Geothermal power helps New Zealand manage drought in Q2 2012 (Power Engineering Magazine)
Geothermal helped offset a drop in hydropower generation in New Zealand in the latest dry period, the Energy Quarterly report showed on Friday.
According to the latest report by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE), hydropower generation in the three months to June fell to the lowest level since the second quarter of 2008. However, thanks to geothermal facilities commissioned over the past two years the use of gas- and coal-fired power generation to compensate for the low hydropower output in the period was 17% lower than in the same quarter in 2008.
MBIE's Energy Information and Modelling team manager Bryan Field said that geothermal and wind power covered 18% of the country's electricity needs in the period, compared with 10% during the dry period four years earlier.
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