New Zealand’s second emissions reduction plan

Overview

The second emissions reduction plan (ERP2) will outline the actions that we intend to take to reduce emissions in New Zealand during the second emissions budget period (2026 – 2030). The ERP2 is a key tool to bring the Government’s climate strategy to life. This consultation includes policy proposals that sit across the Government’s five priority areas of its climate strategy and focus on key sectors: energy, transport, agriculture, forestry and waste.   

The discussion document sets out how emissions pricing, and the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme in particular, will play a central role in our climate change response. Generally, the approach outlined in the discussion document is to support emissions pricing to drive net emissions reductions where it is most effective to do so. 

The document also outlines seven key policies which the Government believes will have the greatest impact on reducing emissions, alongside other actions in each sector:  

• Increasing renewable energy by reducing the consenting burden through Electrify NZ    
• Targeting 10,000 public EV chargers by 2030   
• Lowering agricultural emissions by giving farmers the tools to reduce emissions and through fair and sustainable pricing of on-farm agricultural emissions by 2030   
• Investing in resource recovery through the Waste Minimisation Fund   
• Improving organic waste and landfill gas capture  
• Improving public transport  
• Investigating carbon capture, utilisation and storage (CCUS).   

Read a short summary of the discussion document [PDF,  2.3 MB]

Read the full discussion document [PDF, 4.9 MB]

Read the technical annex [PDF, 2 MB]

Consultation submission template [DOC, 279 KB]

Correction note

The 'ENZ results used for Tech Annex' XLSX sheet was updated on 14 August: 

• The file (ENZ results used for the Tech Annex) uploaded to the website on 1 August 2024 did not include the incremental annual impact of differences between 2023 projections and the 2024 interim baseline for EB2 (2026-2030). The correct file was added to the website on 14 August 2024.

The discussion document was updated on 19 July to: 

• clarify the meaning of footnote 9 on page 16 that the potential abatement of options for further agricultural emissions reductions in table 0.2 are not included within the projected emissions reductions of policies included in table 0.1 
• correct a typographical error on page 59. 

The technical annex was updated on 19 July to: 

• correct table 10 by removing the reference to the effects of changes to the Clean Car Standard as these are included in table 11   
• correct agricultural mitigation assumptions for the baseline in appendix 1. 

Further information on modelling

• Economic Impact of New Zealand’s Second Emissions Reduction Plan [PDF, 5.2 MB]

Report to Ministry for the Environment by Principal Economics Limited in collaboration with the Centre for Policy Studies and Infometrics Limited" referred to in the Technical Annex. It is important to note that this report was prepared by independent external consultants, using data and assumptions as at a particular point in time and should not be considered government policy.

• ENZ results used for the Tech Annex [XLSX, 738 KB]

This workbook includes detailed ENZ results for the baseline, low and high sensitivity ranges and the incremental annual impact of differences between 2023 projections and the 2024 interim baseline for EB2 (2026-2030),

• Tech annex Fig 13 [XLSX, 72 KB]
• Tech annex Fig 6 [XLSX, 77 KB]

These files show the underlying numbers for selected graphs.

Consultation events

There were several events and hui held during the consultation period.

View the presentation slides [PDF, 3.6MB].

What happens next

This consultation closed on 25 August 2024.

We will analyse the submissions received to help inform final decisions on the second emissions reduction plan, which will be published by the end of 2024.

A summary of submissions will be published after the final plan is released.

If you have any further questions, please email ERPconsultation@mfe.govt.nz.