Resuming oil and gas exploration ‘a referendum on climate change policy’

Monday, 7 October 2024

The Crown Minerals Amendment Bill would lift the ban on new oil and gas exploration permits that currently exists outside of onshore Taranaki.

The decision whether to remove the ban on new offshore oil and gas exploration is “essentially a referendum on New Zealand's approach to climate change policy”, the chief adviser to the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment has told MPs.

Parliament’s Economic Development, Science and Innovation select committee met on Monday for its second and final day hearing submissions on the Crown Minerals Amendment Bill that would lift the ban.

Addressing the committee in place of commissioner Simon Upton, who is in Paris, Matt Paterson said the Government’s decision to lift the exploration ban was a choice to put “the economic benefits of resource extraction ahead of environmental impacts”.

Resources Minister Shane Jones confronted climate protesters in Wellington, sparking a fiery exchange over the Government's reversal of the oil and gas ban. Protesters called Jones a 'climate denier,' while he accused them of being 'extreme.'

Clauses in the Crown Minerals Amendment Bill that would loosen the financial obligations on drillers to clean-up oil and gas wells at the end of their life could result in costs in the order of hundreds of millions dollars falling on taxpayers, he said.

The day’s hearings opened with a claim from one of the most vocal proponents of resuming offshore oil and gas exploration that climate change was “not an existential threat” and that New Zealand would be largely insulated from its worst effects.

Wellington barrister Sean Rush, who has specialised in advising the oil and gas sector, said the country could become the “Norway of the South Pacific”.

Brushing off suggestions from MPs that the gas might not be out there, Rush said the country was “under-explored”.

“It's a bit like fishing. If you don't have your fishing hook in the river, you'll never catch a fish.”

A previous interaction between Rush and Resources Minister Shane Jones at a seminar hosted by Energy Resources Aotearoa in February prompted Jones to declare he himself was “New Zealand’s number one doubting Thomas” on “climate religion”.

The vast majority of the dozens of organisations and individuals who have made submissions to the committee have been vehemently opposed to lifting the offshore exploration ban, however.

Emotions ran high on the first day of submissions on Friday with visibly upset Generation Zero spokesperson, Carley Dove-Mcsalls emphasising the powerlessness and anxiety young people were feeling at seeing climate change initiatives rolled back.

Cynicism from submitters about the hearings from critics of the bill peaked on Monday.

Select committee chairperson Parmjeet Parmar took the rare step of cutting off a submitter after warning her to be ‘respectful’.

Christine Rose, founder of Māui and Hector’s Dolphin Defenders, was cut off by committee chair Parmjeet Parmar when she wrapped up her submission by asking MPs “not to “f… the planet”.

Rose earlier told the committee she had been undecided whether to attend “because it seems so futile”, and was rebuked by Parmar for disrespecting the committee after calling the Government coalition partners “three deaf, dumb and blind monkeys”.

“Usually I’d go through the formalities of trying to influence the select committee with respectful and reasoned arguments, using evidence, science and facts,” Rose said.

“But … this government has no interest, or maybe no capacity, for reasoned or science-based arguments,” Rose said.

World Wide Fund for Nature NZ chief executive Kayla Kingdon-Bebb described Rush’s assessment of the low threat posed by climate change as “unbelievable”.

“It is 2024, and yet here we are debating a policy that outright ignores the global scientific consensus on fossil-fuel use,” she said.

Speaking in favour of the lifting the exploration ban, John Carnegie, chief executive of Energy Resources Aotearoa, whose members comprise businesses with an interest in the oil and gas sector, said the journey to a low carbon economy “is upon us, but it will take time”.

“We fully expect the role of natural gas in New Zealand's energy mix to diminish, but it will remain an essential fuel in shoring-up our energy security.

“No-one wants to see blackouts or more factory closures. And we also all want to achieve our climate goals,” he said.

Reforms included in the legislation that are designed to shift some of the financial risk of decommissioning oil and gas wells away from their past operators and potentially on to the taxpayer did not go far enough, Carnegie said.

The debacle that is expected to result in taxpayers picking up a bill of about $443 million for the decommissioning of the Tui oil well was a one-off and “not evidence of a systemic problem”, he said.

Thomas Blakie, a Unicef alumni ‘young ambassador’, told the committee that “despite all the submissions made on the bill, young people have not been welcome to engage in this room with decision-makers like yourself on our future”.

“We care deeply about our collective future. We want to have a say on designing our future,” he said.

“Experts on the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the International Energy Agency and global research institutions are firm that we need to stop developing new oil and gas fields so that we might have a liveable planet for every child,” he said.