40 | Electricity outage proves a challenge Sharemilker Gregor Ramsay cranking up the standby generator. Russell Fredric RURAL PEOPLE » Robert and Cate Willis Emergency generators may well be a hot ticket for storm-shy dairy farmers, especially after receiving some cool cash from Fonterra’s $3.8 billion sale of its consumer brands. However, one Southland farmer is offering a couple of caveats following his experience during the violent October storm that ravaged the region. Having bought a 50kVA generator 15 years ago, sufficient to run his milking shed and its refrigeration system, Robert Willis thought his farm was well prepared for an electricity outage. Robert and his wife Cate own a 112 hectare farm, run by 50/50 sharemilkers Gregor and Lynne Ramsay in Gummies Bush, Southland, and live on a lifestyle block elsewhere. The Willis’ also own a support block run by Robert that winters 330 cows and grazes 90 calves and 90 yearlings under contract to the Ramsay’s, along with the Willis’ grazing 60 beef cattle. “Our power went out on Thursday afternoon and didn’t come back on until the early hours of Sunday morning,” Robert says. While the farm was better off during the outage than many, there was one thing Robert had not factored in when he installed the generator – the need for power for the farm’s water well pump. “Our system wasn’t bullet proof because we put the generator at the cow shed, but our well pump is on the other side of the farm. My [emergency] plan with that was, we can cart water in so I put an extra tank at the cow shed that gives us a day up our sleeve if we have water issues before we have to start transporting water into the property.” Having this contingency, Rob rang a water carrier but was told, after the water failed to be delivered, Invercargill City Council had mandated that tanker water could not be supplied. The farm consumes about 30,000 litres-plus of water a day. “[Invercargill City Council] wanted to keep the water just for Invercargill and emergency services because the pumping station at Branxholme wasn’t working. All of a sudden, the reality for me came home again; I expected the services to be able to provide, but we had an issue.” Robert then had the idea of having water transported from the support block but the carrier declined as it could only deliver treated portable water. This situation forced Robert to cart water himself in calf tanks on a trailer in the face of what was rumoured at the time to be a week-long power outage. “I was like, we’re using 35,000 litres a day – we’re in trouble.” Fortunately, a simple solution was to have a plug installed at the well pump to connect a generator to, with “a kind neighbour” offering the loan of a generator at night to pump water to the cow shed. “That was our saving grace; I would have been working 24/7 to move 10,000 litres every four hours. We had started to think we might be still doing this for a week” p: 03 218 6179 e: Greg.Munro@mcp.co.nz w: www.mcp.co.nz Proudly supporting Robert and CateWillis At McCulloch + Partners we are a local business run by local people. We pride ourselves on being friendly, accessible and experienced accounting specialists no matter the industry you’re in. Contact us to take advantage of our modern approach to accounting and business expertise. Southland Helicopters delivers precision aerial services across the Southland region - from spraying, fertiliser, bucket lifts, gravelling, fire-lighting and surveying - all operated with agile, ultra-quiet MD600NNOTAR helicopters Contact us today for all your aerial agricultural needs office@southlandheli.nz Email 027 432 2227 Hayden Cherry
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