Five things Judith Collins has said on climate change
ANALYSIS: As Judith Collins takes the helm of the National Party, Stuff revisits some of her recent comments on climate science and policy. While former leader Todd Muller negotiated on National's behalf to pass the Zero Carbon Act , Collins was reportedly set to cross the floor to vote against the Bill ( though she didn't ). On the School Strike 4 Climate NZ protests: They are very earnest and very truthful in what they believe. I don't know what they're going to do in 12 years' time when the world has not actually led to a mass extinction of humans. I'm sure that they will have found something else... Another generation will come. Every generation has its thing. CONTEXT: Collins was speaking to the AM Show on the morning of the September 2019 climate march. Its unclear who Collins is referring to when she speaks of the belief humans would be dying in vast numbers by 2031. But the comment appears to be confusing or conflating several scientific findings: that the world had 12 years to reduce emissions before it becomes impossible (or at least really challenging) to meet the Paris Agreement goals; that catastrophic climate change increases the risk that plants and animals will go extinct in the coming decades; and that global warming will make life increasingly uncomfortable for human societies, as health-threatening heatwaves , famines and infectious disease outbreaks arrive more frequently as the century progresses. READ MORE: * Judith Collins, the new leader of National Party, promises to 'crush' the Government * Will the rangatahi save us? Generation Z: Unapologetic. Uncompromising * Zero Carbon Bill passes with near-unanimous support, setting climate change targets into law On the 1.5 degrees Celsius Paris Agreement target: The world will not end if we pass 1.5 degrees Celsius (1.5C) of warming. The children marching in the street with signs saying You will die of old age, I will die of climate change have been needlessly exploited by an increasingly fanatical Green lobby... Scientists expect the impacts of 1.5C warming to be lower than 2C. But the same statement is true for the difference between 2.0C and 2.5C... The costs of global warming are real, but there is no indication they are insurmountable. And there is nothing magically different that happens at 1.5C that doesnt happen at 1.6C. Assuming the IPCC models reflect the relationship between carbon dioxide and global warming, there is almost no chance the world will avoid 1.5C. CONTEXT: A few weeks after the September school strike, Collins outlined her thoughts about climate change more fully on Facebook , prompting accusations that National had its own climate crisis . Although its true that the world wont end after 1.5C of warming and that the challenges rise as the mercury does, its wrong to imply that temperature thresholds dont mean anything. Some aspects of the climate system have tipping points , beyond which researchers believe the effects of heating get dramatically worse. As an example, an award-winning team of Kiwi scientists concluded, if we dont limit global warming to 1.5C, the melting of Antarctic ice and the inundation of coastal cities may be supercharged. Worldwide, hundreds of peer-reviewed studies helped the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reach the conclusion that a 2C warmer world will be a much more unpleasant and costly place to live in than a 1.5C one. Its also misleading to suggest society can easily absorb the estimated $20 trillion cost of exceeding our 1.5C target by half a degree. Collins questioning of the link between carbon dioxide and global warming veers into climate denial territory. The link was first established 150 years ago . Studies show climate models have been remarkably accurate over recent decades though theyre not perfect, and scientists are working to improve them all the time. On Covid-19s impact on climate action: As a nation we will be changed... We will wonder why the government that talked so much about housing development decided to add climate change into RMA decisions by local councils and we will wonder how that could happen without adequate public consultation. We will be ready to embrace infrastructure on a scale not seen since the Think Big days. And when anyone mentions Greta, we will ask: Who? CONTEXT: Collins wrote this op-ed for the Sunday Star-Times, 11 days after the country went into lockdown. She mentions the Resource Management Act amendment bill, which allows resource consents for emissions-intensive projects (such as coal mines) to be refused. Hundreds of submissions were received during public consultation last year. Collins also refers to Greta Thunberg, the 17-year-old activist who sparked the global School Strike For Climate movement, which moved online after the pandemic outbreak. On New Zealand's emissions: [The country] contributes around 0.03 per cent of the world's carbon emissions. So instead of flagellating ourselves and you know, putting a hair shirt on we should be saying: Who are these big emitters? I'd rather have New Zealand producing milk and dairy products and meat and wool than countries that don't take any notice at all... I just think that the Greens and Labour and New Zealand First have been happy to go and throw New Zealand farmers under a bus. CONTEXT: Collins, speaking to radio show The Country last year, had her figures wrong. The countrys actual contribution 0.17 per cent of global emissions in 2014 is more than five times larger than the stat given. New Zealanders per-person emissions are some of the highest in the world , though our emissions profile is unusual methane contributes comparatively more to our footprint. Our household emissions also continue to rise . A few months after this interview, the coalition Government announced a partnership with farmers to measure and price on-farm emissions. The He Waka Eke Noa programme has been making steady progress . On the Zero Carbon Bill: What we need to do is to amend this [Zero Carbon] Bill once it becomes an Act and once we're in Government... We will be changing these: the target for biogenic methane reduction to be recommended by the independent Climate Change Commission. Otherwise, why bother having it? We will have stronger provisions that consider the level of action being taken by other countries and allow targets to be adjusted to ensure we remain in step with the international community. The bill that we will be putting through will ensure that the commission considers the economic impacts when providing advice on targets and emissions reductions. The bill will also see the emissions budgets being split between biogenic methane and carbon dioxide, as recommended by the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment. And the bill will also include a greater commitment to investment and innovation and research and development to find solutions for reducing emissions. CONTEXT: During the third reading of the Bill in 2019, Collins outlined her concerns and changes the National Party would make, should it be elected this year. The Zero Carbon Act contains split targets, requiring the country to cut biogenic methane by 10 per cent by 2030 and between 24 and 47 per cent by 2050. All other greenhouses gases must be net zero by 2050. Both targets were set by the Government, but Climate Change Minister James Shaw has since asked the Climate Change Commission for advice on the methane target. To get us there, the legislation requires a series of emissions budgets to be set, the first by Government , with all future budgets set by the independent Climate Change Commission . Economic analysis of the impacts of different ways of cutting emissions and the pace of emissions cuts is part of the commissions job description.