Climate Change Minister Simon Watts announced big changes to climate change laws. Photo / Mark Mitchell
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts quietly announced sweeping changes to New Zealand’s climate change laws last night, including stripping the Climate Change Commission of one of its main jobs.
The Greens say the late-night release showed the Government calling time on the bipartisan emissions reduction architecture created by the Zero Carbon Act, the law National and NZ First passed with Labour and the Greens in 2019 (NZ First was part of the government at the time).
Watts also announced a weakening of one of the Government’s own climate goals, changing the deadline for achieving a carbon neutral government from 2025 to 2050.
One of the main tools the Government uses to reduce the country’s emissions is an Emissions Reduction Plan or ERP, which is a list of policies that will be used to drive down emissions.
The plans are produced every five years and begin with the Climate Change Commission publishing advice on what might be required in an ERP, including the overall policy direction and some specific policies that could be included in the forthcoming plan.
The Government, which has the final say on what climate change policies it actually implements, responds to that advice with what it thinks should be in the actual ERP.
Both the Climate Change Commission’s advice and the Government’s plan are produced in draft form and consulted on, given they include fairly dramatic interventions in the economy, meaning the process can be lengthy.
The Climate Change Commission’s part in the process is meant to help shape the Government’s final plan and ensure it measures up to the goals set by the Zero Carbon Act.
Watts plans to change this so that the Climate Change Commission will no longer produce its draft advice, leaving the Government to produce an ERP on its own.
Watts said the “climate change system can be unnecessarily complex and duplicative in parts, which creates high compliance costs and slows effective action”.
“We have been clear in our commitment to look into the CCRA [Climate Change Response Act] to see where we can make improvements,” he said.
The plans were uploaded in a press release to the Beehive website at about 8pm on Tuesday night. Usually, Beehive statements are circulated around the press gallery when they are uploaded.
The late timing of the release was put down to the fact some of the information it contained was market sensitive. Releases regarding the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) are often published after the market closes to avoid disruption.
Green Party co-leader Chlöe Swarbrick said the Government was sneaking through significant changes while no one was watching.
“Under the cover of night, Christopher Luxon’s Government announced their most significant destruction of climate action yet,” she said.
She noted that the Zero Carbon Act, the amendment to the Climate Change Response Act that created the Climate Change Commission, was passed with National support, signalling the party’s support for the framework for dealing with climate action.
“Christopher Luxon promised New Zealanders he would abide by our climate commitments,” Swarbrick said.
Watts also announced changes to the ETS, New Zealand’s main emissions reduction tool and the one favoured by the current government.
The Government is making good on a promise to widen the ETS beyond forestry to allow other projects that suck carbon emissions out of the atmosphere to enter the ETS.
Watts released a framework for how this might function.
“The framework will support any landholder, project owner, or group interested in accessing a carbon market, to understand whether their project or activity has the environmental and scientific rigour needed to enter those markets.
“Forestry is already a critical part of our climate response, but we also want to enable businesses and organisations to explore other ways to reduce emissions.
“We are progressing work to help farmers and landholders access pathways for recognition and reward for activities that remove carbon from the atmosphere on farm, including opportunities around rewetting peatlands,” he said.
Watts will also sever the link between the ETS and the Paris agreement, removing a requirement for ETS settings to accord with Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), the main target set under the Paris agreement.
Lisa McLaren the co-director of 350 Aotearoa and the former convener of one of the main groups that lobbied for the Zero Carbon Act, said Watts’ changes “represents the government effectively backing out of their bipartisan commitment to maintaining the Zero Carbon Act as it stands.
“In 2019, National voted in favour of a Climate Commission with the power to assess and critique climate plans of the government of the day. Today, they are walking back on that commitment,” she said.
She said the Government’s climate change plans didn’t stack up, “so it is gagging the very body designed to hold it accountable”.