Pee Kay: “…we’re in bad company…”says Chris Luxon

We could be on the hook for up to $5 billion in carbon credits but Chris Luxon has made a pronouncement from on high that “remaining in the Paris climate agreement is a bottom line in any coalition negotiations…”

Is this another of Chris’s “big time outbursts” that just might end up inflicting pain on his posterior like the July decree might when he stated during a post-Cabinet press conference that National “ain’t doing business” with parties that want to spend, borrow, and increase taxes, pointing to TOP’s proposed land value tax.

Andi Cocroft: Carbon Credits or Productive Landscapes?

The Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment has reignited an important discussion about the future of New Zealand’s landscapes. His latest report argues that forestry should gradually be removed from the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS), or at least its role significantly restricted, because the current system is encouraging carbon offsetting rather than reducing emissions at their source.

The recommendation will inevitably be viewed through the lens of climate policy, but there is a broader question that deserves equal attention.

Mike's Minute: The madness of the carbon auction needs to end

It's the definition of madness. And stupidity.

How many times do you have to do the same dumb thing with no result, thus proving your system doesn’t work, before you admit your system doesn’t work and give up?

Dr Eric Crampton: Government right to rely on the Emissions Trading Scheme

The New Zealand Initiative today [17/7/27] welcomed the government’s intention, stated in the Draft Emissions Reduction Plan, to rely on the Emissions Trading Scheme to achieve the Zero Carbon Act’s goal of net zero emissions from 2050.

 
But it also urged measures that would strengthen the ETS

Mike's Minute: The climate advice is bordering on nutty

I listened to Rod Carr yesterday, post the release of his Climate Commission's advice to the Government 2036-2040.

He is unfailingly polite. When it was put to him that the Government, who have launched their own inquiry into methane might be cutting across his work, he was having none of it, despite the fact that is exactly what the Government are doing.

Point of Order: Stuff and nonsense.....

......The Post is blinkered when reporting on which Maori (no, not all of them) may suffer from carbon plan

Oh, dear. Our Maori people are being dealt another blow.

That’s the impression given by the headline on an article in The Post headed Carbon plan ‘damaging to Maori”.

Dr Eric Crampton: Finally our unemployment figures make sense

The economists descended on Wellington last week. Or, at least, many shuffled their way from the Ministries over to Victoria University to meet with academics from across the country for the annual three-day conference of the New Zealand Association of Economists.

The NZAE annual meetings are a strange and wonderful thing, whether by accident or by design. In larger countries, economists’ conferences tend to be more specialised. Academics attend some conferences, including academic researchers based in places like the Federal Reserve, but few practitioners attend. Other conferences cater to policy practitioners in the bureaus – with fewer academics in attendance. The NZAE meetings mix things up, so policymakers get to hear from academics and vice versa.

Roger Partridge: Blowing the budget

Yesterday’s budget was not the only budget in town. It followed hot on the heels of Climate Change Minister James Shaw’s announcement on Monday of the Government’s $2.9 billion Emissions Reduction Plan. The plan sets out the steps the Government will take to meet the first of three national emissions budgets.

Like yesterday’s budget from the Minister of Finance, Shaw’s announcement showed an alarming air of unreality.

The Finance Minister’s error was failing to respond to the change in the country’s economic predicament. Shaw’s error was failing to realise the Government has already implemented a policy to achieve the very objectives proposed for his costly Emissions Reduction Plan – at least for non-agricultural emissions.