I am curious if any of y'all here think Aotearoa buying bitumen from overseas is a step forward, a good idea?
Just been looking at an article about Marsden Point and found NZ First have gotten an investigation into reopening the refinery. Resilience has been cited.
Refinery closes, badda bing badda boom, Cyclone Gabriel hits.
From a NZ First petition- "“The devastation brought on by Cyclone Gabriella is immense. New Zealand is now in desperate need of bitumen for the lengthy and expensive roading rebuild – a quality product which Marsden Point was once producing for us locally until it was shut down."
Now, I get that Peters and Jones aren't everyone's cup of tea. This is part of NZF policy that is supportable.
Neo-liberalism failure yet again, unless it is working exactly as it should…
Sourcing bitumen from a wider market should allow us to get a product that is more suitable to our needs. Marsden Pt was very limited in what crude it could process, and the properties of the crud that comes out the bottom (bitumen) is governed to a large extent by the crude that goes in. It can be modified to an extent with additives, but you'd get a much better product if you started with something more suitable. Not an issue in some applications, but in some parts of NZ roading concerns struggled to build adequate roads with Marsden Pt bitumen.
Outcome will depend on whether NZTA sources on performance or price.
There's nothing resilient about a policy that is centred in everyone that can afford it having a car or two. Is NZF's resiliency a climate denying adaptation position? Resiliency washing.
Resiliency would look like this:
baseline relocalisation of as many systems as we can especially food production and work.
rebuild neighbourhoods so many things are within walking/biking/PT distance
make those neighbourhoods desirable
use sustainability design eg each element serves multiple functions (this is how you build resiliency into systems) eg relocalising food production reduces GHGs, provides jobs, fresher and healthier food, less miles
The things I have named reduce miles. Less mills travelled = less road maintenance = less bitumen used.
I'm guessing that that is against NZF policy, which would see expansion of the bitumen sector as a good thing.
You can also say that persevering with Marsden Pt was just as daft.
We would have then been locked in to using the capacity of the refinery for the rest of it's life, and with completely wrong market signals once consumption dropped below refinery capacity, and the owners had to dump excess fuel into the market at reduced prices.
Without having to keep the Marsden Pt refinery operating we can source fuel to match a reducing demand.
I suspect your position is predicated on the idea that we will always have access to overseas supplies. What if there is a GCF or war or other event that means we don't?
There is absolutely no doubt we will transition to renewables.
Either with a planned and staged transition, or, one forced by decreasing resources and and steadily more unliveable climate. Accompanied by wars and sociatal breakdown. Given the preponderance of anto-social AGW denialist nutters, like NZ, gaining power worldwide at present, the second is more likely
Unfortunately increases in energy efficiency are negated by rising population. And with vehicles, by increases in vehicle size. The total proportion of renewables has remained stubbornly about 10% since 1990. Mostly due to inertia and lack of investment by successive Governments.
one forced by decreasing resources and and steadily more unliveable climate. Accompanied by wars and sociatal breakdown
that's definitely a transition, but it's not what most people mean when they say transition to renewables. If there are resource wars, GFC, societal breakdown, where will NZ be getting all its lithium from?
I don't think anyone has answered the question of what NZ would do if we lost our import supply of crude oil and we have no refinery. That's a transition too I guess
If we lose our import supply of oil then having a refinery is irrelevant.
Whether we import oil to refine here, or import refined products, it is still subject to the same supply constraints.
BTW. Renewables are not dependant on lithium. It currently makes batteries more efficient, but you can have renewable, and even rather good batteries/ power supplies without it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_redox_flow_battery
If we lose our import supply of oil then having a refinery is irrelevant.
How is it irrelevant?
Whether we import oil to refine here, or import refined products, it is still subject to the same supply constraints.
Of course, but the scenario is where we can't import crude or refined, but have domestic crude and a refinery or not. I don't know why this is so hard to address.
The refinery was originally an attempt at import substitution. Keeping the expense of refining off our balance of trade. Which made sense 50 years ago. Until it was sold in the “great fire sale” in the 90’s which meant the oil companies who bought it, not NZ, benefited from the subsequent earnings.
Now. What makes sense is still import substitution. But with renewables which don't require billions per year paid to offshore oil producers.
we’re really talking at cross purposes here. Your argument is based on us not tipping into collapse, and in that sense it makes sense.
My question, which in fact still hasn’t been answered, is what happens if there is no more overseas source of crude or refined and all we have is our own crude? If you say ‘but we don’t have enough oil locally to meet demand!’, well of course, just like we won’t have enough import if the global system collapses.
The point of keeping a refinery on shore isn’t to avoid or delay transition to renewables, it’s to hold one thread of resilience. Might not be a good thread to hold, but that argument hasn’t been made yet because you, Graeme and Ad are all arguing within the context of current economics, not early collapse scenarios. Which is why I keep the repeated the question.
NZ might get really lucky and we get a L/G/TPM government in 2026, and we get serious about transition. But it will have to include degrowth and powerdown soon because there is no way to transition fully to renewables any more. That window has passed.
We will always have access to crude oil so far as I can tell.
(I have a lot of big-state leftie sympathy for your view of Marsden Point).
Even if our access to the refineries of Singapore, South Korea and Japan were shut down (say in the case of China invading Taiwan), we would still get it from Australia's refineries. It is Gull, BP and CALTEX that provide those sources already.
International access doesn't seem to be forcing fuel substitution locally. For example despite massive growth in electricity production here over the last decade, Huntly's owner Genesis was quite happy to switch to brown Indonesian coal while our super-high-grade coking coal went to the Chinese and Thai steel mills.
That's the BAU argument. Meanwhile, climate scientists and communicators, journalists, and transitioners are all pointing to collapse of civilisation if we don't drop GHGs fast. There's some chance that we will change voluntarily, but it's looking more likely that we will be forced into hard change. So yes, losing access to global supplies of crude oil is a scenario we should be considering, at least in our thinking.
With that crude we were able to make diesel, jet fuel, petrol and fuel oil for ships.
Also much needed bitumen for repairs.
No matter which way you look at it we are now less resilient, and more reliant on the whims of the market and beholden to shareholders of shipping companies.
The oil shocks showed that it was immeterial whether we imported oil in refined or crude form. The local production is exported to where ever the oil companies can make the most money for it.
If there are shortages in markets that can pay more, what do you think is going to happen?
If there are shortages in markets that can pay more, what do you think is going to happen?
the NZ economy collapses and we do a hard and fast transition to an agrarian economy large based on internal production?
What you and Graeme and Ad are arguing is economics. At some point in a collapse we have a choice between protecting the economy or protecting our ability to function as a nation state. What you are all saying is true, but what gsays and I are saying is true too. We're just talking about different stages of an unknown process.
"…a choice between protecting the current BAU neoliberal economy or protecting our ability to function as a nation state…"
The economic system we use now isn't the only one, and it's certainly not prepared or useful for what is coming down the line with the polycrisis of climate/ecological collapse, resources depletion and war, social unrest.
But further, if the global economic system collapses, what do you think will happen to the NZ one? We won't have a choice about keeping teh current economic system, but we have choices now about transition, and future proofing (to the extent we can).
The collapse of the global sytem will inivitably collapse NZ.
We have already seen how that works, in several worldwide depressions. We don't have the capacity to transition to an internal economy. Successive Governments of all stripes have demolished local capacity in favour of exporting milk powder. Muldoon was, in fact, the last Government to try and build future resiliance.
Even if we can feed ourselves, do you think neighbours with their huge populations and military, are going to let us be? How do you deal with millions of refugees from countries that no longer support life?
The best thing for resiliance, as far as energy goes, is to separate ourselves from the global system of oil supply and rely on sustainable local sources.
It still needs a large degree of hope, that in the inevitable catastrophic failure of global climate, New Zealanders will be allowed to use our own resources. Resources that NACT will have already sold.
"If there are shortages in markets that can pay more, what do you think is going to happen?"
This is the problem with Aotearoa being a global market participant. Our viability as a society is at the whims of 'the market' and companies that have balance sheets that are way bigger than this nation's.
That is why we must pivot away from this Chicago School way of doing things.
We do not have the oil reserves to support our consumption – as Joe90 says we rely on imported crude. Reopening Marsden Point is not going to change that.
the world cannot afford our consumption, we are one of the countries well into overshoot. That's the not the issue, because we have to drop consumption anyway. The issue is what would happen if we lose access to imported crude. Can we mine our own crude but no longer have a way of refining it?
All these debates (including I would guess NZF), revolve around the idea that civilisation is going to continue BAU. It's not.
Apples aren't mined, they're harvested. In a woodland-style orchard-garden, apple trees need no inputs other than what settles upon them from the sky, across their whole lifecycle. Apple fruits are given generously and nothing is asked in return. The crop grows greater and greater every year. Sunlight, air, water, and a live medium to grow in, all free, is all that's required for this resource.
