The Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment’s report linking biogenic methane to forest planting has largely been welcomed by Beef + Lamb NZ.
BLNZ chief insights officer Julian Ashby said the commissioner’s report reiterates a 2020 report from the Ministry for Environment that highlighted how New Zealand drystock farms had about 1.4 million hectares of woody vegetation capable of absorbing about a third of on-farm agricultural emissions (tukuwaro).
“It is a fresh bit of thinking but there is a risk we will see cherry picking by different groups, and it also does make some fairly heroic assumptions about carbon dioxide getting to net zero by 2050.”
BLNZ GM for policy Dave Harrison agreed the report is a relatively complex one, made more so by delving into aspects of marginal methane emissions and sectors’ relative contribution to it.
“But it is useful in that it is talking about gross emissions and not just net targets, and how fossil fuel emitters are just offsetting emissions using trees.”
This has been a long-running issue BLNZ has had with the current regulations.
The commissioner “does point out we cannot plant our way out of the problem, and you cannot expect behaviour change with the current system only linking fossil fuel to creating ‘green holes’ to absorb it”, Harrison said.
Upton has steered firmly away from making policy recommendations, but he has made his concerns over not linking biogenic methane emissions to forest plantings clear.
Both Harrison and Ashby welcomed any influence the report may have on government (karauna) policy. They said they believe the government is coming around to better defining forestry offsetting’s role in NZ’s carbon policy.
Climate Change Minister James Shaw has recently said that large emitters’ ability to offset emissions through tree planting may soon not be an option.
Adjustments to the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) may soon also enforce more behaviour change around fossil fuel emissions, and Shaw has stated he is open to exploring forestry’s role in the ETS, including making the government a buyer of the ETS units, driving down how many units are available.
