New Zealand & Climate Change
We were told back in 2017, by Jacinda Ardern, that her government is the most open and transparent government we have ever had.
Ardern in her first formal speech to Parliament as Prime Minister pledged: “This government will foster a more open and democratic society. It will strengthen transparency around official information.”
Since that pledge was made by her we have gone down a path of race based co-governance by unelected tribal elite on the basis of a “mythical partnership” requirement of the Treaty of Waitangi.
I say “mythical” deliberately because when you read the Treaty document there is no mention of partnership or anything that remotely resembles a partnership requirement.
As a result of their reliance on this mythical partnership requirement Ardern’s government made many changes to legislation and proposed more, that significantly altered the fundamental principles upon which our country has been governed and on our democratic rights.
Ardern in 2020 declared a Climate Emergency, committing to urgent action on reducing emissions by progressing radical zero carbon goals which were justified on the basis that such controls were necessary to avoid constraints on trade.
In an article by Muriel Newman from the New Zealand Centre for Political Research, she stated the following:
Climate change represents a major threat to New Zealand – but not because of the emissions produced by cows and sheep or from driving cars to the shops. The biggest threat comes from the unhinged obsession of climate fanatics – including New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern – who are trying to force damaging policies onto the country that will have zero impact on the climate but will devastate the fundamentals of our economy.
It was Helen Clark’s Labour Government that first led New Zealand down this path back in 2002, when they ratified the UN’s Kyoto Protocol (and introduced an Emissions Trading Scheme) even though it had been designed for industrial nations, not rural economies where the main ‘emitters’ are cows and sheep.
Ruminants, of course, play a major part in a carbon cycle that goes all the way back to the dinosaurs. Grass lands sequester carbon dioxide through photosynthesis, and when eaten by ruminants, carbon is released as methane, which breaks down into the carbon dioxide and water the plants need to grow. It’s a cycle of life commonly known as a “biogenic carbon cycle”.
When National won office in 2008, instead of repealing Labour’s socialist climate agenda, they doubled down by signing up to the UN’s Paris Agreement to limit emissions; even as the world’s major emitters were walking away.
Ironically, the Covid-19 pandemic partially delivered on the UN’s Paris objectives, when world economies shut down in early 2020, leading to a massive decline in man-made global greenhouse gas emissions.
However, instead of atmospheric carbon dioxide levels falling – as the UN had led us to believe they would - the US State Department’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration found they had risen dramatically.
The Washington Post of June 4, 2020, carried the story: “Global emissions plunged an unprecedented 17 percent during the coronavirus pandemic… Carbon dioxide levels are the highest they’ve been in human history, and probably are the highest in 3 million years. The last time there was this much CO2 in the atmosphere, global average surface temperatures were significantly warmer than they are today, and sea levels were 50 to 80 feet higher.”
Those real-life findings countered the dreadful scaremongering surrounding this issue.
They not only showed that human emissions are so insignificant that their impact on the climate is negligible, but they also reminded us that the earth has been both hotter and colder than today, irrespective of carbon levels.
The reality is that carbon dioxide is a trace gas that is present in only minute concentrations in the atmosphere - making up around 0.04 percent. Almost all carbon dioxide – 97 percent – is produced through natural processes including being released from oceans, rocks, volcanoes, and, of course, during the respiration of all living things. Only 3 percent of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is generated by human activity and of that, New Zealand’s contribution is an infinitesimal 0.17 percent.
New Zealand’s total GHG emissions amount to 0.17% of the Global Total and the agricultural sector produces 48% of that total. That amounts to 0.082% of the global total.
All around the world, governments are turning their backs on radical climate policies that will undermine energy security and economic independence.
Isn’t it time New Zealand did the same?
The fundamental problem is that the climate crisis was a political crisis – not one rooted in the real world.
The more I study the effects of climate change the more I am convinced that a majority of the opinions written about climate change should be headed up as “Climate Crazy” not climate change.
The first thing that I see in almost every debate around climate change is the effects of our carbon emissions into the atmosphere and how we need to go back to carbon zero or the planet will burn up.
This in my opinion is where the “crazy” starts.
We have been indoctrinated with the lie that CO2 is bad for the environment and that we need to reduce our emissions down to zero if we want to save the planet from burning up.
Well I have to tell you that this is the biggest lie of all and if by some chance we were ever able to get the emissions down to zero that would be the day that life on earth would stop.
“What kind of madness is this?”
