A major report examining how the country should fight climate change is due out on Sunday, sparking calls for change.
Young people demand change in the School Strike 4 Climate outside Parliament on 26 January. Photo: RNZ / Dom Thomas
The Climate Change Commission's Draft Advice will be published this weekend.
Wellington climate change scientist Dave Frame hopes it will recommend altering the methods used by governments to bring down greenhouse gas emissions.
Orthodoxy over the past few decades has been to offset emissions through tree-planting or by buying carbon credits on the international market.
But such tactics do not bring down the actual volume of carbon dioxide emitted in New Zealand every year, said Te Herenga Waka / Victoria University climate change professor Dave Frame.
"We've tended to go quite extensively after sinks of carbon - forestry sinks domestically and carbon credits overseas - and in theory those are perfectly legitimate ways of dealing with the problem," Frame said.
"But unless you're making inroads into those gross carbon dioxide emissions, then you're really deferring the problem, because [offsets] are a really temporary way of dealing with it."
What is the Climate Change Commission doing?
As part of the Paris Agreement, Aotearoa has committed to reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 30 percent from 2005 levels, and to have a net zero carbon economy by 2050.
Some experts predict US President Joe Biden will put more pressure on countries to ensure they reach those goals.
New Zealand's Climate Change Commission, appointed in December 2019, has been tasked with the responsibility of holding successive governments to account on climate change action.
Its first report this Sunday will outline how thinking should change, where gains can be made, and how New Zealand is faring in meeting the Paris Agreement targets.
Public consultation will be open for six weeks, before the final report is submitted to parliament at the end of May. The government can choose which recommendations it adopts.
The commission is made up of experts in climate science, adaptation, agriculture, economics, and Māori-Crown relationships.
Former Reserve Bank deputy governor Rod Carr is the commission chairperson.
Climate Change Commission chairperson Rod Carr. Photo: Supplied
What should come from the report?
Some scientists hope the commission's report will address the lack of substantial action taken over the past few decades in reducing the amount of carbon emitted.
Frame said offsetting emissions by buying carbon credits or planting forests was a
temporary fix.
"You buy some carbon credits this time, the number [of emissions] you report has dropped, but unless you've cut the gross emissions, you'll have to buy them again in the next period.
"They're kind of like an interest payment on the loan. Unless you're paying down the principle, you're not really making inroads into the structure of the thing," he said.
The UN has said offsets should not be considered the "get-out-of-jail free card", and "the danger is that it can lead to complacency."
That includes the idea that planting trees is the save-all solution.
Frame said he wanted the report to address the difference between gross emissions - the total number of carbon emissions from every year - and net emissions - the number of emissions minus however much has been offset.
Victoria University climate change professor Dave Frame. Photo: RNZ / Chris Bramwell
"I'd like to see some focus on gross reductions, as a core part of it. There are other levers, such as international offsets, and forestry sinks in New Zealand, and agricultural sector gases which contribute to the climate change mitigation portfolio.
"But it would be a mistake inter-generationally to rely on those while leaving gross CO2 emissions high."
The transport sector was one of the biggest culprits of fossil fuel emissions in the country and much of the focus needed to be on shifting transport to electric energy, he said.
Direction for the government
The Climate Change Commission's report will make recommendations about what actions are needed.
Co-Director of 350 Aotearoa, Erica Finnie, said there needed to be clearer directions from the government about how targets should be reached.
A 350 Aotearoa protest in Wellington in 2019. Photo: Supplied
"We've done little in the way of policy that supports meeting the goal," she said.
"We've got targets from the government and we saw in December last year a commitment that the public sector will need to be carbon neutral by 2025," Finnie said.
"What we do in New Zealand is we set targets and we don't have clear pathways of how we get there, and we don't have many policies that support our climate goals."
Finnie said the government had not been strong enough when it allowed agencies that could not make it to carbon zero in time to offset their emissions.
"A lot of what our government has done so far… lets us off the hook by trading emissions or by offsetting emissions through forestry, rather than looking at the core industries that are most carbon intensive, and having clear pathways to transform those industries so they'll work in a zero carbon economy."
The commission is expected to recommend the scale and pace of change.
"The sooner that we act and the more we do to bring down emissions in the next ten years is really going to set the scene for whether we're able to meet our zero carbon targets for 2050," Finnie said.