The Supreme Court has given the green light to allow a case brought against seven businesses responsible for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions to proceed to trial. The Supreme Court in Smith v Fonterra[1] reversed the Court of Appeal's 2021 decision to strike out the case, ...

Anderson Lloyd is pleased to be inducted into The Legal 500 Asia Pacific Green Guide 2024 Edition as a recommended firm, for a second year. The Legal 500 Green Guide is the first worldwide guide recognising the top law firms advising on issues around climate ...

The general election results are in, with National and Act currently holding a slim majority. The formation of the next government will depend on the outcome of the special votes. With how the votes currently look, we thought it timely to look into some of ...

Anderson Lloyd are pleased to have helped Sealord secure a long term deal with NZ Carbon Farming and Te Arawa Fisheries for the generation of carbon credits as part of Sealord's commitment to net zero carbon by 2050. With $10m invested into this 10-year programme, ...

Once again Anderson Lloyd proudly sponsored the 5th annual Carbon Forestry NZ Conference, held earlier this week in Rotorua. Dan Williams, Partner at Anderson Lloyd, chaired the opening conference session on International Markets and Domestic Developments. Over 300 industry professionals attended to hear from and workshop with ...

Following a recent review of the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme by the Climate Change Commission, the government is consulting on both its proposal to reform the ETS and re-design the permanent forestry category. In March 2023, the Climate Change Commission undertook a review of ...

The Climate Change Commission is seeking consultation on its draft advice to the Government on the strategic direction of New Zealand's second emissions reduction plan. Under the Climate Change Response Act 2002, the Climate Change Commission (Commission) is required to provide policy advice to the ...

The review will seek to consider how the ETS can shift the balance of emissions reductions incentivised by the ETS from predominantly net emissions reductions, to gross emissions reductions. Background Gross emissions reductions are the actual decrease in emissions occurring. In contrast, net emissions reductions ...

The Government has recently released a public discussion document relating to the governance framework of the Emission Trading Scheme. The Government has identified that the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme (NZ ETS) lacks a market governance framework that efficiently deals with several risks within the ...

With several important changes to the NZ ETS due to come into effect on 1 January 2023, the Government has sought to provide further clarification as to how these changes might operate in practice. As previously highlighted by Anderson Lloyd in our article Carbon Forests, ...

The Government has released their agricultural emissions proposal document for consultation to the public. The Government has for the most part accepted the proposal put forward by He Waka Eke Noa (Partnership) except on a few key points. This has seemingly struck a midway ground ...

The New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme is the key system used by the New Zealand Government to respond to climate change, while New Zealand Units are the primary currency of that system. What are NZUs? New Zealand Units (also known as NZUs or sometimes "carbon ...

The Climate Change Response (Zero Carbon) Amendment Act 2019 introduced a net zero greenhouse gas emissions reduction target by 2050. Achieving this will require significant changes to fuel use in New Zealand as fossil fuel is a major contributor to the nation's emissions. Bioenergy is ...

The Climate Change Commission has recommended changes to the way volume limits and prices are set in order to accelerate New Zealand's decarbonisation.   With New Zealand's proposed climate change policies and targets being set out in the recently released Emissions Reduction Plan (ERP), the Climate ...

New Zealand's first Emissions Reduction Plan outlines how New Zealand will achieve its target emissions reductions from now until the end of 2025.  Following consultation with the public after the release of the Emission Reduction Plan discussion document last October, the Government released the final ...

The Climate Change Commission has released their second piece of advice to Government on assessing how ready farmers and the agricultural sector is for an emissions pricing system. Advice on 'readiness' of sector The advice is tailored to address 'readiness' in the sense of asking ...

He Waka Eke Noa has recommended an alternative agricultural emissions pricing system that would sit outside the Emissions Trading Scheme. Background Under the Climate Change Response (Zero Carbon) Amendment Act 2019 the Government legislated emissions reduction targets of reducing methane to 10% below 2017 levels ...

The Government has recently released proposals to change some of the forestry settings in the Emissions Trading Scheme. The Ministry for Primary Industries (MPI) has identified that the current settings in the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) are driving increased levels of exotic afforestation, particularly due ...

Following on from the release of the Government's "Emissions Reduction Plan" discussion document in October, the He Waka Eke Noa partnership has now released its first discussion document outlining its proposals for an agriculture sector-specific emissions pricing scheme. In 2019, the Climate Change Response Act ...

New Zealand's first "Emissions Reduction Plan" is due to be released in May 2022. A discussion document released by the Ministry for the Environment in October provides insight as to how the plan may affect several key sectors.  On 31 May 2021 the Climate Change ...

With the dramatic increase in the price of NZUs over the last few years, a number of rural land owners are starting to think seriously about carbon forestry. Anderson Lloyd has advised a number of clients about the legal options and structures for implementing a ...

In early June 2021, the Climate Commission published its report to the Government on its first three emissions budgets and directions for emissions reduction plan 2022-2025. The purpose of this article is to summarise the Commission's recommendation in respect of the Agri Sector, but first, ...

Article published on Stuff website on Tuesday 7 September 2021 One of the country’s largest forestry plantation owners, Aratu Forests, has signed a 90-year agreement with eLandNZ to plant native trees on unusable land, creating permanent buffers alongside waterways. The partnership, brokered by law firm ...

After the third Emissions Trading Scheme auction saw the $50 price ceiling exceeded, the Government released additional credits into the market. We revisit how the auction process works and what happened at the latest auction on 1 September. Background Auctions were introduced as part of ...

Cabinet has approved the exposure draft of the proposed Natural and Built Environments Act (NBA). The NBA will provide for land use and environmental regulation and will be the primary piece of legislation to replace the Resource Management Act 1991 (RMA). The NBA, along with ...

The recent passing of the Climate Change Response (Emissions Trading Reform) Amendment Act makes a number of reforms to the ETS which are aimed at ensuring it is a more effective tool to help meet NZ's emission reduction targets. Key changes include the introduction of ...

On 22 June 2020, the Climate Change Response (Emissions Trading Reform) Amendment Bill received royal asset, introducing updates to the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) In pursuit of improving the ETS, the Climate Change Response (Emissions Trading Reform) Amendment Bill (Bill) has received royal asset, amending ...

An updated version of this article can be found here -    After undertaking reviews of the New Zealand Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) in 2015 – 2016, the Government has now acknowledged the current ETS is not being utilised to its full potential. In pursuit ...

The Zero Carbon Bill has been passed with bi-partisan support, while the Government has agreed to work with farmers to reduce emissions outside of the Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS). Zero Carbon Bill The Government passed the Zero Carbon Bill last week with near unanimous support. ...

The Government has released details of its proposals for lowering agricultural emissions and is now seeking your feedback. Reducing agricultural emissions is a key part of the Government’s plans to transition to a low-emission economy and achieve its 2050 targets in the Zero Carbon Bill. ...