The Government’s draft Emissions Reduction Plan shows New Zealand can stay within the limits of the first two emissions budgets while growing the economy, Climate Change Minister Simon Watts said today.

“This draft Emissions Reduction Plan shows that with effective climate change policies we can both grow the economy and deliver our climate change commitments,” he said.

“Our plan focuses on transitioning to a low-emission economy by leveraging the abundance of opportunities New Zealand has, including our unique landscape and resources.”

Reducing net emissions is one of the nine Government targets for achieving better results from the public service.

“This is the first opportunity to consult with New Zealanders on our plan to get the country on track for net zero emissions by 2050,” Mr Watts says.

“Earlier this month, the Government released our climate strategy. The Emissions Reduction Plan centres around the five core pillars of that strategy.”

Some key policies include:

• doubling renewable energy by reducing the consenting burden through Electrify NZ
• targeting 10,000 public EV chargers by 2030
• lowering agricultural emissions by giving farmers the tools to reduce emissions
• investing in resource recovery through the Waste Minimisation Fund
• investigating carbon capture, utilisation, and storage (CCUS).

“The consultation also covers how the Government intends to strengthen the NZ Emission Trading Scheme to support achieving our climate change targets, and other complementary policies,” Mr Watts says

“Changes made to actions or activities in the first Emissions Reduction Plan is also covered by the consultation. Projections show that we remain on track to meeting the first Emissions Budget, however we want to seek public feedback on the impact of the change in approach.

“The final Emissions Reduction Plan for the period 2026-2030 will be finalised by the end of this year after considering public feedback and advice from the Climate Change Commission.”

The Science Media Centre – in response to a request for experts to comment – has published these responses –

• Professor Sara Walton, Co-Director of He Kaupapa Hononga Otago’s Climate Change Research Network, University of Otago: 

“In a continuation from the five pillars released recently the Government has now released The Second Emissions Reduction Plan. This plan takes a different direction from previous plans, which we might expect from a more centre right government. Indeed what is most apparent throughout the document are the actions around removing barriers and enabling markets for private investment. However, there is little in the plan that develops the infrastructure to support and enable essential mitigation to meet Aotearoa’s Paris Agreement targets.

“There is much to comment on with relation to this plan but I will make an overall comment related to my research expertise. In terms of business eco-innovation, it is generally recognised that there are three key driving forces – regulation, technology push and market pull. These three factors have been shown to be important for there to be any eco-innovation, including business related climate innovation. To be successful in creating an enabling environment for the private sector to develop the various technologies and processes that this reduction plan is going to need, a government needs to consider all three driving forces.

“This is one of the shortcomings of this plan. There is the assumption that the private sector will be enabled by removing barriers but actually there needs to be the development of enabling policies, investment infrastructure for technology and the appropriate development of markets. There is little information in the plan to show that all of the factors that will drive any change have been considered. As such, I cannot understand how the reductions outlined in this plan will be realised.”

No conflicts of interest.

• Professor Lisa Ellis, Director of the Philosophy, Politics, and Economics Programme, University of Otago:

“The first step to getting out of a hole is to stop digging. In both mitigation and adaptation, this plan anticipates continued digging in the hope that someone else will pull us out of the hole. That someone else is likely to be our children and grandchildren.

“On adaptation, the first thing we need to do is to stop building in areas at risk of erosion, flooding, and other natural hazards that are exacerbated by climate change. The second thing we need to do is to provide a legal framework and multi-generational funding for managed relocation from areas of increasing risk. Neither of
these is addressed here, and housing is not even mentioned.

“On mitigation, again, we are digging ourselves deeper into the climate change hole with this second ERP. To meet our international commitments, and to keep our exports viable for our increasingly climate-ambitious customers, gross emissions need to fall and keep falling to a level that includes only very hard to abate residual emissions. Net zero should be achieved using removals for those residual emissions.

“Offsets are just transitional instruments, not permanent solutions to the climate crisis. We need a combination of a functional emissions trading system and other policies to drive the transition to a low-emissions economy, but this second ERP only digs us in deeper.”

No conflicts of interest.

• Professor Geoff Willmott, Assistant Dean Research (Commercialisation), Faculty of Science, University of Auckland, and Principal Investigator, MacDiarmid Institute: 

“This Draft Plan leans in on the idea that new technologies can help to meet our future emissions goals. Technological progress is often described as a “magic bullet” for emissions because of the unpredictable pathway from research, through to development, and to deployment. But new technologies require strong investment; there is nothing magic about that. In this plan, planning for innovation is relatively sparse. Adoption of technologies from overseas is emphasized (with the partial exception of agricultural emissions research). But there is a predictable lack of ambition when it comes to research and development (R&D) carried out here in New Zealand, and directing investment (public or private) in that direction.

“This Plan is primarily about reducing New Zealand’s emissions profile. Globally-available technologies are indeed likely to play a large role in reducing our emissions. But locally-developed technologies can materially help to reduce New Zealand’s emissions – why not? R&D in our universities and research institutions will also help to onshore technologies by reducing the costs of adopting and adapting new tools, and by providing our own graduate ‘talent’ so that we aren’t so reliant on immigration for highly in-demand skills.

“There are wider benefits to encouraging onshore R&D activity: generating useful IP, exporting local solutions to provide a win-win for climate and productivity, active participation in global research collaborations, and so on. Perhaps some of these benefits are considered out-of-scope here, while our chronically underfunded public research system is undergoing a review. But this Government’s Climate Strategy (reiterated in this Draft Plan) has described the “opportunity” represented by “world-leading climate innovation boost[ing] the economy”.  At some point it would be excellent to see this ambition coherently addressed and supported by New Zealand’s Government.”

No conflicts of interest.

• Ralph E. H. Sims, Professor Emeritus, Sustainable Energy and Climate Mitigation, Massey University:

“‘Long-lived gases including CO2 will require immediate reductions in emissions from human activities of over 60% to stabilise their concentrations at today’s levels’ was a statement from the First IPCC Assessment Report summary in 1990.

“Almost 35 years later, the current NZ Coalition Government does not seem to understand the enormity of the issue, in spite of the growing number of extreme climate events happening here and around the world.

“Many of their policies to date will result in higher annual emissions that will not be offset by either planting trees or the emissions reduction scheme.

“Meeting our international obligations under the Paris Agreement is becoming more challenging.

“Recommendations made by the Climate Change Commission after major analyses have not been accepted.

“The apparent reliance by Government on immature technologies that may or may not one day reduce ruminant methane significantly, or could perhaps sequester some carbon by capture and storage systems in decades to come, is high risk given such technological solutions might never become commercially viable – and will also take many years to evolve.

“The urgent need to reduce domestic emissions, and the numerous means of achieving this, have been evident for years, as has the knowledge that delaying mitigation now will prove to be more costly in decades to come – without including the huge costs of more future extreme weather events.

“New Zealand is only a small greenhouse gas emitter on a global basis but we have one of the highest per capita emissions of all countries and hence need to play our part.

“The key is to educate Kiwi businesses and residents (e.g. using a Covid-type media campaign) about the enormity of the problem, and explain the means that everyone has to significantly lower their carbon footprints and hence gain the many co-benefits. This includes saving money (e.g. by driving slower, turning lights off, insulating houses, eating less red meat).

“It’s pretty basic – with local and regional councils having a key role to play.

“With such an improved understanding by everyone, then politicians will no longer feel obliged to set policies after being lobbied by high greenhouse gas emitting businesses that tend to look at their short-term profit rather than long-term prospects.”

No conflicts of interest.

Sources:  Minister of Climate Change and the Science Media Centre