Pears and plums also, feijoa, fig, peach, apricot, quince, loquat, grape, mulberry, sweet chestnut, hazel, walnut; this is just the first few of a very long list 🙂
Education about food stories is important in changing attitudes.
Many of us still have memories of or access to sweet smelling fresh fruit. Food kms matter.
People once had your attitude to the car and walked in front of it at 5 miles an hour with a flag calling "car coming" so it did not scare the work horses.
Now we have to face that the age of the car needs a rethink, as it is a resource greedy thing which pollutes.
Local foods and 15 minute cities are on the planning board, pity our cities have such dinosaurs as mayors.
the apple as a thing on a supermarket shelf won't be a thing for very much longer in human terms if we don't transition.
eg frosts taking out the flowers/buds, extreme heat causing apple drop or making it impossible for workers to be in the orchard, high winds or floods damaging trees and apples, changes in insect populations.
Meanwhile, the regen farmers are ahead of the game in terms of adapting to variation in weather and climate.
Don't need value added to apple varieties that are grown for nutrition and health. The value is in what we eat, and how the land is tended where it grows.
No, not economic, but around having the flexibility to reduce petroleum use seamlessly to as low as possible.
Maintaining Marsden Pt would mean we are locked into usage at the refinery's minimum capacity, then a sudden step to imports or zero. I see it better to make that adjustment as quickly as we can. Also the same situation is playing out in Australia and around the world where refinery capacity is being rationalised to fewer, larger refineries.
The import risks would be similar for refined product or crude. But with both options we have a very sudden adjustment to make if there's any disruption.
The government should nationalize these fossil fuel resources as soon as possible. When the time comes they will then be able to shut them down, where as leaving them in private sector hands is provoking a legal battle getting in the way of dis-establishing these industries.
Keeping a too small, inefficient, long past it's use by date, refinery, running, is Daft!
Nothing to do with resiliance as the oil, whether refined or not, is imported anyway.
We should be transitioning to sustainable energy produced locally, not continuing to spend on oil imports with all the negatives of the fortune we spend propping up the oil industry, on our balance of trade.
Net spending on oil is greater than our net dairy earnings. Replacing that with wind, hydro and solar will be a huge boost to our current account.
Not to mention avoiding all the military spend on supporting US wars, over oil.
Lastly, spending billions to keep oil infrastructure assets going which should be redundant in future, instead of spending on renewables goes against the AGW adaptation we need, which has had the can kicked down the road for too long already.
A fact not mentioned clearly in the concern of government about welfare of late, the 2022 drum beat about the need for opening the border to migrant workers in 2022 – because they were not available locally. The reluctance of employers to hire older workers.
In 2022 the former Government
launched an older workers employment action plan focussing on access to training and up-skilling for people aged 50 and over to ensure they can find jobs or stay in work.
With 40% of long term jobseeker support recipients aged 50 to 64, the need is clearly there, and the plan aims to improve employment services so this age group feels more comfortable using them.
"The only problem for the three fledgling unions, all with strong ties to the anti-vax movement, is that there’s no Rachel Mangan, Ken Lawson or Howard Granger on the publicly-accessible registers of teachers, nurses and doctors in New Zealand.
In fact, not one of the names listed on the “testimonials” page of the three unions’ websites shows up on those registers."
Yes, that is how it goes. If the victim is trans – it is a national emergency – declared a "hate crime", vigils are held, new laws are demanded.
If the perpetrator is trans – don't mention it. Well, on para 22 if you must. But you have to make sure that the first words (and the headline) are "woman" and "her".
I have been out on the road/amongst the (true) precariat for about six years now..
And one observation I would make is how fucked up so many gen xers seem to be…
And it is largely down to alcohol..and 'p'..
And it is p I am addressing here..
And definitions: p is meth/speed..the most garbage/damaging of drugs..
( And while we are at it..'crack' here is not 'crack'..crack is cocaine put thru another chemical process…I have had habits on both of them…largely in other parts of the planet…)
And I would like to present what I think is a viable option to help p-heads kick that crap..and to move them onto something much easier to kick..
I think the treatment authorities should use prescribed cocaine much the same way they used methadone to help heroin addicts quit…
For those people really wanting to quit..allow them to use cocaine to help them get thru the speed-withdrawals..(which can be really fucked ugly..if the literature on the matter is to be believed..)
And I recommend using cocaine for this purpose largely from my own experiences .
In that having been addicted to alcohol/heroin/ciggies/coke/crack..I have come up with my own withdrawal ranking list..
I have heroin at 8.5.out of ten in difficulty…alcohol and ciggies at 4/10..
And cocaine.?..cocaine struggles to reach 1/10 ..
After using reasonably heroic amounts of the stuff…for a rather long time…(I used to mix it with my heroin..and ..after kicking that..still used coke)
Anyway..I decided to kick it..and that was that..I just stopped..
A couple of mildly restless nites sleep..and that was it..
Compared to anything else cocaine is so easy to kick/stop using..
This is why I would recommend cocaine be available to be prescribed to p-addicts..to get them thru the hell of meth-withdrawals..as a stepping-stone..
Sounds like that approach could be worth a try. The authorities could test its effectiveness, maybe?
I just hope NZ doesn't follow the USA and Canada and get a wave of fentanyl, which is impossible to get off once you start on it. Apparently the dealers mix it in with heroin but don't tell their customers.
I think there has to be a change in mindset by the medical professionals…to treating cocaine just like any other medication..and using it for those purposes..
It would be effective to help p-addicts..and would also be very effective for the aged/infirmed…
and with/for the latter it would be delivering a better quality of life..when that is most needed..
The United States on Friday restored its longstanding policy that settlements are inconsistent with international law, reversing a stance implemented by the former administration, hours after Israel announced a plan to advance the construction of thousands of new settlement homes in response to a terror shooting in the West Bank.
“We’ve seen the reports and I have to say we’re disappointed in the announcement,” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in response to a question on the matter during a press conference in Argentina.
“It’s been long-standing US policy under Republican and Democratic administrations alike that new settlements are counterproductive to reaching an enduring peace.”
"We’ve seen the reports and I have to say we’re disappointed in the announcement,” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in response to a question on the matter during a press conference in Argentina.
“It’s been long-standing US policy under Republican and Democratic administrations alike that new settlements are counterproductive to reaching an enduring peace.”
The genocide-enabling USA make me want to puke. "Disappointed". Really?
How about what you are doing is wrong on so many levels so fucking stop it or we will not supply you with any more weapons and you're on your own."
Nah. It's just "counter-productive."
The USA government should be despised as genocide enablers.
Because becoming more conservative as you age is about about getting richer. And millennials/gen z have never got richer because boomers grabbed the lot for themselves. It's not fucking rocket science.
/
The Link between Age and Conservatism Is Breaking
Millennials and Gen Z are not becoming more conservative as they age, as generations before them did. Why?
[…]
Most polls show that Millennials and Gen Z are not becoming more conservative as they age, the way that Boomers and Gen X did before them.
Of course the coalition of chaos plans to allow the Seamounts of the Southwest Pacific to be vandalised.
In the Southeast Pacific, off the coast of Chile, underwater mountains create a breathtaking deep-sea landscape where cold-water corals, intricate glass sponges, anemones, and a host of creatures that captivate the imagination are thriving. Nearly half of the animals living here exist nowhere else on Earth. Seamounts are oases for biodiversity; for the last month, an international team of scientists explored this understudied region in our global ocean. Data and imagery collected on the #SEPacificSeamounts expedition will help advance Chile’s effort to establish a high-seas marine protected area along the Nazca and Salas y Gómez Ridges.
VALPARAISO, Chile – An international group of scientists, led by Dr. Javier Sellanes of the Universidad Católica del Norte, may have discovered more than 100 new species living on seamounts off the coast of Chile. The recent Schmidt Ocean Institute expedition resulted in identifying deep-sea corals, glass sponges, sea urchins, amphipods, squat lobsters, and other species likely new to science.
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Some years ago, I bought a book at Dunedin’s Regent Booksale for $1.50. As one does. Vandrad the Viking (1898), by J. Storer Clouston, is an obscure book these days – I cannot find a proper online review – but soon it was sitting on my shelf, gathering dust alongside ...
History is not on the side of the centre-left, when Democratic presidents fall behind in the polls and choose not to run for re-election. On both previous occasions in the past 75 years (Harry Truman in 1952, Lyndon Johnson in 1968) the Democrats proceeded to then lose the White House ...