The UNFCCC (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change) declared in October 2022 that their predictions around climate change were in fact wrong and that they were reducing their predicted climate warming numbers by 50%.
“The UNFCCC announced that it accepts research shows climate change is expected to reach just 2.5°C – only half as much as has long been assumed.
In a formal statement, the UNFCCC said the world is “on track for around 2.5 degrees Celsius of warming by the end of the century”.
This new paradigm replaces the long-standing and much-feared presumption of 4 – 5°C by 2021 – which led to worldwide declarations of a “Climate Emergency” in recent years.
Our government has been making decisions, based on the UN’s Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 2014 fifth assessment report in regard to lowering our greenhouse gas emissions from the agricultural sectors, that we now find were based on facts which were actually wrong.
The UN stated in October 2022 that the figures need to be cut in half.
We’ve been told for many years now that New Zealand produces excessive emissions of greenhouse gases, with our world-beating farmers accused of being largely to blame.
The argument from the IPCC has always been that the methane produced by livestock digestion is more ‘dangerous’ than carbon dioxide by a factor of twenty-eight - even though methane is part of a natural cycle that can be traced back to the dinosaurs.
However, it now turns out those climate change ‘experts’ were wrong, and that the actual figure is only seven, not twenty-eight.
The IPCC admitted the mistake in their Sixth Assessment Report, explaining at page 1016 of Chapter 7, “…expressing methane emissions as CO2 equivalent of 28, and overstates the effect on global surface temperature by a factor of 3-4”.
This mistake has never been acknowledged or corrected by New Zealand officials and in fact those false assumptions from the IPCC have continued to underpin the Net Zero policy agenda.
The UN admitted their temperature predictions were wrong: “According to the report from UN Climate Change released on 26 October 2022 the world is ‘on track for around 2.5 degrees Celsius of warming by the end of the century’. The UN’s announcement effectively conceded that there is no ‘climate emergency’.”
Our National led coalition government that was elected in 2023 has recently announced that they are going to do away with the Labour government’s proposed carbon pricing scheme for agricultural emissions - “He Waka Eke Noa”.
When this was announced there was a huge outcry from the environmental lobby complaining that this decision would almost lead to destruction of our world. But when you look at the science behind this decision you can easily see that it was the right decision.
First of all the science behind the emissions debate has now been irrefutably proven to have been wrong in fact and to overstated the detrimental effects by a factor of 3 or 4 as shown in the UNFCCC report on Climate Change released on 26 October 2022.
Secondly; The Covid-19 pandemic caused world economies to partially shut down in early 2020, leading to a massive decline in man-made global greenhouse gas emissions.
However, instead of atmospheric carbon dioxide levels falling – as the UN had led us to believe they would - the US State Department’s National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration found they had risen dramatically.
Global emissions plunged an unprecedented 17 percent during the coronavirus pandemic yet carbon dioxide levels were the highest they’ve been in human history, and probably the highest in 3 million years.
Those real-life findings countered the dreadful scaremongering surrounding this issue.
They not only showed that human emissions are so insignificant that their impact on the climate is negligible, but they also reminded us that the earth has been both hotter and colder than today, irrespective of carbon levels.
Third; The reality is that carbon dioxide is a trace gas that is present in only minute concentrations in the atmosphere - making up around 0.04 percent. Almost all carbon dioxide – 97 percent – is produced through natural processes including being released from oceans, rocks, volcanoes, and, of course, during the respiration of all living things. Only 3 percent of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is generated by human activity and of that, New Zealand’s contribution is an infinitesimal 0.17 percent.
New Zealand’s total GHG emissions amount to 0.17% of the Global Total and the agricultural sector produces 48% of that total. That amounts to 0.082% of the global total.
Finally in relation to agricultural emissions the proposed scheme for measuring and controlling the rate of emissions is so flawed that it is totally unfit for purpose and this has now been acknowledged by the current government action in doing away with the proposals under “He Waka Eke Noa”.
It is claimed that agricultural emissions make up 48 percent of New Zealand's gross emissions, including most nitrous oxide and biogenic methane. But the fact is that under the current system of measuring emissions there is no provision for including the sequestration of carbon through grass pasture.
The carbon sequestration from pastoral farming is currently ignored and surely this must mean that the basis for analysis of the GHG emissions from farming is based on flawed science and therefore gives an incorrect measure of the actual emissions from farming.
