Government More Confident It Can Stay Within Its Greenhouse Gas Budgets

Kate Newton
Climate Change Correspondent

The government says
it has improved confidence it can stay within its greenhouse
gas budgets, despite warnings from the Climate Change
Commission.

The commission said
in July that all of New Zealand’s climate targets were
at risk, and time to get back on track was running
out.

Its annual emissions monitoring report said the
country’s climate pollution had gradually decreased over
time, but progress stalled in 2024.

It singled out the
government’s decision to axe agricultural emission pricing
and said confidence in the emissions trading scheme – which
the government has said is its main tool to drive down
greenhouse gases – was “fragile”.

Without new policies
to cut climate pollution, both the country’s 2050 net-zero
target and emissions ‘budgets’ might not be met, the
commission said.

Emissions budgets are the maximum
amount of greenhouse gases the country can emit in a
five-year time period in order to keep it on track for
2050.

The report also took aim at the government’s
emissions projections – saying in some cases they “do not
appear to be driven by a realistic assessment of current
policy”.

The Ministry for Cities, Environment, Regions
and Transport (MCERT) published the government’s response on
Tuesday, saying it acknowledged the commission’s
recommendations.

The country was on track to meet its
current emissions budget, which ends in 2030, with a buffer
of 3.6 million tonnes of emissions, the ministry
said.

The buffer is about 1.2 percent of the overall
emissions budget.

It confirmed the next budget was
still off-track by 8.7 million tonnes.

However, since
the commission compiled its report, the government had
announced new policies “that improve delivery confidence”,
MCERT said.

It would continue to monitor risks and
work on “strategic options to close the projected emissions
gap for the third emissions budget”, which runs from
2031-2035.

After the government decided not to go
ahead with a price on agricultural methane, it had committed
$437 million to support the development and adoption of
technologies that reduce agricultural emissions.

That
money appears to be the same $400m investment announced by
the government in 2024, which itself was a continuation of a
fund set up by the previous government in 2022.

RNZ
has asked MCERT to explain how the fund is a new development
since the Climate Change Commission compiled its report. The
ministry has acknowledged the request.

Since the
commission’s assessment period ended on 31 March, the
government had announced an additional $51m investment fund
to encourage farmers to actually adopt the
technologies.

It also announced a new Gas Transition
Loan Guarantee Scheme, to help major gas users convert to
other fuel types.

Unlike a similar fund under the
previous government, the fund is fuel-agnostic – companies
can use it to convert from one fossil fuel to
another.

Other developments the ministry pointed to
include:

• A $21m second round of zero-interest
  loans for public EV chargers
• A decision to keep the
  Clean Vehicle Standard, which limits tailpipe emissions of
  imported vehicles
• “Emerging evidence” that less food
  waste is being sent to landfill
• Keeping emissions
  trading scheme settings stable to encourage
  confidence

“We will continue to monitor
implementation progress and delivery risks,” the ministry
said.

“We will consider corrective action … if risks
materialise or the outlook for meeting the current budget
changes.”

It was early in the 2026-2030 emissions
budget period and the government had confidence it could be
met, it said.

“Alongside this, we are progressing work
to identify options for closing the projected gap to [the
next budget] and supporting achievement of New Zealand’s
longer-term climate change
targets.”

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