Gary Holden: Lodestone Managing Director on the solar farm they're constructing in Canterbury

Solar energy company Lodestone is expanding to the South Island. 

It's constructing a solar farm in Canterbury's Clandeboye, with first generation expected next year. 

It will generate 43 gigawatt hours of renewable electricity annually, similar to the company's sites in the Upper North Island. 

Managing Director Gary Holden told Mike Hosking there are six more consented sites in their portfolio. 

He says they're trying to build a solar farm in every area they can, to follow the populations.  

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
More renewable power as coming. Last week it was hunting
in batteries. This week it's Loadstone Energy and the solar farm.
It's in Toomocha. Construction starts lightly this month or early next.
I think Gerry Holden's managing director of Loadstones will us
Gary morning.

Speaker 2 (00:12):
Good morning, how are you well?

Speaker 1 (00:13):
Thank you? What's your portfolio? You've got any solar in
there already?

Speaker 2 (00:16):
Night?

Speaker 3 (00:18):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (00:18):
This is the South Canterbury site in Clandi Boys, our
fifth project, and so we we're now on the South
Island and effectively trying to build a solar farm in
every community that we can and follow the population. You know,
have a scattering of generation that kind of lines up
with where the businesses and and and residences are all solar,

(00:44):
all solar.

Speaker 3 (00:45):
Yeah, we we We've got an innovative contracts that takes
a solar from a farm and sells it to a
business era or a property that simulates as if those solar.

Speaker 2 (00:57):
Panels are on the facility. And so we pretty much
feel like there's a kind of an open end of
how many of these projects we can do.

Speaker 1 (01:06):
Who do you sell to? Do you sell to a retailer?

Speaker 2 (01:10):
We primarily we sell directly to customers.

Speaker 1 (01:13):
So you're a John Taylor.

Speaker 2 (01:14):
As they say, we essentially are a new version of
a gent tailor that's focused on solar and ultimately we'll
be adding batteries to our farms to round out.

Speaker 1 (01:26):
The generation that battery thing. So the Huntley I don't
know if you're up on, but the Huntly thing last week.
So they're going to do these I can't remember the
number of gigs. I think megah whatever it was. They're
going to do one hundred and twenty thousand houses by
twenty thirty five, two major batteries and that will be
for two hours supply. That struck me as disappointing. Are

(01:46):
batteries really the answer for major storage for long term
use or not? No?

Speaker 2 (01:52):
I mean they're designed just to shift energy from one
part of the day to the other. And I think
I think for Genesis there anticipating that, you know, if
there ultimately is a solar farm in every community, then
there will be energy in the afternoon when the sun
is shining that you could shift into the evening. And
so they're just they're just getting a bit ahead of

(02:14):
the curve. And it's quite a quite a good idea
and it enables quite a lot of solar to be built.

Speaker 1 (02:19):
Okay, are you happy with the consent process of you
able to do business in a way that suits you.

Speaker 2 (02:25):
Yeah, We've we've got six more consented sites actually in
our portfolio coming. And you know, our strategy has been
to keep them relatively small, have them tuck into communities
and maybe even behind a hedgerow so you can't really
even see them, and then put sheep underneath and keep
the productive value of the land going. And so so

(02:48):
when you when you approach it from that direction, consenting
has been really quite a straightforward process.

Speaker 1 (02:53):
Good stuff. Good to hear, Gary, and get you on
to get and carry Holden, who's the Boodstone Energy managing director.
It's it's moving it. Hi's the old renewable story. I'm
fascinated with it.

Speaker 3 (03:03):
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