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Casey's work demonstrating how electric technology that is available today can lead to more profitable businesses and his electrification advocacy work as CEO of Rewiring Aotearoa has earned him another title, this time the Otago Daily Times business leader of the year.
In the midst of the cherry harvest, Mike Casey has received another cherry on top.
As business editor Sally Rae wrote:
He was happy to open the gates to the orchard, saying for a long time, the primary sector in particular had been seen as climate negative, rather than positive.
But here was a primary sector entity which was leading the charge on electrification which ultimately drives down fossil fuels and lowers farm input costs — ‘‘that gets people curious’’.
Mr Casey was never a preacher — ‘‘you must never tell people what they should be doing’’ — rather, it was about showing people what he was doing and they were welcome to ‘‘take from this whatever you want’’ — ask as many questions and take as many photographs. Being more co-operative rather than competitive was when change was ultimately shifted.
... Being an entrepreneur, it was all about problems to solve and right now there was no bigger problem to solve than the climate problem. He was buoyed by the reception to Rewiring Aotearoa’s message, particularly that it was reaching a lot of different types of Kiwis.
Often climate action was not pro-business but he was a businessman so it was about pairing good smart business with climate action, and his goal was for New Zealand to be seen as a ‘‘beacon of light’’ on how to do that.
In the last Electric Avenue of 2025, we look at the two biggest trends in the world of energy; the Government goes electric for its fancy fleet upgrade; Nick Offerman offers his services to a US campaign extolling the virtues of EVs; Australia shows what's possible in new homes when you add solar, batteries and smart tech; a start-up selling portable solar and battery systems that wants it to be as easy and common as wi-fi; and The Lines Company looks to put some solar on the roof of the Ōtorohanga Kiwi House.
Read moreDownloadWhen it comes to electric farming, "the numbers are becoming undeniable," says Nicholson Poultry's Jeff Collings. With 60kW of solar, a Nissan Leaf as a 'farm quad', electric mowers, an electric ute that can run a water blaster, and even a chicken manure scraper made out of a wrecked Tesla that, as Rewiring's Matt Newman says, looks a bit like something out of Mad Max, "almost everything is electric". There aren't many others in New Zealand who have gone this far down the electric road. And, with his electric Stark Varg, the fastest off-road motorbike in the world, he's obviously having plenty of fun on that road, too.
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