Climate scenarios

Rod Oram (‘‘Diving into an energy change’’, Business, April 16) criticises scenario work undertaken by the BusinessNZ Energy Council. He asserted that this work suggests New Zealand is weakly committed to carbon reduction.

This misunderstands the purpose of scenarios. They are not advocacy. If they were, why would we present two choices? The future is not that stark or simple.

The council is not saying that either scenario is what will happen – let alone that either should. The scenarios were designed to help people understand how resources are linked – and what the future might conceivably look like.

We acknowledge the obvious point that neither scenario is sufficient to fulfil New Zealand’s climate change commitments. That doesn’t mean that they serve no purpose, but rather, that further decisions and commitments will be needed. But we all knew that.

To suggest BusinessNZ lacks ambition is not a fair interpretation of the council’s work.

David Caygill, chairman, BusinessNZ Energy Council