Rescheduling the game from 4.40pm to 12.30pm AEST has also prompted the league to push back Richmond's match against Gold Coast at the MCG from 2.10pm to 3.20pm.
Geelong's game against West Coast at GMHBA Stadium at 1.45pm is unaffected.
York Park (University of Tasmania Stadium) is among places caught up in power outage drama in Launceston this week.
TasNetworks chief executive Sean McGoldrick told the ABC the power was on at York Park and the network was secure.
But if there is an outage on Saturday, TasNetworks staff do not intend to intervene.
That is due to a pay dispute between Tasmania's electrical workers union, The Communications, Electrical and Plumbing Union (CEPU) and TasNetworks. The CEPU is attempting to secure a pay increase for TasNetworks staff.
The action made the original 4.40pm start time unfeasible, given floodlights would have been required for a large portion of the game.
"Due to circumstance out of our control we have made the decision to move to an earlier start time of 12.30pm for the Hawthorn v North Melbourne match and thank everyone involved in working through this," AFL chief executive Andrew Dillon said in a statement."The later start time for the Richmond and Gold Coast Suns match means we do not have three games being played at once and fans tuning into the broadcast will also be able to celebrate (retiring Tiger) Dustin Martin's lap of honour at the MCG."
It is unclear how significant a power outage would be if it occurred during the rescheduled Hawthorn-North game, but the time change will still clearly affect some fans - especially those travelling from interstate.
The AFL said ticket holders for the two affected games would be contacted.
Other options were to move the game to Blundstone Arena in Hobart or back to Melbourne - given Marvel Stadium is empty on Saturday.
The game is crucial to the Hawks' finals hopes.
They can seal a top-eight berth with a win - but are at risk of missing out if they lose.
Both teams were due to fly to Launceston on Friday.
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