Here comes the hot weather: Parts of New Zealand due to push past 30C this week
Kiwis are in for an early dose of scorching summer heat later this week - with temperatures pushing past 30C in parts of the country.
MetService is forecasting highs of 28C, 31C and 29C for Napier, Hastings and Gisborne respectively on Thursday.
“That’s well above average for this time of year – but we’re of course knocking on the door of summer,” MetService meteorologist Mmathapelo Makgabutlane said.
That warmth will be felt in most regions: Auckland, Hamilton, Tauranga and Whangārei are likely to experience highs in the early to mid-20s over the remainder of the week.
Further south tomorrow, the mercury is likely to rise as high as 27C in Christchurch – well past its November average of 19C – while Timaru is in for a toasty maximum of 26C.
“Those day-time temperatures are certainly on the warm side, but some of the overnight temperatures also don’t dip too low,” Makgabutlane said.
Aucklanders were in for balmy lows of 16C and 17C over the next few nights, with high humidity likely to hamper sleep across the city.
“But even parts of Southland have minimum temperatures in the mid-teens, which is fairly warm.”
Makgabutlane said the heat was coming with a ridge of high pressure meeting a northwesterly air flow – drawing warm, moist air over New Zealand.
On Thursday, a frontal system was also forecast to begin bringing rain and wind to the South Island, with the wettest weather expected in the west.
But little of that was likely to reach parched northeastern areas like Hawke’s Bay.
“If we’re lucky, there may be a little bit of rain from that, but there’s nothing substantial on the cards.”
The dry and hot conditions are already fuelling concern about fire danger in the region, months away from the peak of summer.
Fire and Emergency New Zealand Hawke’s Bay district manager Glen Varcoe confirmed fire-risk indices were late last week elevated to high across the Ahuriri and Heretaunga districts, including Napier and Hastings and coastal regions north to Wairoa.
Last Thursday, police said both fire safety officers and police had been investigating five bush and scrub fires in Northern Hawke’s Bay, in some cases suspected deliberately lit.
Niwa reports temperatures are likely to be warmer than average through to January, with frequent northwesterly winds leading to more days above 25C.
Also raising the odds for hot summer weather was the potential for marine heatwave conditions – already occurring in seas to the east of New Zealand – to expand and intensify.
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Even Australians get it - so why not Kiwis???
“Ten years ago, if a heatwave as intense as last week’s record-breaker had hit the east coast, Australia’s power supply may well have buckled. But this time, the system largely operated as we needed, despite some outages.
On Australia’s main grid last quarter, renewables and energy storage contributed more than 50% of supplied electricity for the first time, while wholesale power prices were more than 40% lower than a year earlier.
[…] shifting demand from gas and coal for power and petrol for cars is likely to deliver significantly lower energy bills for households.
Last quarter, wind generation was up almost 30%, grid solar 15% and grid-scale batteries almost tripled their output. Gas generation fell 27% to its lowest level for a quarter century, while coal fell 4.6% to its lowest quarterly level ever.
Gas has long been the most expensive way to produce power. Gas peaking plants tend to fire up only when supply struggles to meet demand and power prices soar. Less demand for gas has flowed through to lower wholesale prices.”
Full article: www.theguardian.com...
If even Australians see the benefit of solar - then why is NZ actively boycotting solar uptake? The increased line rental for electricity was done to make solar less competitive and prevent cost per kWh to rise even more than it did - and electricity costs are expected to rise even more. Especially as National favours gas - which is the most expensive form of generating electricity. Which in turn will accelerate Climate Change, as if New Zealand didn’t have enough problems with droughts, floods, slips, etc. already.
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