This is a free articleCoverageThis morning, US President Joe Biden announced his withdrawal from the Presidential race. And that is genuinely newsworthy. Thanks for your service, President Biden, and all the best to you and yours.However, the media in New Zealand, particularly the 1News nightly bulletin, has been breathlessly covering ...
A homeless person’s camp beside a blocked-off slipped damage walkway in Freeman’s Bay: we are chasing our tail on our worsening and inter-related housing, poverty and climate crises. Photo: Photo: Lynn Grieveson / The KākāTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy ...
What has happened to it all?Crazy, some'd sayWhere is the life that I recognise?(Gone away)But I won't cry for yesterdayThere's an ordinary worldSomehow I have to findAnd as I try to make my wayTo the ordinary worldYesterday morning began as many others - what to write about today? I began ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 7:00 am on Monday, July 22 are:Today’s Must Read: Father and son live in a tent, and have done for four years, in a million ...
TL;DR: As of 7:00 am on Monday, July 22, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:US President Joe Biden announced via X this morning he would not stand for a second term.Multinational professional services firm ...
A listing of 32 news and opinion articles we found interesting and shared on social media during the past week: Sun, July 14, 2024 thru Sat, July 20, 2024. Story of the week As reflected by preponderance of coverage, our Story of the Week is Project 2025. Until now traveling ...
This weekend, a friend pointed out someone who said they’d like to read my posts, but didn’t want to pay. And my first reaction was sympathy.I’ve already told folks that if they can’t comfortably subscribe, and would like to read, I’d be happy to offer free subscriptions. I don’t want ...
National: The Party of ‘Law and Order’ IntroductionThis weekend, the Government formally kicked off one of their flagship policy programs: a military style boot camp that New Zealand has experimented with over the past 50 years. Cartoon credit: Guy BodyIt’s very popular with the National Party’s Law and Orderimage, ...
Day one of the solo leg of my long journey home begins with my favourite sound: footfalls in an empty street. 5.00 am and it’s already light and already too warm, almost.If I can make the train that leaves Budapest later this hour I could be in Belgrade by nightfall; ...
Do you remember Y2K, the threat that hung over humanity in the closing days of the twentieth century? Horror scenarios of planes falling from the sky, electronic payments failing and ATMs refusing to dispense cash. As for your VCR following instructions and recording your favourite show - forget about it.All ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts being questioned by The Kākā’s Bernard Hickey.TL;DR: My top six things to note around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the week to July 20 were:1. A strategy that fails Zero Carbon Act & Paris targetsThe National-ACT-NZ First Coalition Government finally unveiled ...
Summary:As New Zealand loses at least 12 leaders in the public service space of health, climate, and pharmaceuticals, this month alone, directly in response to the Government’s policies and budget choices, what lies ahead may be darker than it appears. Tui examines some of those departures and draws a long ...
The Minister of Housing’s ambition is to reduce markedly the ratio of house prices to household incomes. If his strategy works it would transform the housing market, dramatically changing the prospects of housing as an investment.Leaving aside the Minister’s metaphor of ‘flooding the market’ I do not see how the ...
As previously noted, my historical fantasy piece, set in the fifth-century Mediterranean, was accepted for a Pirate Horror anthology, only for the anthology to later fall through. But in a good bit of news, it turned out that the story could indeed be re-marketed as sword and sorcery. As of ...
An employee of tobacco company Philip Morris International demonstrates a heated tobacco device. Photo: Getty ImagesTL;DR: The top six things I’ve noted around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy on Friday, July 19 are:At a time when the Coalition Government is cutting spending on health, infrastructure, education, housing ...
TL;DR: My pick of the top six links elsewhere around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day or so to 8:30 am on Friday, July 19 are:Scoop: NZ First Minister Casey Costello orders 50% cut to excise tax on heated tobacco products. The minister has ...
Kia ora, it’s time for another Friday roundup, in which we pull together some of the links and stories that caught our eye this week. Feel free to add more in the comments! Our header image this week shows a foggy day in Auckland town, captured by Patrick Reynolds. ...
TL;DR : Here’s the top six items climate news for Aotearoa this week, as selected by Bernard Hickey and The Kākā’s climate correspondent Cathrine Dyer. A discussion recorded yesterday is in the video above and the audio of that sent onto the podcast feed.The Government released its draft Emissions Reduction ...
Save some money, get rich and old, bring it back to Tobacco Road.Bring that dynamite and a crane, blow it up, start all over again.Roll up. Roll up. Or tailor made, if you prefer...Whether you’re selling ciggies, digging for gold, catching dolphins in your nets, or encouraging folks to flutter ...
Waiting In The Wings:For truly, if Trump is America’s un-assassinated Caesar, then J.D. Vance is America’s Octavian, the Republic’s youthful undertaker – and its first Emperor.DONALD TRUMP’S SELECTION of James D. Vance as his running-mate bodes ill for the American republic. A fervent supporter of Viktor Orban, the “illiberal” prime ...
TL;DR: As of 6:00 am on Friday, July 19, the top six announcements, speeches, reports and research around housing, climate and poverty in Aotearoa’s political economy in the last day are:The PSAannounced the Employment Relations Authority (ERA) had ruled in the PSA’s favour in its case against the Ministry ...
TL;DR: The podcast above of the weekly ‘hoon’ webinar for paying subscribers last night features co-hosts and talking with:The Kākā’s climate correspondent talking about the National-ACT-NZ First Government’s release of its first Emissions Reduction Plan;University of Otago Foreign Relations Professor and special guest Dr Karin von ...
Open access notablesImproving global temperature datasets to better account for non-uniform warming, Calvert, Quarterly Journal of the Royal Meteorological Society:To better account for spatial non-uniform trends in warming, a new GITD [global instrumental temperature dataset] was created that used maximum likelihood estimation (MLE) to combine the land surface ...
A late change to charter school legislation will cheat educators out of fair pay and negotiating power proving charter schools are just a vehicle to make profit out of our education system. ...
In 2004 te iwi Māori rallied against the Crown’s attempt to confiscate our coastlines and moana with the Foreshore and Seabed Act. This led to the largest hīkoi of a generation and the birth of Te Pāti Māori. 20 years later, history is repeating itself. Today the government has announced ...
It has been five and a half years since the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care was established to investigate the abuse of children, young people, and vulnerable adults within state and faith-based institutions. Yesterday, the final report - Whanaketia through pain and trauma, from darkness to light ...
The Green Party is calling on the Government to take action off the back of the International Court of Justice ruling on Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestine. ...
On Friday the International Court of Justice reaffirmed what Palestinian’s have been telling us for decades: that the occupation and colonisation of Palestinian lands by Israel is illegal and must end immediately. They also called for reparations for Palestinian’s who have lived under Israeli occupation since it began in 1967. ...
Labour calls on the Government to act after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Israel’s occupation of Palestinian Territories is illegal. ...
The 53.7 percent rise in benefit sanctions over the last year is more proof of this Government’s disdain for our communities most in need of support. ...
Aotearoa could be a country where every child grows up feeling safe, loved and with a sense of belonging in their whānau and community. But for some of our children, this is far from reality. Instead, they are trapped in a maze of intergenerational harm that they can’t escape on ...
Te Pāti Māori are calling for David Seymour to resign as Associate Health Minister in response to his call for Pharmac to ignore the Treaty of Waitangi. “This announcement is just another example of the government’s anti-Tiriti, anti-Māori agenda.” Said Co-leader and spokesperson for health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. “Seymour thinks it ...
The soaring price of renting is driving the rise of inflation in this country - with latest figures from Stats NZ showing rents are up 4.8 per cent on average while annual inflation is at 3.3 per cent. ...
National’s Emissions Reduction Plan will take New Zealand further from the economy we need to ensure the next generation has a stable climate and secure livelihoods. ...
Following consultation with named parties and thorough consideration of privacy interests, the Green Party is in a position to release the Executive Summary of the final report from the independent investigation into Darleen Tana. ...
Prime Minister Christopher Luxon should be asking serious questions of his Minister for Resources Shane Jones now it’s been revealed he misled the public about a dinner with mining companies that he didn’t declare and said wasn’t pre-arranged. ...
Te Pāti Māori have submitted to the Justice Select Committee against the Sentencing (Reinstating Three Strikes) Amendment Bill. The bill will further entrench racism in our justice system and fails to focus on rehabilitation. “Reinstating Three Strikes will empower a systematically racist system and exacerbate the overrepresentation of Māori in ...
The Transport and Infrastructure Committee is set to make a determination on the Residential Tenancies Amendment (RTA) Bill in the coming weeks. “This legislation will give landlords the power to kick our whānau out onto the street for no reason” said Housing spokesperson, Mariameno Kapa-Kingi. “Their solution to the housing ...
“National’s campaign was about tackling crime and the best they can do is a two-year long Ministerial Advisory Group,” Labour justice spokesperson Duncan Webb said. ...
