2025 Annual Shareholder Meeting

Tuesday 16 September 2025
Chair’s address to ASM
Kia ora koutou,
On behalf of the Contact Energy Board of Directors, I
would like to start by thanking our people, our customers
and you, our shareholders, for what has been one of the
most significant years in Contact’s history.
We have delivered a strong performance, underpinned by
our long-term investment in renewable generation.
As I share my reflections and insights of the past year, I
want to acknowledge and talk about the challenges and
opportunities in the energy sector, and how Contact is
focused on supporting New Zealand’s economic growth
aspirations.
Strategic update and highlights of the year
Our Contact26 strategy is to be a leader in New Zealand’s
decarbonisation.
We have continued to deliver strongly against that strategy
through renewable investment, growing electricity
demand, continuing to decarbonise our own generation
portfolio and creating outstanding customer experiences.
We are taking bold steps to support the country’s energy
transition to a renewable future.

In the past four years, Contact has committed to more
than $2.3 billion building critical energy infrastructure, and
we are accelerating that investment for the long-term
benefit of New Zealand.
We have completed $1.2billion of new renewable
generation with Tauhara and Te Huka 3 coming online.
Together, these have brought an additional 1.9 TWh of
annual generation onstream, enough energy to power the
equivalent of 260,000 homes.
Projects totalling another $1.1billion are currently under
construction, spanning geothermal, solar and grid scale
batteries. These investments will extend our operations
on the Wairakei steamfield, delivering renewable power for
future generations. They will bring on a further 0.6TWh of
net new generation and 100MW of new storage onstream.
Our new long-term electricity agreements have created
new energy demand in iconic companies such as NZ
Steel, Fonterra, and Oji Fibre Solutions supporting their
long-term future and demonstrating the part we play in the
New Zealand economy.
It’s almost a year to the day since Contact announced the
proposed acquisition of Manawa Energy. Following the
regulatory approvals this transaction was completed on
11 July.

The combination of our two companies is an important
step forward in New Zealand’s energy transition. It will
enable a greater investment in future renewable
generation, enhance market security, and ultimately
contribute to reducing wholes prices long term.
I look forward to reporting on our future progress as we
integrate Manawa into Contact.
We remain on target to meet our ambition to be Net Zero in
our generation operations by 2035. In the past decade,
Contact’s generation emissions have reduced 50 percent,
and with the planned closure of our Taranaki Combined
Cycle plant at the end of the year this will increase to 75
percent.
Our Contact26 strategy has served us well. We are now
turning to the next strategic horizon and are undertaking a
review to ensure we will be well positioned for the future.
Energy market
Geopolitical, economic and environmental uncertainty
continues to be felt both here and internationally.
Yet in this, is opportunity.
The electricity sector has a key role to support New
Zealand through these challenges and underpin a pathway
to sustainable growth and energy independence.
As a country, we are in the midst of a renewable
investment boom. In the past 18 months, almost 4.5TWh

of total new renewable generation has come online. To put
this in context, that’s more than 10 per cent of our nation’s
annual generation – and there is more to come.
According to Bloomberg global energy data between 2021
to 2024, New Zealand is a global leader investing $240 per
person, per year in renewable infrastructure, greater than
the US, China, UK and Australia. And Contact is leading
the way.
For those who say nothing is being done, these are the
facts.
The market is not broken. Those who call the market
broken, fail to come with a solution.
The solution to lower energy prices is more capacity and
that comes from more investment. Investment is
occurring at pace - insofar as we can get consents.
Notwithstanding ongoing challenges with the upstream
gas market, gas will remain an important peaking fuel in
the medium term and support security of supply.
We have long-term gas supply contracts to support the
availability of our remaining peakers, and, more
importantly, to ensure households and commercial gas
customers have access to this energy source while we
help them to transition to renewable energy over time.
The abrupt gas decline has hit the country faster, and with
more impact that could have been foreseen. What we see

today, is the result of a cut in fuel supply. The change in
government policy with the oil and gas ban led to
unintended consequences. We need to be careful such
mistakes are not repeated.
Transition
Contact remains focused on providing competitive value
and innovation, while providing support for those facing
energy hardship.
We recognise our role in ensuring New Zealand’s
electricity remains affordable, reliable and renewable –
the energy trilemma. The World Energy Council continues
to rank New Zealand as one of the top 10 countries
globally against these benchmarks.
We are committed to playing our part to support New
Zealand’s security of supply. This winter we extended the
operating hours of the Taranaki Combined Cycle plant. It
will close later this year; a year later than planned. We are
party to the Huntly Strategic Firming agreement, a
strategic energy reserve to be used as a buffer when
required and open to all electricity market participants.
Regulatory reform
Renewable generation investments deliver benefits to the
community for decades. As a result, infrastructure
investors always seek reasonable long-term investment
certainty.

