I was pleased with some of the feedback I got following last week’s editorial, though there was one comment I wasn’t quite expecting. It was in relation to this line:

The previous regime blindly shut down our ability to produce our own fuel; this one’s now trying to ensure we don’t run out for as long as possible if worse comes to worst … but then, what will the next do?

Though the reader acknowledged my use of the statement to illustrate my point, he took issue with my use of the word ‘blindly’, suggesting “a 21st-century government taking steps to reduce – or avoid escalating – fossil-fuel production was displaying admirable clarity of long-distance vision”. He also suggested that ‘we don’t run out for as long as possible’ was myopic when framed in the context of fossil fuels.

Now, we’ve discussed our points of view, and I’ll give it to him that ‘blindly’ might have been a bit strong. I do agree that – globally – we need to be far more aggressive in weaning ourselves off fossil fuels. However, real-world alternatives (in the context of heavy transport) are not yet readily available or a realistic proposition for many. More poignantly perhaps, a nation the size of ours surely needs to safeguard its vulnerabilities to some extent – be well prepared for disruptions.

With that in the background, it was his mention of long-distance vision that really got me thinking. It would be easy to argue that the new Fuel Security Plan is a long-term vision; it does support low-carbon alternatives, after all. But I know the context of the statement is far wider than that. The problem is, it appears to me that, globally, we’re behind the eight ball here.

In just the last month, for example, California has binned its Advanced Clean Fleets rule (which would have concurrently mandated and incentivised the adoption of zero-emission trucks). The ambition to install a diesel-fired peaker power plant at Marsden Point emerged. New Zealand’s Zero Carbon Act has been upended. The EU’s 2040 climate targets were watered down before being adopted. The government released its National Adaptation Framework in mid-October, which could be seen as merely treating the symptoms rather than the cause.

I could go on and on. Globally, there’s just so much change of mind, compromise, inconsistency, pandering, double speak, pigheadedness … all the things that inhibit real change. It’s overwhelming. In the last month, too, Dr Kevin Trenberth, an honorary academic at the faculty of science, University of Auckland, suggested ‘net-zero’ is now a pipe dream (a good read, by the way).

I’ve asked the question in relation to this debate before: what do we really want? I’ll expand that here with: Is it whatever the government of the day tells us it is? Is it a cleaner, healthier, more sustainable future? Is it convenience? Is it to do whatever we can each day to temper our impact on the planet? Is it to pretend we care for social points? Is it profit? Is it to just plod along without giving any of it much thought at all?

From my perspective, until the collective ‘we’ – governments and individuals – have looked inward and confronted those questions and the many others, there will be a lack of long-distance vision, and the whole climate debate may just be another perpetual argument that nobody wins.

Take care out there,

Gavin Myers
Editor