According to a paper published called Phase 3 Multivariate analysis of Greenhouse Gas emissions from sheep and beef farms – April 2020 (https://www.nzagrc.org.nz/assets/Publications/Multivariate-analysis-of-GHG-from-sheep-and-beef-farms_April-2020.pdf) it takes up to 7 tonnes of CO2 to grow a hectare of grass on the farm.
Grass pasture is produced in what is known as biogenic carbon cycle where plants remove carbon dioxide (CO₂) from the atmosphere and deposit carbon into plant leaves, roots, and stems while oxygen is released back into the atmosphere.
The farm turns those 7 tonnes of CO2 per hectare into enough feed for 10 ewes. Those 10 ewes each emit about 20 – 22 grams of methane a day which means they produce in total 80 kgs of methane per year. It is accepted that methane is a more potent greenhouse gas than CO2 – generally regarded as 7 times stronger. If we multiply our ewe’s 80 kgs of methane by 7 we get 560 kgs of CO2 equivalent.
The farm is therefore, using approximately 12 times more CO2 than it emits. A car owner cannot say that, or a coal fired boiler, or a private jet going to a climate conference. Farmers are not quite the villains they are made out to be.
It is only fair that if the discussions are to be held around the detrimental effects of farming on the environment, then the beneficial effects should also be part of the discussion to reflect the reality of the situation and bring some much needed balance to the discussions.
We like to eat and we want to breathe clean air and be confident that our planet will be left in acceptable – or even good – shape for our children, for their children and for many generations after them and to do this we need to better understand the role of agriculture in nourishing our world, while also focusing attention on cleaner air and a healthy climate.
When we talk about the GHG emissions of livestock or the carbon footprint of meat, methane is often at the heart of the matter. Ruminant animals such as cows emit methane. But methane doesn’t hang around for a century; it’s a short-lived GHG.
In about a decade’s time, it’s converted to water vapour and carbon dioxide, which is part of the cycle whereby plants take CO₂ out of the atmosphere and convert it into feed via photosynthesis.
Animals eat the non-human edible vegetation and upcycle it to meat and dairy products that provide efficient sources of protein and other essential nutrients to humans. It’s a cyclical process, also referred to as the biogenic carbon cycle, that’s been around as long as life itself.
It is a fact that there is a distinct possibility that life could come close to extinguishing itself, due to a shortage of CO₂, which is essential for life on Earth.
The IPCC in 2007 stated that:
“We should recognise that we are dealing with a coupled nonlinear chaotic system, and therefore that the long-term prediction of future climate states is not possible.”
CO₂ is the “Gas of Life” the most important building block for all life on Earth. All life is carbon-based, including our own. Surely the carbon cycle and its central role in the creation of life should be taught to our children rather than the demonization of CO₂, that “carbon” is a “pollutant” that threatens the continuation of life.
We know for a fact that CO₂ is essential for life and that it must be at a certain level in the atmosphere for the survival of plants, which are the primary food for all the other species alive today. Should we not celebrate CO₂ as the giver of life that it is?
It is a proven fact that plants, including trees and all our food crops, are capable of growing much faster at higher levels of CO₂ than present in the atmosphere today. Even at the today’s concentration of 400 ppm plants are relatively starved for nutrition.
The optimum level of CO₂ for plant growth is about 5 times higher, 2000 ppm, yet the alarmists warn it is already too high. They must be challenged every day by every person who knows the truth in this matter. CO₂ is the giver of life and we should celebrate CO₂ rather than denigrate it as is the fashion today.
We may be witnessing the “Greening of the Earth” as higher levels of CO₂, promote increased growth of plants around the world, which has been confirmed by scientists with CSIRO in Australia, in Germany, and in North America.
If CO₂ levels in the atmosphere were to fall to below a minimum of 150 ppm the survival of plants will be threatened and if plants die all the animals, insects, and other invertebrates that depend on the plants for their survival will also die.
How long will it be at the present level of CO₂ depletion until most or all of life on Earth is threatened with extinction by lack of CO₂ in the atmosphere?
Climate change activists say that food production is destroying the planet but in fact the food producers rely on the land to make a living and the vast majority use best practical options to ensure that they maintain or improve the land they use for their food production operations.
The food producers believe that land should be used for food production in a sustainable manner and that we get the food security that is required to ensure our populations survival.
In conclusion I believe that we need to remember that carbon dioxide is the gas of life, indeed the backbone of life on Earth rather than the devil that it is being portrayed as by many environmental commentators.
The biggest threat actually comes from the unhinged obsession of climate fanatics who are trying to force damaging policies onto the country that will have zero impact on the climate but will devastate the fundamentals of our economy.