“There are more examples of charter schools failing their students than there are success stories. The coalition Government is driving to dismantle our public school system and instead promote a privatised, competitive structure that puts profits before kids,” Jan Tinetti said. ...
“This government is choosing to deliberately mislead and withhold information, keeping our people in the dark about this government’s agenda and the future of our mokopuna,” said co-leader and spokesperson for Health, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer. The call comes after the demand from the Chief Ombudsman that Associate Minister of Health, Casey ...
“Today’s climate announcement by Simon Watts makes clear the National Government is simply paying lip service to meeting its climate change targets,” Megan Woods said. ...
National is choosing to make life harder for workers by taking away the rights our communities have fought hard for. Here's how they’re taking workers backwards. ...
Australia, Canada and New Zealand today issued the following statement on the need for an urgent ceasefire in Gaza and the risk of expanded conflict between Hizballah and Israel. The situation in Gaza is catastrophic. The human suffering is unacceptable. It cannot continue. We remain unequivocal in our condemnation of ...
Attorney-General Judith Collins today reminded all State and faith-based institutions of their legal obligation to preserve records relevant to the safety and wellbeing of those in its care. “The Abuse in Care Inquiry’s report has found cases where records of the most vulnerable people in State and faith‑based institutions were ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says the Government’s online safety website for children and young people has reached one million page views. “It is great to see so many young people and their families accessing the site Keep It Real Online to learn how to stay safe online, and manage ...
Tēnā tātou katoa, Ngā mihi te rangi, ngā mihi te whenua, ngā mihi ki a koutou, kia ora mai koutou. Thank you for the opportunity to be here and the invitation to speak at this 50th anniversary conference. I acknowledge all those who have gone before us and paved the ...
New Zealand’s payroll providers have successfully prepared to ensure 3.5 million individuals will, from Wednesday next week, be able to keep more of what they earn each pay, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis and Revenue Minister Simon Watts. “The Government's tax policy changes are legally effective from Wednesday. Delivering this tax ...
An experimental vineyard which will help futureproof the wine sector has been opened in Blenheim by Associate Regional Development Minister Mark Patterson. The covered vineyard, based at the New Zealand Wine Centre – Te Pokapū Wāina o Aotearoa, enables controlled environmental conditions. “The research that will be produced at the Experimental ...
The Coalition Government has confirmed the indicative regional breakdown of North Island Weather Event (NIWE) funding for state highway recovery projects funded through Budget 2024, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “Regions in the North Island suffered extensive and devastating damage from Cyclone Gabrielle and the 2023 Auckland Anniversary Floods, and ...
Indonesia’s Foreign Minister, Retno Marsudi, will visit New Zealand next week, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “Indonesia is important to New Zealand’s security and economic interests and is our closest South East Asian neighbour,” says Mr Peters, who is currently in Laos to engage with South East Asian partners. ...
He aha te kai a te rangatira? He kōrero, he kōrero, he kōrero. The government has reaffirmed its commitment to supporting the aspirations of Ngāti Maniapoto, Minister for Māori Development Tama Potaka says. “My thanks to Te Nehenehenui Trust – Ngāti Maniapoto for bringing their important kōrero to a ministerial ...
Transport Minister Simeon Brown has thanked outgoing Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority, Janice Fredric, for her service to the board.“I have received Ms Fredric’s resignation from the role of Chair of the Civil Aviation Authority,” Mr Brown says.“On behalf of the Government, I want to thank Ms Fredric for ...
The Government is proposing legislation to overturn a Court of Appeal decision and amend the Marine and Coastal Area Act in order to restore Parliament’s test for Customary Marine Title, Treaty Negotiations Minister Paul Goldsmith says. “Section 58 required an applicant group to prove they have exclusively used and occupied ...
Regulation Minister David Seymour says that opposition parties have united in bad faith, opposing what they claim are ‘dangerous changes’ to the Early Childhood Education sector, despite no changes even being proposed yet. “Issues with affordability and availability of early childhood education, and the complexity of its regulation, has led ...
After receiving more than 740 submissions in the first 20 days, Regulation Minister David Seymour is asking the Ministry for Regulation to extend engagement on the early childhood education regulation review by an extra two weeks. “The level of interest has been very high, and from the conversations I’ve been ...
The Coalition Government is investing $802.9 million into the Wairarapa and Manawatū rail lines as part of a funding agreement with the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA), KiwiRail, and the Greater Wellington and Horizons Regional Councils to deliver more reliable services for commuters in the lower North Island, Transport Minister Simeon ...
Local Government Minister Simeon Brown has announced his intention to appoint a Crown Manager to both Hawke’s Bay Regional and Wairoa District Councils to speed up the delivery of flood protection work in Wairoa."Recent severe weather events in Wairoa this year, combined with damage from Cyclone Gabrielle in 2023 have ...
Mr Speaker, this is a day that many New Zealanders who were abused in State care never thought would come. It’s the day that this Parliament accepts, with deep sorrow and regret, the Report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in Care. At the heart of this report are the ...
For the first time, the Government is formally acknowledging some children and young people at Lake Alice Psychiatric Hospital experienced torture. The final report of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Abuse in State and Faith-based Care “Whanaketia – through pain and trauma, from darkness to light,” was tabled in Parliament ...
The Government has acknowledged the nearly 2,400 courageous survivors who shared their experiences during the Royal Commission of Inquiry into Historical Abuse in State and Faith-Based Care. The final report from the largest and most complex public inquiry ever held in New Zealand, the Royal Commission Inquiry “Whanaketia – through ...
With a week to go before hard-working New Zealanders see personal income tax relief for the first time in fourteen years, 513,000 people have used the Budget tax calculator to see how much they will benefit, says Finance Minister Nicola Willis. “Tax relief is long overdue. From next Wednesday, personal income ...
Workplace Relations and Safety Minister Brooke van Velden says a bill that has passed its first reading will improve parental leave settings and give non-biological parents more flexibility as primary carer for their child. The Regulatory Systems Amendment Bill (No3), passed its first reading this morning. “It includes a change ...
Two Bills designed to improve regulation and make it easier to do business have passed their first reading in Parliament, says Economic Development Minister Melissa Lee. The Regulatory Systems (Economic Development) Amendment Bill and Regulatory Systems (Immigration and Workforce) Amendment Bill make key changes to legislation administered by the Ministry ...
New legislation paves the way for greater competition in sectors such as banking and electricity, Commerce and Consumer Affairs Minister Andrew Bayly says. “Competitive markets boost productivity, create employment opportunities and lift living standards. To support competition, we need good quality regulation but, unfortunately, a recent OECD report ranked New ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says lotteries for charitable purposes, such as those run by the Heart Foundation, Coastguard NZ, and local hospices, will soon be allowed to operate online permanently. “Under current laws, these fundraising lotteries are only allowed to operate online until October 2024, after which ...
The Coalition Government is accelerating work on the new four-lane expressway between Auckland and Whangārei as part of its Roads of National Significance programme, with an accelerated delivery model to deliver this project faster and more efficiently, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says. “For too long, the lack of resilient transport connections ...
Sir Don McKinnon will travel to Viet Nam this week as a Special Envoy of the Government, Foreign Minister Winston Peters has announced. “It is important that the Government give due recognition to the significant contributions that General Secretary Nguyen Phu Trong made to New Zealand-Viet Nam relations,” Mr ...
Minister of Internal Affairs Brooke van Velden says newly appointed Commissioner, Grant Illingworth KC, will help deliver the report for the first phase of the Royal Commission of Inquiry into COVID-19 Lessons, due on 28 November 2024. “I am pleased to announce that Mr Illingworth will commence his appointment as ...
Foreign Minister Winston Peters travels to Laos this week to participate in a series of Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN)-led Ministerial meetings in Vientiane. “ASEAN plays an important role in supporting a peaceful, stable and prosperous Indo-Pacific,” Mr Peters says. “This will be our third visit to ...
Construction of a new mental health facility at Te Nikau Grey Hospital in Greymouth is today one step closer, Mental Health Minister Matt Doocey says. “This $27 million facility shows this Government is delivering on its promise to boost mental health care and improve front line services,” Mr Doocey says. ...
New Zealand is committing nearly $50 million to a package supporting sustainable Pacific fisheries development over the next four years, Foreign Minister Winston Peters and Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones announced today. “This support consisting of a range of initiatives demonstrates New Zealand’s commitment to assisting our Pacific partners ...
Associate Education Minister David Seymour says proposed changes to the Education and Training Amendment Bill will ensure charter schools have more flexibility to negotiate employment agreements and are equipped with the right teaching resources. “Cabinet has agreed to progress an amendment which means unions will not be able to initiate ...
