Ambitious emissions reduction plan light on the details
Work in progress. That is probably the best way to describe the Government’s inaugural emissions reduction plan.
High on ambition, broad in scope, but still a bit lacking in details while industry and Government go away and start to work on applying the plan to reshape and reduce the energy form that has underpinned economic activity since the industrial revolution.
The massive doorstop of a document running to 343 pages is really the adding together of a bunch of initiatives already under way, while also throwing in new ones.
It is massive and complex in areas, full of labyrinthine recommendations, targets, initiatives and suggestions that ‘‘could’’ make a difference.
Finance Minister Grant Robertson, focused squarely on the economic upsides for households: that the plan will help make the cleaner energy options cheaper, wean us off fossil fuels.
He warned that with high inflation, climate change might not seem the most pressing issue, but it was the most important, he said.
Climate Change Minister James Shaw laid out the wider context, New Zealand’s international obligations and how the six emission Budgets and emission reduction plans will help deliver net-zero emissions by 2050.
He also detailed how the state will work with Ma¯ori to give effect to the plan and be inclusive.
In an area of interest to a lot of households – in the middle of a cost-ofliving crunch – money for making new houses and existing ones more energy efficient, there is nothing new.
There is a lot of talk about changing the industry to make the various tweaks around house production and subsidies work better, but nothing concrete yet in this plan.
The Climate Commission initially suggested last year that new gas connections to homes could be phased out. This plan does not commit to that.
There were also recommendations around banning imports of new fossil fuel-powered cars. That hasn’t been done, although the report does assume – almost certainly correctly – that by
2035 all new cars will be low or zero emissions. Instead of going down the bans route, the Government has instead mostly used targets. In transport, it targets reducing total kilometres travelled by the light vehicle fleet by 20% on 2019 levels by 2035 at which point zero emission vehicles will make up 30% of the fleet. Freight transport emissions will be reduced by 35%.
New baseload fossil-fuel power generation (large scale generation), however, will likely be banned by 2024 There is a cash-for-clunkers car trade-in scheme, starting with a trial, that will pay lower income people to trade in their cars for scrap if they are going to buy a new hybrid, PHEV or electric vehicle.
That will get a whopping $568 million over the next four years. There is little detail about the scheme yet – such as who will be able to get it, how much they will get and the effect on emissions for the price tag.
There is also commitment to boost local spatial planning to make it easier to bike, walk and get around.
Much of the heavy lifting appears to be in the commercial energy generation areas: phasing out of low-medium temperature coal boilers by 2037 (and banning new ones now) and giving more assistance to sectors through a revamped Government Investment in Decarbonising Industry Fund (GIDI) that will soak up $678m over the next four years.
The Government claims this is an area where emission reductions can be achieved quickly.
Agriculture gets more money for research with a new Centre for Climate Action on Agricultural Emissions being set up. The He Waka Eke Noa partnership between farmers and Government to work out a farmgate emissions pricing scheme continues to be worked on.
Yesterday was the announcement, but the next couple of years will show just how effective the plan is at actually driving down emissions.