Council calls for more ambitious emissions reductions

Christchurch City Council wants the Climate Change Commission to be more ambitious in its greenhouse gas emission targets and to set a bolder direction for New Zealand’s climate action.

It has prepared a submission on the Climate Change Commission’s Draft Advice, which is currently out for consultation.

The centrepiece of the Commission’s Draft Advice is the development of three domestic emissions budgets for the country to meet in order to set New Zealand on the path to being net carbon neutral by 2050.

The Commission’s Draft Advice also makes an assessment of New Zealand’s Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC), which is New Zealand’s international commitment to global emissions reduction efforts. It concludes that our current NDC is not compatible with doing our share to limit global warming to 1.5˚C and that we need to do more.

In its submission on the Draft Advice, the Council seeks more ambitious emissions reductions in the first three budgets and supports the Commission’s view that the NDC should be stronger to more accurately reflect New Zealand’s share of global emission reduction.

The Council submits that the Climate Change Commission should set the budgets to achieve the stronger NDC in order to keep global warming to 1.5˚C.

“New Zealand is a relatively wealthy, innovative and capable country who also has one of the highest per capita emissions rates in the world. To do our fair share of international efforts, we need to make deeper and earlier emission reductions than other less developed nations,’’ the Council’s submission says.

The submission also says the Council:

• Favours domestic emission reductions and domestic offsets (such as planting native forests), ahead of purchasing overseas credits.
• Supports a move away from new exotic plantations and towards the establishment of more native forests to form a more permanent carbon sink in New Zealand.
• Supports an increased ambition in mode-shift towards active and public transport, and greater acknowledgement of the role of urban form in enabling emissions reduction.
• Strongly supports genuine, active and enduring partnership with iwi/Māori in developing and implementing climate action.
• Requests that the views of children and young people are specifically sought during the development of all climate policy.
• Suggests greater consultation with local government during development of new government policy statements to enable greater alignment of policy, and to avoid policy statements in one area becoming a barrier to progress in another area (such as emissions reduction).