I keep seeing people from the UK & USA (even journalists) criticising NZ’s economy and freedom - so I’ve created this based on data from http://tradingeconomics.com and http://worldpopulationreview.com
From the NZ cartoonist Chris Slane
The cartoon is set in New Zealand, hence the RBNZ (=Reserve Bank of New Zealand fan) but it's applicable to lots of other countries too.
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| Snowfall in New Zealand was well below average in 2021, meteorologists said. Photograph: Lee Brown/University of Leeds/PA |
From The Guardian
[Just a reminder: in the Southern Hemisphere, winter occurs in June, July and August]
New Zealand has recorded its warmest ever winter, and scientists say that climate change is driving temperatures ever higher.
For the three months through to the end of August 2021, the average temperature was 9.8C, according to New Zealand’s National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research.
The figure was 1.3C above the long-term average and 0.2C higher than the previous record posted in 2020. Scientists have been keeping records since 1909, but most of the warmest winters have been recent.
Nava Fedaeff, a meteorologist at the institute, said that on top of a background of global warming, this year there were more warm winds than usual from the north and warmer sea temperatures.
She said the underlying warming trend could be tracked through carbon dioxide concentration, which had increased in New Zealand from 320 parts per million 50 years ago to about 412 parts per million today.
Fedaeff said snowfall at lower elevations was well below average this winter as it was often replaced with rain, which could make for lower river levels later in the year because there would be less snowmelt. That could impact irrigation for farms, she said.
There were also more extreme weather events, Fedaeff said, including severe flooding in some places and dry spells in others.
Prof James Renwick, a climate scientist at the Victoria University of Wellington, said that in the short term at least, some New Zealand farmers with cow or sheep herds might benefit from a longer grass-growing season.
But he said the changes were also putting pressure on natural ecosystems and that over time more species would face extinction. It was imperative for humans to slow the rate of greenhouse gas emissions, he said.
“If we don’t get on top of warming soon, there is going to be grief for large sections of the world.”
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| View of Auckland skyline from Waiheke Island as the sun sets. New Zealand has recorded its hottest June since records began 110 years ago. Photograph: Kerry Kissane/Getty Images |
From The Guardian
New Zealand has experienced its hottest June since records began more than 110 years ago, according to official climate data. [Reminder: June is winter in the southern hemisphere]
Despite a polar blast that swept up the country last week, figures from the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research’s (NIWA) show the average temperature for June was 2C warmer than usual, with twenty-four locations around the country hitting their own record highs.
That makes this June New Zealand’s warmest since NIWA’s seven station temperature series began in 1909.
The warmth was widespread, with every long-term monitoring station observing either above or well-above average mean temperatures. It was particularly warm in Motueka, near the top of the South Island, where the mean temperature of 10.8C was 3.2C higher than the town’s 1981-2010 average.
Of the six main centres, Auckland was the warmest and sunniest, Tauranga was the wettest, Christchurch was the coldest and driest, and Dunedin was the least sunny.
The highest temperature recorded was in Hastings, in the Hawke’s Bay, and Leigh, north of Auckland, both reaching 22C on different days of the month.
The 2C average increase is “a massive shift” relative to normal, climate scientist Gregor Macara said, adding that the previous June record was an average 1.64C higher than usual.
NIWA puts the increase in temperatures down to above-normal sea level air pressure to the east of the country, and climate change.
“North-easterlies are dragging air masses from the sub-tropics, so they are relatively warm. The fact we were having more north-easterlies than normal delivered warmer air over the country than we would typically see in June.”
Sea surface temperatures were also warmer than normal and could be a contributing factor.
“Because we are an island nation, our climate is characterised as maritime, which means it is influenced by the sea. The warmer-than-normal sea surfaces helped to sustain the warmer-than-normal air temperatures,” Macara said.
Underpinning all of this was climate change, he said.
In the past 100 years, New Zealand’s temperature has increased by 1C, which is contributing to the overall warmer temperatures, Macara said.
If warmer winter months persist in the years to come, that could spell trouble for the country’s ski-fields and agricultural sector.
“It will pose increasing challenges on the ski-industry because it will be more marginal to operate earlier in the season with the lack of snowfall, or with temperatures that are too warm to enable artificial snow to be made.”
