NZ's economic growth is "approaching its environmental limits", a once-a-decade environmental report card says.

Gareth Morgan's The Opportunities Party would ban subsidies on fossil fuels, increase the price of carbon and overhaul energy efficiency efforts under a climate change policy launched this evening.

A leading climate scientist has welcomed a new 20-year Government "roadmap" that singles out climate change as an environmental research priority for New Zealand.

COMMENT: The sooner we take action, the lower the cost will be and the less damage we will pass on to future generations.

New Zealand is being accused of cheating to fulfil its international climate change obligations.

Many suspect the design of ETS, with no price floor and emissions cap, was never intended to make a difference to our climate changing emissions.

Limiting the conversation to short-term costs avoids dealing with the much greater long-term consequences, writes Tim Naish.

After many years focused on creative accounting, New Zealand is facing pressure to deliver emission reduction results.

The Government has adopted a soft unilateral target for reducing carbon emissions by 2020, but Climate Change Minister Tim Groser said a future Government might lift it, should progress towards an international agreement post-2020 warrant it.

The Government's climate change policy is a shambles and a disgrace, writes Brian Fallow. "Unless, that is, you are happy for the costs of the inevitable adjustment to a low-carbon future to be needlessly increased."

As Australia is renewing its commitment to the Kyoto Protocol, New Zealand has backed off, leaving Greenpeace to label the move embarrassing.

A crash in the price of carbon credits could force landowners who invested in new forests to sell their land, an analyst says.

Reaction to the Government's announcement yesterday to postpone key stages of the emissions trading scheme.

The Government has indefinitely postponed key stages of the emissions trading scheme.

The Government has pushed out the dates and levels at which New Zealand will face higher carbon costs under the emissions trading scheme.