I acknowledge the work the government and regulators are
doing to explore ways of continually improving and
evolving the electricity market as we all navigate the
energy transition.
However, we need policies that both encourage growth in
electricity demand and support new investment in
renewable energy.
We welcome the government’s initiatives to improve
resource consenting to accelerate renewable
development. However, calls for fundamental – but
undefined market reform – and its potential impact on
investment confidence is of concern.
We need stable market settings that support investor
confidence. Investment in renewable generation gives
decades of benefit. A legacy for generations.
Acknowledgements
Contact’s investment, growth and success would not be
possible without the hard work of our CEO Mike Fuge, and
the entire Contact team. To you, I say thank you.
I also want to take this opportunity to thank my fellow
directors, and to acknowledge, in particular, Elena Trout,
who after nine years of invaluable service is today
stepping down from the Board. Elena has made a
significant contribution not just to Contact, but to the
wider New Zealand energy sector.

Now, as we look to the year ahead, one where Contact and
Manawa Energy become one, we will continue to
accelerate investment in the electrification efforts, and
together with all our stakeholders help build a more
sustainable, thriving New Zealand for all.
Ngā mihi nui.

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Tuesday 16 September 2025
CEO’s address to ASM
Tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou katoa. Ngā mihi nui
ki a koutou katoa.
It is my pleasure to be here today and to share my
reflections on the past financial year; a year that has been
characterised by bold aspiration, hard mahi and
significant achievement.
Through intensive focus and unwavering commitment to
our Contact26 strategy, we have delivered outcomes that
will help shape New Zealand’s energy future for
generations.
As Rob has outlined, we have delivered growth, invested
heavily and played our part in supporting New Zealand’s
economic development.
Before I get into the detail, I want to acknowledge our
people and welcome our new Manawa colleagues to their
first Contact Annual Shareholder Meeting.
I am incredibly proud of our team and what they have
achieved. They are a group of high-performing
professionals who come to work every day focused on the
role they have in supporting the energy transition.

Business and Financial Performance
Contact has delivered a strong financial performance in
the 2025 financial year.
Our EBITDAF of $774million, was up 17 percent on the
previous year, and profit after tax was $261million - on an
underlying basis.
This result excludes the release of the Ahuroa Gas Storage
provision of $98million before tax but includes the
$18million Manawa transaction and integration costs.
Adjusting for these one-off Manawa-related costs,
EBITDAF was $792million.
Market conditions were impacted by the accelerated
decline in gas availability. With two historically dry
periods, as well as periods of intense hydro inflows, hydro
storage was highly volatile. These conditions meant
significant volatility of wholesale prices.
In this context, our financial performance reflects our
resilient risk management as well as the benefits of our
$1.2billion investment in new geothermal capacity at
Tauhara and Te Huka 3.
Contact also supported the market and played our part in
New Zealand’s energy security. We managed through dry
conditions by securing gas, in the short-term, from
Methanex.

We also ran our Taranaki Combined Cycle plant and used
flexible gas storage at Ahuroa to support economic
thermal generation.
This was the first year our new geothermal power stations
Tauhara and Te Huka 3 were both operational. In a
challenging year, Contact’s baseload geothermal
generation increased to 4.5TWh, up 34 per cent on the
previous year.
It has reinforced the importance of geothermal and our
commitment to delivering a secure and reliable electricity
supply for New Zealand. We have delivered the right
projects, at the right time.
In light of our financial results, we will pay shareholders 39
cents per share annual dividend, up five percent from the
previous financial year.
Strategy
We are now four years into our Contact26 strategy to:
• Grow demand
• Grow renewable development
• Decarbonise our portfolio and
• Create outstanding customer experiences
In this short time, we have committed more than $2billion
to build the critical energy infrastructure our country
needs.

Now more than ever, we must continue to play a leading
role in ensuring secure, sustainable and affordable energy
for New Zealanders.
The FY25 year saw a significant investment in growth and
continued focus on project delivery, with our entire net
profit - and some - invested in developing renewable
energy projects.
As Rob said, according to Bloomberg global energy data
between 2021 to 2024, New Zealand is a global
leader investing $240 per person, per year in renewable
infrastructure, greater than the US, China, UK and
Australia. And Contact is leading the way.
It is our profound belief that our role is to enable the
electrification of the economy. We are walking alongside
our commercial, industrial and residential customers to
help them in the energy transition. We will continue our
orderly investment in renewable generation to support
this.
Manawa
Rob has spoken about the combination of Contact and
Manawa being an important step forward in the country’s
energy transition.
Together we have highly complementary, geographically
diverse hydro generation. Contact’s hydro assets in the
South produce more energy in the summer following the

