resulted in fewer outages for Northern Territory citizens than there were in the past. I have said before in this House that 20 years or so ago many houses in the Territory had a generator set standing by because the likelihood of the power going out was very, very high.
The authority is also very responsive to issues. One issue, for instance, has been the large colonies of roosting flying foxes in the town of Katherine. As a result of that, the authority moved very quickly to put in higher insulators. As they were, the flying foxes, which have a wingspan of 800 mm, were able to arc from the line to the pole and ground, and take out the power. We moved very quickly and spent some hundreds of thousands of dollars in Katherine, largely rectifying that problem.
In Darwin, we found that one of the main reasons for outages was overhanging trees. We have commenced a major tree-lopping program. One would be surprised if members such as the member for Fannie Bay are not aware that trees that were once big are much smaller. We have removed whole trees at a cost to the government, in a joint program with Darwin City Council.
Our R & M program this year is something like $54m, a substantial amount of cash, which goes to show that this government is committed to making sure the lights stay on. We know we have responsibilities as the owners of the reticulation and we know that we can never be so confident as to defy acts of nature. There are significant acts of nature in this place that take the power out from time to time. It is getting better. We are spending the money. We have a predictable program, a cyclical program that is also able to cope with unforeseen events like Katherine. I am very proud of the good work that is being done by the authority.
ANSWER
Mr Speaker, it is a difficult thing to run power reticulation in the tropics. We have very high rates of lightning strike, we have difficulty with animals - particularly flying foxes as was evidenced in Katherine recently. Also, because we live in an area where we get a lot of rainfall, foliage is abundant and trees grow well and quickly. Lovely little mahoganies turn into giant mahoganies.
We measure our outages - we have been doing that for some time now - so that we can benchmark against other tropical jurisdictions with the problems of flying foxes and trees and lightning strikes that we have here. We are able to demonstrate that we are making marked improvements in our system average outage duration. It is something we look at very closely and it is something that the staff are all aware of.
I am able to proudly proclaim to this House that our additional funding in repairs and maintenance - no cut, additional money in repairs and maintenance - has resulted in fewer outages for Northern Territory citizens than there were in the past. I have said before in this House that 20 years or so ago many houses in the Territory had a generator set standing by because the likelihood of the power going out was very, very high.
The authority is also very responsive to issues. One issue, for instance, has been the large colonies of roosting flying foxes in the town of Katherine. As a result of that, the authority moved very quickly to put in higher insulators. As they were, the flying foxes, which have a wingspan of 800 mm, were able to arc from the line to the pole and ground, and take out the power. We moved very quickly and spent some hundreds of thousands of dollars in Katherine, largely rectifying that problem.
In Darwin, we found that one of the main reasons for outages was overhanging trees. We have commenced a major tree-lopping program. One would be surprised if members such as the member for Fannie Bay are not aware that trees that were once big are much smaller. We have removed whole trees at a cost to the government, in a joint program with Darwin City Council.
Our R & M program this year is something like $54m, a substantial amount of cash, which goes to show that this government is committed to making sure the lights stay on. We know we have responsibilities as the owners of the reticulation and we know that we can never be so confident as to defy acts of nature. There are significant acts of nature in this place that take the power out from time to time. It is getting better. We are spending the money. We have a predictable program, a cyclical program that is also able to cope with unforeseen events like Katherine. I am very proud of the good work that is being done by the authority.
Last updated: 09 Aug 2016