$67.4m promised to help public sector buy EVs, clean heat
In a few short years government departments will need to buy offsets to counter any climate pollution they can’t get rid of. But with coal boilers and fossilfuelled cars still rife, will the money be enough? Eloise Gibson investigates.
White collar crime-fighting agency the Serious Fraud Office owns the least-polluting government vehicle fleet in the country.
The police force has one of the highest-emitting fleets per kilometre, pumping out 192 grams of carbon dioxide, compared with the SFO’s 39g. Unfortunately for the climate, the SFO owns one car, while the police have 3400.
Those figures could rapidly change, though: starting from 2025, government departments and agencies will have to buy carbon offsets to cover any planet-heating emissions they haven’t squeezed out of their operations. Schools, district health boards and Ka¯ inga Ora will also have to buy offsets, but their deadline hasn’t been set.
Under the Government’s plan for the public service to be carbonneutral by 2025, public organisations must plan how to cut gases, cull unnecessary vehicles from their fleets, choose electric vehicles (EVs) when they can, and lease better-insulated large buildings.
Climate Change Minister James Shaw described the 2025 offset deadline as a ‘‘a bit of a rod for agencies’ backs’’.
‘‘If you haven’t managed to eliminate your emissions by 2025, you’re going to have to pay for the work that you haven’t done,’’ Shaw said.
However, there’s a carrot to go with that stick. Shaw today announced $67.4 million of new funding will be in the Budget to help the public sector cut emissions – $41.7m of that is for the Energy Efficiency & Conservation Authority
(EECA) to help other public agencies lease cleaner car fleets, three-quarters for co-funding vehicle leases and the remainder for offering fleet-greening advice.
On top of that, the State Sector Decarbonisation Fund, which supports schools, hospitals and other public services to ditch coal boilers and buy EVs, will get a further $19.5m. Currently, the fund has been given $200m, with $96.4m of that already allocated. About a further $6m will go towards boosting what Shaw called ‘‘capability’’ – employing staff at the Ministry for the Environment and elsewhere with the skills to help agencies cut their carbon bills.
Climate advocates are likely to be disappointed with the scale of the package.
A Stuff inquiry found about 1150 state schools burn fossil fuels to heat classrooms, including at least 200 schools using coal. According to the Education Ministry, 36 schools have been funded to switch so far.
Erica Finnie, of 350 Aotearoa, said ahead of today’s announcement that the $200m previously allocated was inadequate if the Government wanted schools to be fossil fuel-free by 2025. She and other campaigners had hoped for a massive Budget boost.
Coal is the dirtiest fossil fuel by some margin – and the Government has previously said replacing coal boilers, biggest first, would be its ‘‘immediate focus’’.
Projects funded by the $200m existing fund have mainly been coal boiler replacements, but 422 new EVs have been announced, mainly for DOC and Ka¯ inga Ora.
Asked if the Government could justify funding EVs when there were still coal boilers in schools, Shaw said there would be more funding to come, and the physical process of replacing boilers was constrained. ‘‘The funding that was allocated so far will not be the last time that we fund public sector decarbonisation. There’ll be other stuff in the future and that includes all the other coal boilers, diesel generators, the rest of the car fleet, and so on. This is really just getting us going. In some places . . . people weren’t actually planning on replacing those boilers [so] it’s quite a long planning process for some of those,’’ he said.
Currently, electric vehicles make up just 1.3 per cent of the Government’s fleet of more than 14,000 despite officials estimating there are ‘‘operationally suitable’’ EV options available for about half of the fleet. A briefing to Economic and Regional Development Minister Stuart Nash previously estimated much of the public sector could cut its fleets by 20 per cent or more, which would cut the costs of going electric.
Ironically, accordingly to a Government tally, some climatefocused agencies including Niwa, DOC and the New Zealand Antarctic Institute rank among the highest-emitting fleets per km, as does Fire and Emergency NZ.
The cleanest performers include Stats NZ, TVNZ, some DHBs and Inland Revenue.
Then there is flying. Policy announcements about the carbonneutral public sector have focused on EVs, boilers, and leasing green buildings. However, flying – both domestic and international – was easily the biggest source of climate impact for all four public agencies whose detailed emissions were supplied in the briefing to Nash. Those were EECA, Massey University, Auckland DHB and NZ Trade and Enterprise.
Shaw said there was no need to supply funding to cut flying, because reducing flights would save agencies money. But that didn’t mean they were not tackling their use of flights, he said: ‘‘ [Some] for example, are investing quite heavily in . . . technology to reduce the need to fly to meetings.’’
Although the public sector represents less than 1 per cent of New Zealand’s emissions, the idea is that stimulating demand for EVs, green buildings and other lowercarbon goods will make those things easier and cheaper for everyone. The agencies must measure emissions from their suppliers, as well as their direct emissions. That meant smaller businesses would face similar rules when supplying the private or public sector.
Part of the work inside ministries will be coming up with a public sector-wide policy for buying carbon offsets to counter emissions they can’t get rid of. As things stand, taxpayers could end up paying for two lots of carbon credits – one to meet international obligations under the Paris Agreement, and another to be able to claim that public agencies are carbon-neutral.
Shaw said officials would be working on a fresh policy, including deciding whether offsets bought by the police and others would count towards New Zealand’s Paris Agreement target.
‘‘If you haven’t managed to eliminate your emissions by 2025, you’re going to have to pay for the work that you haven’t done.’’ James Shaw, Climate Change Minister