Councils will be required by law to plan how high-risk communities will prepare for the impacts of climate change as part of proposed changes to the Climate Change Response Act.
On Wednesday, the Government introduced the Climate Change Response Amendment Bill, with Climate Change Minister Simon Watts saying the changes would “reduce unnecessary costs and duplication, provide greater certainty, and enable us to focus our efforts more effectively”.
“This legislation delivers one of the key actions under our National Adaptation Framework to help New Zealand manage growing climate risks. It includes requiring adaption planning in the highest-risk areas and is part of our plan to build for the future."
“For the first time, councils will be required by law to plan how high-risk communities will prepare for the impacts of climate change. Some councils are already working well with their communities to adapt, but this is inconsistent across the country," Watts says.
He says plans will need to cover at least 30 years and set out the sequence of actions and investment needed to manage climate-driven natural hazard risks over time.
“This gives communities clarity, reduces risks early, and helps avoid higher long-term costs.”
The Government says other changes in the Bill include “strengthening market governance of the NZ Emissions Trading Scheme (NZ ETS) secondary market, to improve transparency and integrity” and “improving the operation of the NZ ETS, including fixing disincentives to invest in decarbonisation, and providing a future route for new types of carbon removals, or new emissions sources (but not agriculture), to be added to the NZ ETS”.
Watts says the Climate Change Response Act and the NZ ETS are “our key tools to transition New Zealand to a low-emissions, resilient future”.
“It’s critical that they’re working smoothly to deliver emissions reductions and help us meet our climate targets. That’s why we’re making changes like strengthening oversight of the NZ ETS market.”
Watts says: "These changes ensure our climate framework remains efficient, practical, and focused on results.”
Value for money
This announcement comes after Watts recently directed officials to undertake a stocktake of local government climate-related planning and investment.
In a recently-released letter, Watts, who is also Minister of Local Government, wrote that he wanted councils to make climate-related decisions that are "proportionate, evidence-based, and represent value for money."
"The Government is increasingly concerned that some climate-related planning and investment decisions may be relying on high-end emissions scenarios in a way that results in unnecessary costs being imposed on ratepayers, businesses, and communities," said Watts.
He said he has directed government officials to undertake a stocktake of current council practices. Additionally officials are to; "provide advice on whether extra national direction, reporting requirements or legislative changes are needed to “ensure climate-related decisions appropriately balance resilience, affordability, and value for money for ratepayers."
"The Government's expectation is clear: councils should plan for climate risks, but they must also plan for affordability."
12 Comments
You gotta feel sorry for them.
The exhausts of their quest for unlimited growth are biting them in the bum. And that is only one aspect of several.
'He says plans will need to cover at least 30 years'
Given that the design lifetime of structures is 50-100 years, he's dead right. That means abandoning South Dunedin, for instance (it is indefensible in that timeframe).
Also they seem to be confused as to the removal of the 'most extreme' posit scenario.
Indeed. Lots of NZ fits that category. How much of coastal NZ is less that 3m from average sealevel. One king tide storm from being under water.
Cue those who built or bought in high risk areas screaming that the govt is forcing them off their land etc.
They can scream if they wish, but when the insurance pulls out they will have to either live with the eventual losses form extreme weather events, or lose their property from the bank bailing on the mortgage with no insurance available.
Not so sure it's part of the 'unlimited growth' mantra PDK, more like denial of the risks and perhaps ignorant of the area's history. Look at most towns built around rivers. Usually the town centres and the ensuing spread of housing and industry is on the river's flood plains. Yes it may have been a hundred or more years since those plains were flooded, but that likely just means the risk is higher, not less. The history indicates they've just taken the easiest, cheapest options.
We've discussed this before. Council planning can include a staged drawback from threatened areas to safer ones, and they can work with the insurance companies to make it easier for people to move too.
Do also remember Murray that councils will plan for population increases in their budgeting for projected growth and reasoning for expenditure. Hence it could be argued that this is yet another system assuming exponential growth in the number of humans (assuming every generation will have more people or be in-filled with immigration). How then does this bode for future planning if the population doesn't pan out as planned and debt levels rise.
So the state is offloading responsibility and additional cost to local bodies while bemoaning their inability to provide value....gotta love politicians.
yes, do all this extra work please, it's hard and we want property owners anger directed at you guys not us. Oh and by the way we are putting a cap on rates rises so please do it for free.
Hypo Crisy Luxon
and the Muppets
Coming to you for one...
I find it hard to have any sympathy for those who buy land without reading the LIM and understanding the risks they accept.
The council maps using the extreme flooding scenarios were quite handy when last doing due diligence.
Clouds don't drop a uniform distribution of the most extreme rainfall across a whole region all at once. Instead, it's much more common that a storm can dump a lot of water into a single catchment so the flows and flooding areas can get close to the most extreme scenario, even whilst the rest of the region is relatively unharmed.
In general yes, but LIMs aren't static, they get updated as risks are identified or refined.
And those effected do everything they can to get these risks removed from their LIM to try and save the price of their property.
Agreed. Most councils have good online GIS maps that clearly highligh the risks. Ignorance is a personal decision.
Caveat Emptor.
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