Posted 25th July 2001

Clean Up With Wind Energy

Wind energy is still very topical given all the coverage on climate change. The NZ government is still saying the right things, however writing letters still important, to the editor, or to their MP, or Minister Pete Hodgson, or Prime Minister Helen Clark emphasising the need for action, not just words, to reduce CO2 emissions and stimulate renewable energy. Thanks to George W Bush, the Kyoto Protocol may yet prove to be a dead letter, or it may not given the recent ratification of it by all except US. But the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Resource Management Act in NZ are still in place, both of which require action on reducing net emissions and thus stimulating sustainable energy.

Windflow slams Huntly CO2 consent application.

Windflow Technology director and chief executive, Geoff Henderson, has labelled the Genesis "Energy Efficiency Enhancement" project at Huntly power station a sham. State-owned generator, Genesis, is seeking a resource consent to increase Huntly's carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions by more than 50% to 4.6 megatonnes per year. "Labelling such a project 'energy efficiency enhancement' is pure hypocrisy and greenwash", said Mr Henderson. "In the context of the Resource Management Act, and the Framework Convention on Climate Change (both of which are legally binding), such consent conditions should be relics of history by now."

"The Board of Inquiry into the Taranaki Combined Cycle power station in 1994 recommended that the applicant should pay to avoid or remedy the adverse effects due to CO2 emissions by ensuring 100% absorption of those emissions. And the Minister for the Environment at the time, Simon Upton, adopted this recommendation for increases above prior rates of emission from the electricity sector. "Now this latest consent application, for the country's largest thermal power station, represents a huge leap backwards. Instead of 100% remediation (for all emissions or at least the additional emissions), there is nothing. Instead of honesty about the purpose of the station (to meet demand growth by additional gas-fired power and CO2 emissions), there is greenwash about 'energy efficiency enhancement'. Genesis should be offering to pay the cost of absorbing any additional emissions, not trying to get away scot-free with a 50% increase! "Politicians from all parties have talked of the need for economic instruments, i.e. the polluter-pays principle. But instead of implementation, there has just been talk."

The Government is the 100% shareholder of Genesis, it cannot escape responsibility in this matter: 1. it is still party to the Maui take-or-pay contracts which seem to be fuelling a mad rush of power-station construction in their dying years 2. it has failed to "call in" the Huntly consent application so as to revisit the recommendation of the only other Ministerial Call-in, ie 100% polluter-pays under the RMA. 3. it has failed to issue a National Policy Statement on CO2 emissions when this is clearly needed 4. it has failed to implement anything to send the correct price signals about CO2 emissions.

"Instead of 'think globally, act locally', successive NZ governments seem to 'think and talk globally, act like an ostrich' on the issue of climate change," said Mr Henderson. "Meanwhile other countries are leaving us behind in the field of renewable energy. Denmark, which has already ratified the Kyoto Protocol, has become the giant of the international wind industry (worth $10 billion annually). But successive New Zealand governments seem to listen only to business-as-usual interests, who refuse to meet the challenge of renewable energy in the 21st century. We are the poorer for it! "Increasing dependency on gas-fired power is crazy in the context of climate change policy, but that is exactly what New Zealand is doing. New Zealand's "clean, green image" seems to be little more than image - where is the substance to back it up? Where is the action to match the government's rhetoric on the Kyoto Protocol?" The Huntly "Energy Efficiency Enhancement" Project resource consent hearings will be held this Tuesday, July 10th....