Earlier in June, two of the country’s most popular skiing destinations – Queenstown’s Coronet Peak and Wanaka’s Cardrona Alpine Ski Resort – had to delay their openings due to the warm weather and lack of snowfall.
Agricultural industries that rely on frosts would also suffer, he said, but added the warmer weather could provide opportunities for re-orienting the sector towards crops that do well in warmer climates.
NIWA forecasters predict a continuation of warm weather throughout the remaining winter months.
From The Guardian
The New Zealand government is introducing subsidies to make electric vehicles thousands of dollars cheaper and new petrol and diesel cars [ICEVs] more expensive, as the country tries [to] transition to an emissions-free fleet.
The changes follow New Zealand’s Climate Commission recommendations which laid out sweeping changes required to get the country closer to its emissions targets.
The subsidies for electric and some hybrid vehicles would be up to NZ$8,625 [US$6150] for new vehicles and NZ$3,450 [US$2460] for used [imported] cars. They will start next month.
Transport now makes up almost 33% of long-lived greenhouse gas emissions in Aotearoa, and last week, the Climate Commission laid out new benchmarks for the country to transform the makeup of its fleet. The commission’s recommended plan included banning imports of petrol and diesel cars by 2032, and that road transport be almost completely decarbonised by 2050. To meet its goal for transport emissions, the commission concluded electric vehicles would need to make up half of all light vehicle registrations by 2029, and 100% by 2035.
“Our transport emissions are the fastest growing source of greenhouse gas emissions in New Zealand, so we need to start taking action now if we are going to meet our 2050 targets,” transport minister Michael Wood said in a written statement.
“New Zealand is actually lagging behind on the uptake of EVs, so we are playing catch up internationally,” he said. He said the policy would prevent up to an estimated 9.2m tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions.
The subsidies would be funded by introducing new charges on imports of high-emission utility vehicles and SUVs. For example, an imported Toyota Hilux – one of New Zealand’s more popular utes – could incur a fee of NZ$2,900. Those fees would kick in at the start of January 2022.
New Zealand is one of the world’s worst performers on emission increases, and hitting its climate goals will require a reversal of its current trajectory. The country’s emissions rose by 57% between 1990 and 2018 – the second greatest increase of all industrialised countries. Earlier this year, data showed that New Zealand’s emissions had increased by 2% in 2018-19.
To be fair, NZ's CO2 emissions per capita were 7.7 tonnes in 2018, lower than China's (8 tonnes), Canada and the USA (16.1 tonnes) and Australia (16.8 tonnes), because 82% of electricity comes from renewable sources The good news is that despite having relatively low emissions for a developed country, it's still trying to reduce them further.
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| Source: Wikipedia (Cameron Paisley) |
From The Guardian
Twice a year, glaciologist Lauren Vargo and her colleagues set up camp beside two small lakes close to New Zealand’s Brewster glacier. Each time the trek to carry the measuring stakes takes a little bit longer as the glacier’s terminus gets further away.
Dr Vargo, a native of Ohio now working at the Antarctic Research Centre at the Victoria University of Wellington, is studying New Zealand’s glaciers from the air and on the ice.
New research just published in the journal Nature Climate Change has found that extreme melting of the country’s glaciers in 2018 was at least ten times more likely to have happened because of human-caused global heating.
Loss of ice across New Zealand’s glaciers in 2011, which was another extreme melt year, was six times more likely because of the planet’s warming, the study found, caused by an accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere mostly from burning fossil fuels.
Vargo, the lead author of the study, told the Guardian: “As scientists we know that theoretically warm temperatures should melt ice, but the goal of the research was to formally show that link between melting and climate change.”
The study looked at changes to 10 of New Zealand’s glaciers and was sparked by what Vargo and colleagues witnessed on monitoring flights in 2018.
“In previous years there was always snow on the glaciers but, in 2018, about half of them had no snow on them at all,” Vargo said.
The annual monitoring flights over 50 glaciers have been taking place in New Zealand since 1977 and record the position of the snowline and the thickness and flow of the ice.
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| Mt Cook, NZ South Island |
