An excellent piece by @christinahood.bsky.social at Carbon News on New Zealand's 2035 NDC: Does it meet our Paris Agreement obligations? Per Betteridge's Law of Headlines, the answer is NO. www.carbonnews.co.nz/news/35982/d...

The NZ car industry has made no progress towards meeting the 2025 emissions standards. Are they even trying?

Bloomberg reporting on NZ's weakening climate ambition www.bloomberg.com/news/article...

Wow, the NZ carbon market hates the Government's proposed changes to the ETS and Zero Carbon Act. Carbon price which had already dropped to $51.50 yesterday now down to $41 in intra-day trading. Just keep repeating "The ETS is our key tool to control emissions".

3 November 2025 saw two new NZ electricity records set: highest daily utility solar power generation (1.6 GWh, enough to make 50 million cups of tea), and the last day of an unprecedented 25-day run of zero coal power. There will be a lot more records like this to come.

NZ electricity reached 99.9% renewable on 25 October, I believe that is a record. And that's despite a tenth of geothermal capacity appearing to be out of action (maintenance?) since the start of October. Source: em6

Here's a video of it. www.youtube.com/watch?v=w1N7.... October 25. Wow!

Shane Jones vs Michel Forst, UN Special Rapporteur on Environmental Defenders. "Unicorn kissing green drivel from doomers and malcontents" vs "Do not depict environmental defenders as criminals or extremists or as posing a threat to public order, security, national interest and economic prosperity."

No coal has been burned for electricity for 17 days in a row. I think that is a record. Fossil power < 2% EVERY DAY in October, I think that is also a record. Image: Daily coal power generation in MWh, from em6

The may explain why no suspect information has been released. The French police have effectively conceded that the theft was not illegal because the items will be used to train large language models. waterfordwhispersnews.com/2025/10/20/l...

For anyone working in a museum, archive, gallery, or heritage collection, the Passenger Pigeon Manifesto is a good read. ppmanifesto.hcommons.org

In a new report, Paul Callister and I examine the government's "Aviation Action Plan" and explore how the public/private group Sustainable Aviation Aotearoa, set up in 2022, appears to have failed. Story here: theconversation.com/nzs-governme...

This looks good events.humanitix.com/save-denniston

Pōneke Fun(d)raising Gig to support Denniston Defenders 😎👌🔥 F*&@ isolation & intimidation tactics. Let's come together & raise some fun! Join us to support the amazing #climateactivists who occupied a coal bucket for 23 days to try & stop #BathurstResources new coal mine at #DennistonPlateau

The top of the range is also not compatible. Global average agricultural methane reduction in 1.5C scenarios is 32% from 2020 levels. 24% is what "no additional warming" for NZ would be if the rest of the world were on that 32% reduction 1.5C path.

Went to more sessions on coastal adaptation today then had a chat to protesters outside the @adaptationfutures.bsky.social conference. Totally agree: we are in a climate emergency and mitigation (reducing emissions) should still be top priority, unfortunately we now also need to adapt to 🥵 🌊 ⛈️

Samuel Mehr, 2023 Prime Minister’s Emerging Scientist: This "is a terrible idea. It will weaken our global competitiveness and accelerate our ‘brain drain’ to Australia, Canada, Europe and various other attractive destinations for our top scientific minds."

Jane Harding, President RSTA: "Our concern is that, with the Board ... embedded in a government department... future funding decisions could be influenced... by factors beyond the excellence of the research." The Government has ALREADY changed Marsden to be decided by factors other than excellence.

""Our trading partners are unlikely to smile on this reduction in ambition," [Renwick] said." – perhaps we'll hear from the EU High Commission in Wellington about this soon

Nice

NZ's new methane target: Represents doing nothing if historic efficiency gains continue, and assumes new mitigations won't work. Worse, our farmers need to realise it cedes the future of the paperwork they complain about to places like Brussels instead of Wellington.

Comment: The Government's methane announcement is the policy equivalent of a steaming cowpat on cross-partisan climate consensus.

I was gobsmacked to see this as the lead item on the Six O'clock News with a very critical slant. If the farmers & Govt have lost 1News, then they're in trouble. Good. #nzpol

On the eve of a major international meeting on climate adaptation, NZ's government announces it is weakening its 2050 target to cut methane emissions - now only 14-24% (from 24-47%). As @christinahood.bsky.social says, NZ is now backtracking www.linkedin.com/posts/christ...