snowmelt, while Manawa’s hydro schemes in the North
Island catch more rain in the winter. These
complementary assets will enable a smoother transition
away from fossil fuels and help us manage dry year risk.
Our leadership team and I have spent the past two months
visiting Manawa sites and spending time with our new
colleagues as we integrate the two businesses.
We expect to be operating as one company by Christmas.
Grow demand and renewable development
We were delighted, last November, to host alongside the
Tauhara hapū, the Prime Minister for the opening of
Tauhara, the world’s largest single shaft geothermal power
turbine. In the same month Te Huka 3 also came online.
Following behind our two new geothermal power stations,
the Kōwhai Park solar farm, and the Glenbrook-Ohurua
grid scale battery are expected come online next March.
Our Te Mihi Stage 2 binary plant that will partially replace
the 60-year-old Wairākei plant, is also well underway, with
an on-stream date of mid-2027.
This level of activity is unprecedented in our history. Not
only is it fulfilling an urgent need for renewable energy in
New Zealand, it is supporting the transition and creating
new opportunities for the nation’s economy. You only need
to walk through Taupō, and you witness the impact such
investment is having on heartland communities.

This is partly why we were disappointed when the
Southland Wind Farm fast track resource consent was
declined in March. While we have now been accepted to
lodge an application under the new Fast Track legislation,
and have done so, the reality is an exorbitant amount of
time, and expense, was consumed with the previous
planning regime, with little productive outcomes for
society at large.
We have hope that projects such as the Southland Wind
Farm will be built at pace for the benefit of all. This project
alone will bring more than $200million to the Southland
economy and generate enough renewable energy to power
the equivalent of 150,000 homes.
We have also lodged a consent application to extend the
Glenbrook-Ohurua grid scale battery to 500MW, and
lodged a consent application to build an additional
500MW grid-scale battery at Stratford. We are also
working on several projects to improve the efficiency,
safety and reliability of our hydro assets. This will help
improve energy supply in dry years and during peak winter
demand.
Decarbonising our portfolio
We are acutely aware that we have a responsibility to
ensure reliable, secure energy supply for the country while
we manage the energy transition.

The rapid, and unexpected decline in gas availability has
now got to the point where some hard choices are having
to be made. That, with dry hydrological conditions, led to a
short period of high spot prices in August 2024.
Our response has been swift and comprehensive.
We signed gas agreements with Methanex last August and
again in May this year, to ensure winter periods of high
demand were covered. We also extended the operation of
TCC until the end of the year when it will be
decommissioned. And along with other major gentailers,
we have signed the Huntly Strategic Firming agreement.
Contact has also recently secured a seven-year gas
agreement from Greymouth Gas Limited.
Contact will now be able to support hundreds more New
Zealand businesses, critical gas consumers such as
schools and hospitals, and thousands of Kiwi households
as they transition in a managed, orderly way from fossil
fuels to a renewable energy future.
Our commitment to decarbonisation remains resolute. We
have taken pragmatic steps to ensure reliability of supply
as we transition, helping bridge the gap while we scale up
renewable development.
Creating outstanding customer experiences
Home is everything. It is where life happens, connections
are made, and futures are built.

Our financial year finished with 646,000 customer
connections across energy, broadband and mobile, a
growth of 21,000 connections on the previous year. As of
this morning, we now have 651,472 customer
connections.
We recognise that creating outstanding customer
experiences is more than growth. This is also about
fronting into the challenges New Zealanders face at a time
of increasing pressures on household budgets.
More than a third of our customers are now on our Time of
Use plans, receiving free power in return for off peak use.
Since launch in August 2021, Kiwis have received more
than 260 million hours of free energy. These tools, where
we engage with ordinary Kiwi households, help navigate
supply challenges, help with budgets, and have
transformed energy peaks reducing the reliance on fossil
fuels.
In August 2024 we removed disconnection and
reconnection fees for non-payment for all Contact
customers, resulting in disconnection rates dropping 30
percent year on year.
Earlier this year, the Commerce Commission reviewed
lines and transmission charges. These charges are passed
onto consumers, accounting for up to 40 percent of the
average bill. We recognise these pass-on charges put
more pressure on consumers.

Thank you, and our people
Finally, to our people.
I would like to thank everyone at Contact for their
outstanding work and focus throughout the year. I am
proud of you all and the contribution you have made. Not
just to Contact, but for the difference we are creating.
I would also like to acknowledge and welcome our new
Chief Retail Officer, Carolyn Luey, who joined Contact in
July. Carolyn was appointed following Matt Bolton’s
appointment to Transition Director, last year.
Looking ahead, one thing is clear. Progress will require
both visionary aspiration and the ability to remain
responsive to New Zealand’s energy needs.
We are excited about the future, and the leading role we
play in the country’s energy transition.
Ngā mihi nui.