In response to serious concerns around oversight, overspend and a significant deterioration in financial outlook, the Board of Health New Zealand will be replaced with a Commissioner, Health Minister Dr Shane Reti announced today. “The previous government’s botched health reforms have created significant financial challenges at Health NZ that, without ...
Minister for Space and Science, Innovation and Technology Judith Collins will travel to Adelaide tomorrow for space and science engagements, including speaking at the Australian Space Forum. While there she will also have meetings and visits with a focus on space, biotechnology and innovation. “New Zealand has a thriving space ...
Climate Change Minister Simon Watts will travel to China on Saturday to attend the Ministerial on Climate Action meeting held in Wuhan. “Attending the Ministerial on Climate Action is an opportunity to advocate for New Zealand climate priorities and engage with our key partners on climate action,” Mr Watts says. ...
Oceans and Fisheries Minister Shane Jones is travelling to the Solomon Islands tomorrow for meetings with his counterparts from around the Pacific supporting collective management of the region’s fisheries. The 23rd Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Committee and the 5th Regional Fisheries Ministers’ Meeting in Honiara from 23 to 26 July ...
The Government today launched the Military Style Academy Pilot at Te Au rere a te Tonga Youth Justice residence in Palmerston North, an important part of the Government’s plan to crackdown on youth crime and getting youth offenders back on track, Minister for Children, Karen Chhour said today. “On the ...
The Government has welcomed news the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) has begun work to replace nine priority bridges across the country to ensure our state highway network remains resilient, reliable, and efficient for road users, Transport Minister Simeon Brown says.“Increasing productivity and economic growth is a key priority for the ...
Acting Prime Minister David Seymour has been in contact throughout the evening with senior officials who have coordinated a whole of government response to the global IT outage and can provide an update. The Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet has designated the National Emergency Management Agency as the ...
New Zealand and Japan will continue to step up their shared engagement with the Pacific, Foreign Minister Winston Peters says. “New Zealand and Japan have a strong, shared interest in a free, open and stable Pacific Islands region,” Mr Peters says. “We are pleased to be finding more ways ...
New developments in the heart of North Island forestry country will reinvigorate their communities and boost economic development, Regional Development Minister Shane Jones says. Mr Jones visited Kaingaroa and Kawerau in Bay of Plenty today to open a landmark community centre in the former and a new connecting road in ...
President Adeang, fellow Ministers, honourable Diet Member Horii, Ambassadors, distinguished guests. Minasama, konnichiwa, and good afternoon, everyone. Distinguished guests, it’s a pleasure to be here with you today to talk about New Zealand’s foreign policy reset, the reasons for it, the values that underpin it, and how it ...
Comment: After Climate Change Minister Simon Watts’ preview several weeks ago, I had some optimism about the Government’s emissions reduction plan. Now I’ve read the discussion document, that hope has been dashed. How can the Government propose a plan that wants to take New Zealand taxpayers’ hard-earned money, and spend ...
Christopher Luxon: hurdles The little man from National jumps hurdles in his sleep. He’s quite good at it in his dreams and even though the reality doesn’t quite match up you have to give him credit for getting up every morning and crashing into the very first hurdle of the ...
Comment: It was a good two hours into the conversation when Tyrone Marks raised the most basic of questions when I first spoke to him in 2017. “They didn’t explain the things they did to me. They never told me why. And they still haven’t. There’s no explanation for it. ...
Last summer when Matairangi burned, Ginny and Tom stood at the window of their lounge, watching kākā shoot skyward from the burning trees. From the distance, they looked to Ginny like pages torn from books and thrown into a bonfire. It was Tom, voice tight, who told her it was ...
Opinion: The Canadian short story writer Alice Munro – winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2013 – died in May at the age of 92. Her work was about “the damage people inflict on one another in the name of love”, Deborah Treisman wrote in the New Yorker. ...
This month marks two years since the most powerful telescope ever built sent its first pictures back to earth. From its lofty vantage point, beyond the moon in orbit around the sun, the James Webb Space Telescope was tuned to observe the first stars and galaxies being born soon after ...
Madeleine Chapman rounds out Death Week on The Spinoff with a final recommendation. You can read all of our Death Week coverage here. Nothing forces you to reflect on your life and relationships quite like proximity to death. For those whose nearest and dearest have died, there are reasonably obvious ...
Whitney Greene takes us through her life in television, including the TV character she’d like to plan a funeral for and her cow lung catastrophe on The Traitors NZ. “If the phone rings, I have to answer it,” Whitney Greene from The Traitors NZ warns as we begin our My ...
Maddie Ballard reviews the debut essay collection of Pōneke writer Flora Feltham.In ‘The Raw Material’, the longest essay in Flora Feltham’s dazzling debut collection, the author heads out for a run after hours of weaving and sees the world turn to textile. “Pounding along the Parade, I saw the ...
Andy Christiansen, one half of the experimental rock-pop duo TRiPS, shares the tunes inspiring the band’s perfect weekend and new release. “Good speakers, good food, good music, no distractions”: that’s all you need to enjoy the psychedelic stylings of TRiPS, a new band formed by Fly My Pretties’ Barnaby Weir ...
Celebrating our quadrennial opportunity to become experts in a bunch of sports we never normally watch.The games of the XXXIII Olympiad are upon us. Paris will host this year’s showcase of sporting and athletic prowess, which means some late-night and early-morning viewing for us in Aotearoa.But what sports ...
The photograph is striking and beautiful, but also disturbing – a reminder that my love for John was often entangled in shame.The Sunday Essay is made possible thanks to the support of Creative New Zealand.In the spring of 1980, in Dunedin, shortly before his death, someone took a photograph ...
Get to know Babushka, our latest Dog of the Month. This feature was offered as a reward during our What’s Eating Aotearoa PledgeMe campaign. Thank you to Babu’s humans, Jo and Isabel, for their support. Dog name: Babushka (Babu for short) Age: 2Breed: Border Collie X poodleIf rescued, ...
Pacific Media Watch A Lebanese photojournalist who was severely wounded during an Israeli air strike in south Lebanon carried the Olympic torch in Paris this week in honour of her peers who have been wounded and killed in the field — especially in Gaza and Lebanon. Christina Assi of Agence ...
The first report in a five-part web series focused on the 15th Triennial Conference of Pacific Women taking place in the Marshall Islands this week.SPECIAL REPORT:By Netani Rika in Majuro Women continue to fight for justice 70 years after the first nuclear tests by the United States caused ...
Christopher Luxon has joined with Australia and Canada's leaders in voicing support for US President Joe Biden's ceasefire deal between Israel and Hamas. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra The 2022 election brought the “teal wave” into parliament. The next election will test whether teals, who occupy what were Liberal seats, and other independents can maintain their momentum. Joining us on the Podcast ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Ian Musgrave, Senior lecturer in Pharmacology, University of Adelaide Pixavri/Shutterstock A major Federal Court class action has been dismissed this week after Justice Michael Lee ruled there was not enough evidence to prove the weedkiller Roundup causes cancer. Plaintiff Kelvin ...
In The Week in Politics: politicians have to decide what to do about child abuse, Health NZ is booked in for major surgery and Darleen Tana returns. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Clare Corbould, Associate Professor, Contemporary Histories Research Group, Deakin University Mainstream media are surprisingly muted at the prospect of the world’s most powerful nation being led for the first time by a woman – specifically a woman of colour, Vice President Kamala ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Rebecca Bennett, PhD Student, Associate Research Fellow, Deakin University Last week, a drone delivery company called Wing (owned by Google’s parent company, Alphabet) started operating in Melbourne. Some 250,000 residents in parts of the city’s eastern suburbs can now order food from ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonathan Foo, Lecturer, Physiotherapy, Monash University pikselstock/Shutterstock In the next 40 years in Australia, it’s predicted the number of Australians aged 65 and over will more than double, while the number of people aged 85 and over will more than triple. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Katrina Grant, Research Associate, Power Institute for Arts and Visual Culture, University of Sydney Jonas Åkerström’s 1790 work, Session of the Accademia dell’Arcadia on August 17 1788.Nationalmuseum/Cecilia Heisser Ever wondered whether you’d have a better chance at winning an Olympic gold ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Alexandra Jones, Program Lead, Food Governance, George Institute for Global Health wavebreakmedia/Shutterstock On Thursday, Australian and New Zealand food ministers at state, federal and national levels met to thrash out what’s next for health star ratings on packaged foods. Now, after ...
The Abuse in Care report found many Pacific survivors lost their connections to their culture and language, resulting in trauma that has been carried from generation to generation. ...
In the regulatory review, ECC intends to suggest that ERO focus on curriculum delivery reviews rather than the Ministry, because it’s not efficient or effective to have two agencies with radically different approaches climbing over each other. ...
