Parliament’s environment watchdog slams government’s climate plan: ‘A big gamble’

Parliament’s environment watchdog has questioned the government’s claims it is on track to meet climate targets.

The comments were made in a proposal for a draft emissions reduction plan, which the government must complete by the end of the year.

Few parts of the government plan remain unscathed Contribution by Simon Uptona former National Cabinet Minister and now the Parliamentary Environment Commissioner.

He said it was “irrational” to rely on carbon pricing to reduce pollution in areas such as transport.

He said the government relies on Planting pine trees to offset carbon emissions Rather than actually reducing emissions.

He said calculations showing progress toward the goals appeared overly optimistic and in some cases relied on speculative new technologies.

The committee also criticised the government’s claims of a “least cost” approach to tackling climate change, saying its definition of cost was too narrow and would pass the burden onto future generations.

Upton was not available for an interview Friday.

Under the Zero Carbon Amendment, the government will need to develop a plan to meet shrinking carbon budgets, each lasting five years, in order to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050.

The move would help meet the global goal of limiting global warming to 1.5 to 2 degrees Celsius, which countries have signed up to under the Paris Agreement, and follows years of peer-reviewed research that shows it could avert the worst impacts of warming and turmoil.

The government released a draft plan in July, Calculations show New Zealand is on track to meet its first emissions budget (2022-2025), barely completed the second round of budgets (2026-2030), and failed to complete the third round of budgets (2032-2035).

However, Upton expressed doubts that the first and second budgets could be achieved, saying the margins were so thin that there was a risk that they could not be achieved.

He said even the figures showing the third budget falling short were overly optimistic. He said the plan relied on new methane-reduction technologies for farmers that didn’t exist yet, and assumptions about carbon capture in underground caverns that were “speculative and based on optimistic assumptions”.

He said the government was “unwilling to act now when alternatives are available,” apparently assuming that technologies to reduce pollution will always be much cheaper in the future. The submission said the history of green technologies such as green hydrogen showed that this thinking did not always work.

Upton’s comments on other aspects of the draft plan included:

On taking a “lowest cost” approach

Upton questioned the government’s definition of “lowest cost”, arguing it only took into account some costs, and only in the short term.

The proposal says the draft “currently takes little or no serious account of the wider environmental costs involved or the economic impacts of those costs. For example, it fails to take into account the significant health and productivity benefits of cleaner air from reduced fossil fuel emissions”.

It takes the government program as an example Pass law to allow liquefied natural gas terminals to address energy crisis.

“Deregulation to expedite the construction of facilities to support LNG imports … would likely be the least costly from a gas user’s perspective but would likely extend the long-term use of the gas network.

“If upstream emissions are also taken into account, imported LNG may no longer be the ‘least cost’ solution,” the submission said.

Relying on emissions trading systems

The government says the ETS is its main tool for reducing emissions. The scheme requires polluters to buy one permit for each tonne they emit.

Payments for carbon emissions are intended to incentivize polluters to reduce their emissions of planet-warming gases.

However, the act only covers 43 per cent of emissions, as methane and nitrous oxide from agriculture are not covered. The government also issues free permits to “trade exposed” polluters, such as NZ Steel and Methanex.

Upton said there was another big weakness – allowing polluting companies to offset all their emissions with forestry.

He said planting trees would always be cheaper than reducing emissions, and that businesses would not reduce pollution.

The submission said that unless the scheme design was changed, the ETS would only reduce actual emissions by 10%.

He said the country was permanently occupying land for forestry.

“Since carbon remains in the atmosphere forever, these forests also need to remain on the land permanently,” the submission states.

“Our children and grandchildren will inherit a vast forestry resource that we must maintain in the face of climate change and the risks of extreme weather events, disease and fire.

“Reliance on carbon offsets was never a ‘long-term’ solution… We envisioned cheap forestry carbon offsets buying us time to develop, commercialize and bring to market. That was a full generation ago… Time has been wasted. This plan is likely to waste even more time.

“I believe the nation’s reliance on unlimited forestry carbon offsets is a huge gamble.”

Solving transportation problems through carbon pricing

Upton said a carbon price transmitted through the ETS was unlikely to have enough effect, and that several studies had highlighted the insensitivity of transport sector emissions to carbon prices.

“For example, to achieve modest emissions reductions of between 10 and 20 percent, the value of a ton of emissions would likely need to rise to more than $200,” he wrote.

“If the current carbon price doubles to around $100, it would only mean a 15 cent increase in gas prices. Much higher increases than that would be passed on to drivers because of international events and exchange rate movements.

It will not affect the driver’s behavior.

“It lacks credibility to believe that the current ETS design will help achieve the transition to zero-emission transportation.”

The submission said the ETS – which encourages the conversion of land raised for sheep and cattle to woodland – was the only driver of a reduction in agricultural emissions.