Interview: Soft defences and managed retreat against climate change

Dr Judy Lawrence, Senior Research Fellow at Victoria University Wellington’s Climate Change Research Institute, says that greater central government direction is needed on climate change adaptation.

LoD: You’ve stated that the recent Nelson fires are a climate change warning for New Zealand. Are we likely to see more of the same, or can we expect worse?

JL: Parts of New Zealand are expected to get dryer especially in the east. With this comes enhanced risk of fire in rural areas and where people are close to those areas. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Assessment Report in 2014 categorised fire as a key risk for New Zealand.

LoD: You’ve called for leadership in the form of a National Adaptation Plan for climate change, based on a national risk assessment. Who would carry out this risk assessment, who would devise the plan, and who would you expect be responsible for its implementation?

Dr Judy Lawrence

JL: This was a recommendation of the Climate Change Adaptation Technical Working Group (CCATWG) in 2018 and has now been included in the Zero Carbon Bill currently before Parliament. The first Climate Change Risk Assessment is currently being undertaken and the Bill envisages that the proposed Climate Change Commission would prepare the National Adaptation Plan based on the National Risk Assessment and do the second National Risk Assessment and review the National Adaptation Plan as an independent agency much like in the UK.

The NAP would be done by the Government with reporting to the Climate Commission who would independently review and monitor its implementation. Local government and sectors would develop their own plans to complement the national adaptation plan.

LoD: Hard defences against rising sea levels and the relocating of new development away from areas prone to flooding are capital intensive endeavours. Is there a need for more focused management of funds for adaptation (and for crisis response), a climate change war chest so to speak?

JL: The New Zealand Coastal Policy Statement 2010 specifically takes a precautionary approach and discourages hard defences as an adaptation option while encouraging soft defences and managed retreat ahead of hard defences where practicable.

The National Policy Statement (NPS) mandated in the Resource Management Act 1991 (RMA) has direction powers for local government to implement its policies. The RMA also has provisions to reduce hazard risks like sea-level rise and also to have particular regard to the effects of climate change.

Those exercising functions under the RMA also must recognise and provide for the effects of significant natural hazards (this includes climate change impacts). All councils have the function of controlling the use of land for avoidance and mitigation of natural hazards.

Regarding a “war chest”. Yes, this issue has been raised in a paper prepared by Jonathan Boston and myself in 2017. Some risks are different from others. Some can be adapted to more readily through preparation and the residual by the emergency services and the Defence establishment (note the residual becomes greater as the frequency of events increases and sea levels rise while we do not plan to avoid the risks).

There is a case for a Climate Change Adaptation (CCA) Fund but it needs careful design to avoid moral hazard. We do want to see taxpayers money rewarding bad council or individual decisions on the one hand while cases of specific need are crowded out where decisions have been made that leave if we take preventative actions now, rather than leave the action till events become disruptive across society and the economy. individuals stranded due to no fault of their own. This means procedural justice in allocation of funds would be necessary.

LoD: Are Councils best placed to lead on climate change, or should Central Government by seeking to effect legislative change to take some of the climate change-related decision making away from local government?

JL: There is a strong case for the implementation of all the CCATWG recommendations. They are a complementary package that would strengthen the support for local government to make decisions about land use planning. However, local government comes under great pressure from local interests and ratepayers around developments at the coast and in floodplains, making it difficult for contested issues like this to be implemented especially if it results in an increase in rates or displaces other regional or local competing expenditure.

This situation suggests that greater central government direction is required as to the priority of adapting to the impacts of climate change. However, councils and central government don’t have controls over all private sector and individual decisions and interests. This means that it could only seek legislative influence over some private decisions.

There is evidence that councils plans are not being updated fast enough to keep up with their responsibilities for climate change impacts in their regions and districts. Greater regional direction from regional councils using their existing mandates would also strengthen land use decisions by district councils.

LoD: Is the average New Zealander concerned about the potential impacts of climate change, or is it still largely ‘out of mind’?

JL: There is a perception generally that climate change is a distant threat but increasingly as climate change events are occurring more frequently and temperatures are rising, that the signals are raising concerns in areas affected. There is a greater attention to emissions reduction and awareness about greenhouse gas emissions than there is about climate change related hazard events. We can control the latter

LoD: How susceptible is New Zealand to the impacts of climate change relative to other countries?

JL: New Zealand is exposed to many of the impacts of climate change as the IPCC Fifth assessment highlighted. But it is a matter of scale compared with our ability to address the impacts that is important. Some countries have much greater populations exposed to risk e.g. Bangladesh and India but if one compares risk to GDP, New Zealand has risks related to most of its population living close to the sea and thus exposed to sea level rise, which is ongoing and won’t stop immediately on greenhouse gas reductions. Impacts to our major productive sectors, our biodiversity and health will also have flow on effects across the counry.

The impacts are likely to be many times greater than the initial assessments by the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment 2015 report Rising Seas (work done by NIWA) and the recent assessment by Local Government NZ for local government infrastructure. Both of these are incomplete and further work, some recently released by NIWA on sea level rise and flooding exposure, is currently underway to fill the gaps.

LoD: Is climate change a national security issue?

JL: Any disruption that has widespread impacts frequently affecting our communications infrastructure and civilians must be considered a security risk. Climate change impacts on New Zealand must be considered in that light.

The New Zealand Defence Force has, I understand, done an assessment of the risks. The Sixth Assessment Report of the IPCC for New Zealand will be completed by October 2021, and this will update the key risks to New Zealand which assesses new knowledge since the Fifth assessment (2014) and theRoyal Society of New Zealand report on the local impacts of climate change in 2016.