Te Rūnanga Nui o Ngā Kura Kaupapa Māori invites the current government to work in partnership with them to develop a pathway forward, including the development of a parallel pathway and meaningful policy and strategy for Kura Kaupapa Māori ...
If you haven’t started watching yet, Tara Ward begs you to reconsider. This is an excerpt from our weekly pop culture newsletter Rec Room. Sign up here. In the world of New Zealand reality television, we have many gems in our crown. There’s the delicious second season of the Celebrity Treasure ...
A new poem by Fiona Kidman. The clothes of the dead I did not keep my mother’s furry red beret for long nor the stringy scarves that adorned the necks of my aunts, although I have kept tag ends of gold, the rings and trinkets they wore, the brooches no ...
The government’s announcement that it will re-open the foreshore and seabed controversy by changing the rules on recognising centuries-old Māori customary title for a third time goes against the rule of law and New Zealand values,” Mr Tipa says. ...
The only published and available best-selling indie book chart in New Zealand is the top 10 sales list recorded every week at Unity Books’ stores in High St, Auckland, and Willis St, Wellington.AUCKLAND1 Lioness by Emily Perkins (Bloomsbury, $25) Roarrrr! Perkins’ brilliant, award-winning, Marian-Keyes anointed, darkly funny, long ...
The 2004 Act vested ownership of the foreshore and seabed in the Crown, extinguishing any Māori claims to ownership and causing widespread outrage and protests among Māori communities. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Antje Deckert, Associate Professor (Criminology), Auckland University of Technology Getty Images Despite the connection between institutional harm and gang membership made clear in this week’s mammoth royal commission abuse-in care report, the government seems unlikely to soften its “get tough on ...
From Lewis Clareburt in the swimming to the start of the rowing – the first seven days of Paris 2024 promise to be big for New Zealand. There are few events that bring the country together quite like an Olympic Games. Nothing quite matches the excitement of getting up in ...
Groundbreaking local science just showed up in the most surprising of places: the season finale of The Kardashians. In the season five finale of The Kardashians last night, several members of the family gathered together in one of their signature empty, cream-coloured rooms to hear test results that had been ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Amin Saikal, Emeritus professor of Middle Eastern and Central Asian Studies, Australian National University The Middle East is on the brink of a possibly devastating regional war, with hostilities between Israel and Hezbollah reaching an extremely dangerous level. Washington has engaged in ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Laura Elizabeth Eades, Rheumatologist, Monash University Lupus is an inflammatory autoimmune illness, where the body’s immune system mistakenly attacks itself. Lupus can affect virtually any part of the body, although it most commonly affects the skin, joints and kidneys. The symptoms ...
A law firm that specialises in working with survivors of abuse in State care is disappointed that the Government fails to recognise that its boot camps can be directly compared to previous boot camps from the 1990s and 2000s. ...
Dying is a natural part of life, like updating your Wof or seeing your hairdresser, but without the word-of-mouth recs that help guarantee a good service. What if we changed that? Dying Reviews received by The Spinoff have had the names of organisations redacted while Hospice NZ collects further data. ...
Source: The Conversation (Au and NZ) – By Jonti Horner, Professor (Astrophysics), University of Southern Queensland Mike Lewinski/Flickr, CC BY On any clear night, if you gaze skywards long enough, chances are you’ll see a meteor streaking through the sky. Some nights, however, are better than others. At ...
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I am curious if any of y'all here think Aotearoa buying bitumen from overseas is a step forward, a good idea?
Just been looking at an article about Marsden Point and found NZ First have gotten an investigation into reopening the refinery. Resilience has been cited.
Refinery closes, badda bing badda boom, Cyclone Gabriel hits.
From a NZ First petition- "“The devastation brought on by Cyclone Gabriella is immense. New Zealand is now in desperate need of bitumen for the lengthy and expensive roading rebuild – a quality product which Marsden Point was once producing for us locally until it was shut down."
Now, I get that Peters and Jones aren't everyone's cup of tea. This is part of NZF policy that is supportable.
Neo-liberalism failure yet again, unless it is working exactly as it should…
New Zealand has been buying all bitumen from overseas since early 2021 – more money in it.
https://contractormag.co.nz/contractor/marsden-point-bitumen/
Sourcing bitumen from a wider market should allow us to get a product that is more suitable to our needs. Marsden Pt was very limited in what crude it could process, and the properties of the crud that comes out the bottom (bitumen) is governed to a large extent by the crude that goes in. It can be modified to an extent with additives, but you'd get a much better product if you started with something more suitable. Not an issue in some applications, but in some parts of NZ roading concerns struggled to build adequate roads with Marsden Pt bitumen.
Outcome will depend on whether NZTA sources on performance or price.
Closing Marsden Point was daft.
There's nothing resilient about a policy that is centred in everyone that can afford it having a car or two. Is NZF's resiliency a climate denying adaptation position? Resiliency washing.
Resiliency would look like this:
The things I have named reduce miles. Less mills travelled = less road maintenance = less bitumen used.
I'm guessing that that is against NZF policy, which would see expansion of the bitumen sector as a good thing.
You can also say that persevering with Marsden Pt was just as daft.
We would have then been locked in to using the capacity of the refinery for the rest of it's life, and with completely wrong market signals once consumption dropped below refinery capacity, and the owners had to dump excess fuel into the market at reduced prices.
Without having to keep the Marsden Pt refinery operating we can source fuel to match a reducing demand.
I suspect your position is predicated on the idea that we will always have access to overseas supplies. What if there is a GCF or war or other event that means we don't?
Your argument is primarily economic right?
We relied on access to imported crude.
that doesn't answer my question though. What could we do in these two scenarios?
Our crudes are unsuitable for transport fuels, so we export them.
And if we could refine them into transport fuels, our proven reserves amount to little more than a years worth of consumption.
that still doesn't answer my question.
We do produce our own crude. I was out there drilling for it.
Not in enough quantity for the grades we need. We do produce enough for lube oils and maybe making composites?
Resilience, and sustainability means transitioning to renewables, so we are not dependant on oil for energy in the amounts we currently use.
Wasting money on keeping oil infrastructure going, means less for renewables.
Yes, and that requires faith in two things:
That we will transition to renewables
That transitioning to renewables without powering down will work.
There is absolutely no doubt we will transition to renewables.
Either with a planned and staged transition, or, one forced by decreasing resources and and steadily more unliveable climate. Accompanied by wars and sociatal breakdown. Given the preponderance of anto-social AGW denialist nutters, like NZ, gaining power worldwide at present, the second is more likely
Unfortunately increases in energy efficiency are negated by rising population. And with vehicles, by increases in vehicle size. The total proportion of renewables has remained stubbornly about 10% since 1990. Mostly due to inertia and lack of investment by successive Governments.
that's definitely a transition, but it's not what most people mean when they say transition to renewables. If there are resource wars, GFC, societal breakdown, where will NZ be getting all its lithium from?
I don't think anyone has answered the question of what NZ would do if we lost our import supply of crude oil and we have no refinery. That's a transition too I guess
If we lose our import supply of oil then having a refinery is irrelevant.
Whether we import oil to refine here, or import refined products, it is still subject to the same supply constraints.
BTW. Renewables are not dependant on lithium. It currently makes batteries more efficient, but you can have renewable, and even rather good batteries/ power supplies without it. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_redox_flow_battery
How is it irrelevant?
Of course, but the scenario is where we can't import crude or refined, but have domestic crude and a refinery or not. I don't know why this is so hard to address.
W've addressed it.
We do not have sufficient local reserves of type or quantity for current consumption.
So we depend on imports!
Ergo. Whether it is refined here or offshore it is still imported.
Interposing an expensive and outdated refinery doesn't change the dependance on imported oil and oil companies.
We coul invest in drilling and new oil Wells which may extend our local reserves by a few more years. But still much cheaper to refine offshore rather than rebuilding the refinery. We could also invest in making buggy whips! History lesson for small business owners: Don’t be the last buggy whip maker | Succeeding in Small Business
The refinery was originally an attempt at import substitution. Keeping the expense of refining off our balance of trade. Which made sense 50 years ago. Until it was sold in the “great fire sale” in the 90’s which meant the oil companies who bought it, not NZ, benefited from the subsequent earnings.
Now. What makes sense is still import substitution. But with renewables which don't require billions per year paid to offshore oil producers.
we’re really talking at cross purposes here. Your argument is based on us not tipping into collapse, and in that sense it makes sense.
My question, which in fact still hasn’t been answered, is what happens if there is no more overseas source of crude or refined and all we have is our own crude? If you say ‘but we don’t have enough oil locally to meet demand!’, well of course, just like we won’t have enough import if the global system collapses.
