The Lines Company sets out long-term strategy to keep communities connected
9 April 2026
The Lines Company (TLC) has released its 2026 Asset Management Plan (AMP), outlining how it will continue to invest in its network to support reliable supply, resilience and future growth across the King Country, Central Plateau and Ruapehu regions — keeping customers connected.
The AMP sets the strategic direction for how TLC plans, maintains and develops its electricity network, ensuring investment decisions align with customer expectations, industry best practice and the company’s purpose of growing communities with energy — while building enduring assets that serve today’s customers and future generations.
Chief Executive Mike Fox says the 2026 AMP reflects a year of preparation and planning, focused on strengthening foundations for the future.
“This plan is about doing the right work at the right time, for the right reasons — so our communities can rely on us today and into the future,” says Fox. “It’s also about intergenerational equity: making disciplined capital investments now to maintain and build assets that deliver value for current customers while not unfairly shifting cost or risk to future customers. Our strategic focus is on resilience, affordability and collaboration.”
At a high level, the 2026 AMP prioritises:
- Targeted, long-term investment in the network, considering the financial impact on customers for every dollar spent
- Improving the condition of poles, lines and other equipment to lift overall network reliability
- Creating additional capacity to meet customer demand as homes and businesses grow
- Strengthening resilience across the network to minimise outages and support faster restoration following severe weather events
- Continuing to improve how we plan, monitor and manage network assets
- Targeting investment to areas that matter most to customers, while reducing the highest network risks.
The plan also reflects a rapidly changing electricity sector, with increased collaboration across Electrical Distribution Businesses (EDBs) to improve efficiency, share expertise and deliver value for customers.
“Working more collaboratively across the sector helps ensure every dollar we invest delivers better value for the communities we serve,” Fox says.
While new technologies such as solar and distributed energy are emerging, their uptake across TLC’s network has not yet placed material pressure on the network. This provides TLC with valuable time to learn from other EDBs, plan carefully, manage critical risks and strengthen resilience — particularly important for a rural network as we experience more land conversions into forestry, creating more vegetation related outage risk.
“That planning window allows us to be deliberate and disciplined, focusing on resilience and reliability so our customers can have confidence in the value the TLC delivers,” says Fox.
The AMP is designed to give customers, stakeholders and regulators confidence in TLC’s ability to manage the network — now and in the future — while remaining firmly grounded in its role as a community‑owned business.
“We’re proud of the work our people are doing and the direction we’re taking. This plan shows how we’re positioning TLC to support our communities for the long term — growing communities with energy and keeping you connected,” Fox says.
The 2026 Asset Management Plan is available on The Lines Company website.