Introduction
Greenpeace of New Zealand Incorporated (Greenpeace) is an independent non-governmental organisation that works to protect the environment. A major focus for Greenpeace is working to prevent dangerous climate change.
Greenpeace supports the primary goal of this Amendment to the Crown Minerals Act (Act), being to put into legislation the Government’s decision of 12 April 2018 (Decision) not to award any new petroleum prospecting, exploration or mining permits for climate change reasons.
The Government has an obligation to protect its citizens from climate change. Legislating and end to the offer and award of new petroleum permits is an essential step towards protecting the people of New Zealand, as well as people globally, from catastrophic climate impacts.
The science on climate change is alarming. Governments have a very short window within which to take the action that will have a chance of averting dangerous climate change. On 8 October 2018, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the leading body of
scientific research on climate change established by the United Nations, released its summary of the latest climate science, which outlined the steps required to limit temperature rise to 1.5°C above pre industrial levels (IPCC Report). It found that we must halve global carbon dioxide emissions (CO2) caused by burning oil, gas and coal by 2030, and have net zero carbon emissions by 2050. That not only means that the expansion of fossil fuel industries must end immediately, but that we must also make significant and immediate changes to the way we power our societies so that we are cutting existing production and demand in half in the next ten
years.
Greenpeace has campaigned to stop the expansion of the oil and gas industry in offshore New Zealand now for eight years. During this time, tens of thousands of New Zealanders have joined this call, including iwi and hapū up and down the country, prominent climate scientists, and the biggest local councils in the country. New Zealanders have already made clear that they support
and end to oil and gas exploration outside of this submission process.
We would like to be heard by the Select Committee in support of this submission.