The point of keeping a refinery on shore isn’t to avoid or delay transition to renewables, it’s to hold one thread of resilience. Might not be a good thread to hold, but that argument hasn’t been made yet because you, Graeme and Ad are all arguing within the context of current economics, not early collapse scenarios. Which is why I keep the repeated the question.
NZ might get really lucky and we get a L/G/TPM government in 2026, and we get serious about transition. But it will have to include degrowth and powerdown soon because there is no way to transition fully to renewables any more. That window has passed.
We will always have access to crude oil so far as I can tell.
(I have a lot of big-state leftie sympathy for your view of Marsden Point).
Even if our access to the refineries of Singapore, South Korea and Japan were shut down (say in the case of China invading Taiwan), we would still get it from Australia's refineries. It is Gull, BP and CALTEX that provide those sources already.
International access doesn't seem to be forcing fuel substitution locally. For example despite massive growth in electricity production here over the last decade, Huntly's owner Genesis was quite happy to switch to brown Indonesian coal while our super-high-grade coking coal went to the Chinese and Thai steel mills.
That's the BAU argument. Meanwhile, climate scientists and communicators, journalists, and transitioners are all pointing to collapse of civilisation if we don't drop GHGs fast. There's some chance that we will change voluntarily, but it's looking more likely that we will be forced into hard change. So yes, losing access to global supplies of crude oil is a scenario we should be considering, at least in our thinking.
Monbiot: https://www.monbiot.com/2023/11/03/the-flickering/
With that crude we were able to make diesel, jet fuel, petrol and fuel oil for ships.
Also much needed bitumen for repairs.
No matter which way you look at it we are now less resilient, and more reliant on the whims of the market and beholden to shareholders of shipping companies.
The oil shocks showed that it was immeterial whether we imported oil in refined or crude form. The local production is exported to where ever the oil companies can make the most money for it.
If there are shortages in markets that can pay more, what do you think is going to happen?
the NZ economy collapses and we do a hard and fast transition to an agrarian economy large based on internal production?
What you and Graeme and Ad are arguing is economics. At some point in a collapse we have a choice between protecting the economy or protecting our ability to function as a nation state. What you are all saying is true, but what gsays and I are saying is true too. We're just talking about different stages of an unknown process.
"…a choice between protecting the economy or protecting our ability to function as a nation state…"
I don't see how there could be a choice between those two things? Aren't they both reliant on the other?
let me rephrase.
"…a choice between protecting the current BAU neoliberal economy or protecting our ability to function as a nation state…"
The economic system we use now isn't the only one, and it's certainly not prepared or useful for what is coming down the line with the polycrisis of climate/ecological collapse, resources depletion and war, social unrest.
But further, if the global economic system collapses, what do you think will happen to the NZ one? We won't have a choice about keeping teh current economic system, but we have choices now about transition, and future proofing (to the extent we can).
The collapse of the global sytem will inivitably collapse NZ.
We have already seen how that works, in several worldwide depressions. We don't have the capacity to transition to an internal economy. Successive Governments of all stripes have demolished local capacity in favour of exporting milk powder. Muldoon was, in fact, the last Government to try and build future resiliance.
Even if we can feed ourselves, do you think neighbours with their huge populations and military, are going to let us be? How do you deal with millions of refugees from countries that no longer support life?
De coupling from the global system is not going to happen. Hell, we can't even de-couple from the economically disastrous reduction on taxes for the hugely wealthy. Global 'War on Fair Taxation' Has Slashed Taxes for Richest 1% by a Third (commondreams.org)
The best thing for resiliance, as far as energy goes, is to separate ourselves from the global system of oil supply and rely on sustainable local sources.
It still needs a large degree of hope, that in the inevitable catastrophic failure of global climate, New Zealanders will be allowed to use our own resources. Resources that NACT will have already sold.
"If there are shortages in markets that can pay more, what do you think is going to happen?"
This is the problem with Aotearoa being a global market participant. Our viability as a society is at the whims of 'the market' and companies that have balance sheets that are way bigger than this nation's.
That is why we must pivot away from this Chicago School way of doing things.
We do not have the oil reserves to support our consumption – as Joe90 says we rely on imported crude. Reopening Marsden Point is not going to change that.
https://www.worldometers.info/oil/new-zealand-oil/
the world cannot afford our consumption, we are one of the countries well into overshoot. That's the not the issue, because we have to drop consumption anyway. The issue is what would happen if we lose access to imported crude. Can we mine our own crude but no longer have a way of refining it?
All these debates (including I would guess NZF), revolve around the idea that civilisation is going to continue BAU. It's not.
NZF has morphed into a party of idiots. Pandering to anti-vaccers, AGW deniers and other assorted fruit loops.
That is pretty much our entire economy: we mine bulk stuff here and it gets processed elsewhere into a higher value commodity.
Oil. Wood. Milk. Apples. Coal. People. Meat and fish. Wheat. Wool.
Apples aren't mined, they're harvested. In a woodland-style orchard-garden, apple trees need no inputs other than what settles upon them from the sky, across their whole lifecycle. Apple fruits are given generously and nothing is asked in return. The crop grows greater and greater every year. Sunlight, air, water, and a live medium to grow in, all free, is all that's required for this resource.
Pears and plums also, feijoa, fig, peach, apricot, quince, loquat, grape, mulberry, sweet chestnut, hazel, walnut; this is just the first few of a very long list 🙂
They are barely value-added whether you call it mined or harvested, despite decades of breeding and exporting.
To all but the Lorax Loners, Localist Lifestylers and Deep Retreaters, an apple is a thing on a stack in a supermarket.
Yeah, thanks, Ad – ups to you!
Education about food stories is important in changing attitudes.
Many of us still have memories of or access to sweet smelling fresh fruit. Food kms matter.
People once had your attitude to the car and walked in front of it at 5 miles an hour with a flag calling "car coming" so it did not scare the work horses.
Now we have to face that the age of the car needs a rethink, as it is a resource greedy thing which pollutes.
Local foods and 15 minute cities are on the planning board, pity our cities have such dinosaurs as mayors.
Imho, many LLs are more in touch with reality than the everyman.
At Eden Park today, the Black Caps needed 42 runs off the last over, but it's only a game – you win some, you lose some.
As a species, we've had a good run – you win some, you lose some.
the apple as a thing on a supermarket shelf won't be a thing for very much longer in human terms if we don't transition.
eg frosts taking out the flowers/buds, extreme heat causing apple drop or making it impossible for workers to be in the orchard, high winds or floods damaging trees and apples, changes in insect populations.
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-climate-change-hurt-this-years-apple-harvest/
Meanwhile, the regen farmers are ahead of the game in terms of adapting to variation in weather and climate.
Don't need value added to apple varieties that are grown for nutrition and health. The value is in what we eat, and how the land is tended where it grows.
https://www.heritagefoodcrops.org.nz/montys-surprise-apple/
No, not economic, but around having the flexibility to reduce petroleum use seamlessly to as low as possible.
Maintaining Marsden Pt would mean we are locked into usage at the refinery's minimum capacity, then a sudden step to imports or zero. I see it better to make that adjustment as quickly as we can. Also the same situation is playing out in Australia and around the world where refinery capacity is being rationalised to fewer, larger refineries.
The import risks would be similar for refined product or crude. But with both options we have a very sudden adjustment to make if there's any disruption.
The government should nationalize these fossil fuel resources as soon as possible. When the time comes they will then be able to shut them down, where as leaving them in private sector hands is provoking a legal battle getting in the way of dis-establishing these industries.
In 2012 we used 149,000 barrels of oil per day.
By 2019 it peaked at 179,000 per day.
It's now back to 2012 levels.
Our local coal production is the lowest in 33 years. Our coal use continues to decrease – in part from large public subsidy and policy programmes.
Your scale of state intervention isn't warranted.
Keeping a too small, inefficient, long past it's use by date, refinery, running, is Daft!
Nothing to do with resiliance as the oil, whether refined or not, is imported anyway.
We should be transitioning to sustainable energy produced locally, not continuing to spend on oil imports with all the negatives of the fortune we spend propping up the oil industry, on our balance of trade.
Net spending on oil is greater than our net dairy earnings. Replacing that with wind, hydro and solar will be a huge boost to our current account.
Not to mention avoiding all the military spend on supporting US wars, over oil.
Lastly, spending billions to keep oil infrastructure assets going which should be redundant in future, instead of spending on renewables goes against the AGW adaptation we need, which has had the can kicked down the road for too long already.
A fact not mentioned clearly in the concern of government about welfare of late, the 2022 drum beat about the need for opening the border to migrant workers in 2022 – because they were not available locally. The reluctance of employers to hire older workers.
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/131044912/are-you-past-landing-a-job-at-55-the-reality-of-ageism-despite-labour-shortages
Oh dear! The Cooking Teachers Union is a scam!