Current methane target: -24 to -47% by 2050. New methane target: -14 to -24% by 2050. Also, two year delay in critical decisions on carbon budgets and ag pricing permanently canned. www.beehive.govt.nz/release/gove...

Dr Isaac Henderson from the NZ drone industry says, "The drone doesn’t know if it’s being flown for military or civilian purposes". Reminds me of Tom Lehrer's Wernher von Braun... www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/3608...

Governor General Lord Plunket's farewell to Palmerston North, 23 May 1910: "we will watch when you are going to put the trams here, or how bridges you are going to have at Hokowhitu." My answer, 115 years later: it's too soon to tell.

"...deep-seated systemic problems that incremental change will not solve." Right - time to stop pissing around and do everything we can to get off fossil fuels. www.theguardian.com/environment/...

New Zealand ranks 30th in the world for share of low-carbon electricity.

UNISAVER MUST DIVEST FROM GEN0C!DE If UniSaver does not respond to our demand, we will launch a campaign to get unis across the motu to sever ties with UniSaver. Show your support by signing the open letter here: tinyurl.com/26tj4kpj

Government investing in thermal backup – see Marsden B. Diesel fired, built in 1978, never used. Sold for parts to India in 2012. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marsden_B

Today (30 Sep 2025) an all-time record was set for solar power generation in New Zealand – 1200 MWh from solar farms. (Distributed solar, not shown, likely also a record.) Alas, it earned only 0.08 c/kWh for its owners. Not a great incentive to build more. What will tomorrow's announcement bring?

In August, the market share of fully electric light vehicles in Australia was triple that of NZ (10% vs 3.4%).

So long, Mt Fuji

"A lack of consistent planning and basic investment [has] led to the collapse of New Zealand’s regional public transport" New article by Paul Callister and Heidi O'Callahan thefutureisrail.org/solving-our-...

It’s becoming a tragedy that we have to keep repeating this… or maybe a farce… newsroom.co.nz/2025/09/25/y...

Grabbing a water bottle, she unlocked the bike, and set off down the drive. The clouds scudded across the sky, the wind was fresh, and she noticed the new spring growth. She breathed deeply, and there it was again - that old cycling magic; it never failed to arrive. #VoteForBikes #CyclingMagic

Very little wind power was completed in New Zealand from 2011 to 2020 – capacity only increased 10% in 10 years. Very little geothermal was completed from 2014 to 2023 - capacity only increased 10% in 10 years. Then everything took off. Thanks, Zero Carbon Act of 2019

It was so windy yesterday I thought we might see a new daily record for wind power... but it was only 6th best. Still, 20 million kWh, that's enough to boil water for 600 million cups of tea. Data in MWh/day from app.em6.co.nz

MBIE says real electricity prices have tipped back above their pre-Covid level, Stats NZ say not yet.

New Zealand mentioned at the GeoGessr World Cup! www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7rK...

Time for some good news about the NZ electricity sector!

September 11, 2015 – Pacific Island leaders fail to shift Australia and New Zealand from open climate criminality… i.e. "to back stronger targets on limiting global warming as the showdown at the Pacific Islands Forum on Thursday ended in a stalemate." allouryesterdays.info/2025/09/10/s...

New Zealand Energy Quarterly, June 2025 Fossil fuel use continued its decline this quarter. Rolling 12-month electricity emissions (4.1 Mt CO2) are 59% below peak, gas (2.9 Mt) is 35% below peak, coal (1.3 Mt) 53% below peak, and oil (18.3 Mt) 6% below peak. [1/6]

Frankie is a fan of bike lanes. "Now I feel safe." @cyclewgtn.bsky.social #WellingtonBikeLife

More cuts to the Marsden Fund of @royalsocietynz.bsky.social. This takes it down to $10/capita in real terms when it was over $16 for most of this century. Australia's equivalent, the ARC, is NZ$42/capita, as is the US NSF (despite ongoing attempts to gut the latter). www.rnz.co.nz/news/politic...

...as an elected MP who is supposedly representing us, this is not OK. Help us in our call to end to fossil fuel expansion and save Denniston Plateau 👍 share our content 😊 get involved 💚 donate chuffed.org/project/1296... #StopTheFastTrack #EndCoal #ProtectDennistonPlateau #ClimateJustice

"Auckland gas lines owner Vector [said] it was changing its pricing for permanent gas disconnections ... when someone wanted the gas infrastructure taken off their property. The cost ranges from $750 to $2500." Yoo hoo Vector we see you www.rnz.co.nz/news/busines...

With apologies to the famous chart showing ever-rising atmospheric CO2 against any number of international reports and agreements.