"The only problem for the three fledgling unions, all with strong ties to the anti-vax movement, is that there’s no Rachel Mangan, Ken Lawson or Howard Granger on the publicly-accessible registers of teachers, nurses and doctors in New Zealand.
In fact, not one of the names listed on the “testimonials” page of the three unions’ websites shows up on those registers."
https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/350186655/testimonials-new-unions-arent-quite-what-they-seem
"The bravehearts drove on through the fields in the Corolla.
They came across a bottom feeder sitting in the mud.
“Please, M’Lud, a crust of bread is all I ask,” pleads the peon.
“No, my good man. I am the King of Tough Love!”
Replieth proud and pious Luxon the Aspirational.
But the King is also a Just King and a Merciful one,
And tosses the peon a pack of Marlboro Lights
To stave off his hunger pangs."
https://newsroom.co.nz/2024/02/25/an-ode-for-king-luxon/
Not in a Corolla mate – a Rolls, Mercedes or even a PeopleCrusher 5000![wink wink](https://cdn2.thestandard.org.nz/wp-content/plugins/ark-wysiwyg-comment-editor/ckeditor/plugins/smiley/images/wink_smile.png?x42494)
But they'll call it a Corolla, coz, Austerity for ALL.
This is not a woman. This is a violent and sadistic man. Not our crimes.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2024/feb/23/cat-killing-woman-guilty-murdering-man-oxford-scarlet-blake-jorge-martin-carreno
and people wonder why women are so angry.
At least the Guardian explained further down that they are a trans woman. That's an improvement I guess.
Yes, that is how it goes. If the victim is trans – it is a national emergency – declared a "hate crime", vigils are held, new laws are demanded.
If the perpetrator is trans – don't mention it. Well, on para 22 if you must. But you have to make sure that the first words (and the headline) are "woman" and "her".
He is like an old soap ad..
Lux-on…lux-off…
https://www.police.govt.nz/news/release/gang’s-distinctive-motorcycles-destroyed-following-court-order#:~:text=Six%20distinctive%20motorcycles%20that%20were,the%20remains%20as%20scrap%20metal.
Collins never really went away, did she.
Why though, didn't they crush the 4x4s?
P-addiction solution:
I have been out on the road/amongst the (true) precariat for about six years now..
And one observation I would make is how fucked up so many gen xers seem to be…
And it is largely down to alcohol..and 'p'..
And it is p I am addressing here..
And definitions: p is meth/speed..the most garbage/damaging of drugs..
( And while we are at it..'crack' here is not 'crack'..crack is cocaine put thru another chemical process…I have had habits on both of them…largely in other parts of the planet…)
And I would like to present what I think is a viable option to help p-heads kick that crap..and to move them onto something much easier to kick..
I think the treatment authorities should use prescribed cocaine much the same way they used methadone to help heroin addicts quit…
For those people really wanting to quit..allow them to use cocaine to help them get thru the speed-withdrawals..(which can be really fucked ugly..if the literature on the matter is to be believed..)
And I recommend using cocaine for this purpose largely from my own experiences .
In that having been addicted to alcohol/heroin/ciggies/coke/crack..I have come up with my own withdrawal ranking list..
I have heroin at 8.5.out of ten in difficulty…alcohol and ciggies at 4/10..
And cocaine.?..cocaine struggles to reach 1/10 ..
After using reasonably heroic amounts of the stuff…for a rather long time…(I used to mix it with my heroin..and ..after kicking that..still used coke)
Anyway..I decided to kick it..and that was that..I just stopped..
A couple of mildly restless nites sleep..and that was it..
Compared to anything else cocaine is so easy to kick/stop using..
This is why I would recommend cocaine be available to be prescribed to p-addicts..to get them thru the hell of meth-withdrawals..as a stepping-stone..
(Happy to answer any questions..
Anyone got any better solutions..?)
Good on you for having the strength of will. That may be an answer for some.
Sounds like that approach could be worth a try. The authorities could test its effectiveness, maybe?
I just hope NZ doesn't follow the USA and Canada and get a wave of fentanyl, which is impossible to get off once you start on it. Apparently the dealers mix it in with heroin but don't tell their customers.
I think there has to be a change in mindset by the medical professionals…to treating cocaine just like any other medication..and using it for those purposes..
It would be effective to help p-addicts..and would also be very effective for the aged/infirmed…
and with/for the latter it would be delivering a better quality of life..when that is most needed..
And what's wrong with that..?
A troubling* article, NYT freebie, about how girls are being promoted on social media by their parents.
yuk*
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/22/us/instagram-child-influencers.html?unlocked_article_code=1.Xk0.kP-g.QEqSLFLcdo4a&smid=wa-share
Too little, too late.
/
The United States on Friday restored its longstanding policy that settlements are inconsistent with international law, reversing a stance implemented by the former administration, hours after Israel announced a plan to advance the construction of thousands of new settlement homes in response to a terror shooting in the West Bank.
“We’ve seen the reports and I have to say we’re disappointed in the announcement,” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in response to a question on the matter during a press conference in Argentina.
“It’s been long-standing US policy under Republican and Democratic administrations alike that new settlements are counterproductive to reaching an enduring peace.”
https://www.timesofisrael.com/us-pans-israeli-w-bank-construction-plans-revives-policy-deeming-settlements-illegal/
"We’ve seen the reports and I have to say we’re disappointed in the announcement,” US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in response to a question on the matter during a press conference in Argentina.
“It’s been long-standing US policy under Republican and Democratic administrations alike that new settlements are counterproductive to reaching an enduring peace.”
The genocide-enabling USA make me want to puke. "Disappointed". Really?
How about what you are doing is wrong on so many levels so fucking stop it or we will not supply you with any more weapons and you're on your own."
Nah. It's just "counter-productive."
The USA government should be despised as genocide enablers.
Because becoming more conservative as you age is about about getting richer. And millennials/gen z have never got richer because boomers grabbed the lot for themselves. It's not fucking rocket science.
/
The Link between Age and Conservatism Is Breaking
Millennials and Gen Z are not becoming more conservative as they age, as generations before them did. Why?
[…]
Most polls show that Millennials and Gen Z are not becoming more conservative as they age, the way that Boomers and Gen X did before them.
https://archive.li/jWQBQ (NRO)
Dunno if you can blame the boomers…
They only lived under the dictates of successive governments…and they are the ones who skewed the playing field so…
Remove the boomers…and you still have the same political masters…doing the same shit..
..and the same poverty etc…
Blame the politicians (of all stripes..)
Don't scapegoat all over the boomers…
It only takes a few bastards in each generation to ensure things never really change for the better. Don't blame the entire generation.
How is things in Moscow ?
[TheStandard: A moderator moved this comment to Open Mike as being off topic or irrelevant in the post it was made in. Be more careful in future.]
[One month off for flaming – Incognito]
[I have reduced your ban to two weeks because you apologised. Let this be a lesson for the future – Incognito]
Hows your small penis?
[Three weeks off for counter-flaming – Incognito]
Mod note
Mod note
Second Mod note
Of course the coalition of chaos plans to allow the Seamounts of the Southwest Pacific to be vandalised.
In the Southeast Pacific, off the coast of Chile, underwater mountains create a breathtaking deep-sea landscape where cold-water corals, intricate glass sponges, anemones, and a host of creatures that captivate the imagination are thriving. Nearly half of the animals living here exist nowhere else on Earth. Seamounts are oases for biodiversity; for the last month, an international team of scientists explored this understudied region in our global ocean. Data and imagery collected on the #SEPacificSeamounts expedition will help advance Chile’s effort to establish a high-seas marine protected area along the Nazca and Salas y Gómez Ridges.
VALPARAISO, Chile – An international group of scientists, led by Dr. Javier Sellanes of the Universidad Católica del Norte, may have discovered more than 100 new species living on seamounts off the coast of Chile. The recent Schmidt Ocean Institute expedition resulted in identifying deep-sea corals, glass sponges, sea urchins, amphipods, squat lobsters, and other species likely new to science.
https://schmidtocean.org/underwater-mountains-harbor-abundant-life/
https://schmidtocean.photoshelter.com/galleries/C0000QszlkoaNkKU/G0000ISlDmCQILdA/Seamounts-of-SE-Pacific-FKt240108-Press-Release
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"police given extra powers to stop gang members congregating "
So, freedom of association is gone, but freedom of speech is in; that's straightforward!
https://www.stuff.co.nz/nz-news/350191502/new-law-give-police-courts-greater-powers-gang-crackdown
Those new laws are basically unenforceable. Mere window-dressing to keep the useful idiots happy.
There is a wry chuckle to be had considering the millions spent on the rebranding, so that we will use the name Woolworths.
The rats in the Dunedin supermarket are at a Countdown.