Government's missing the point on climate change

Rosemary Penwarden wonders why coal is still being produced and transported in such huge quantities. Photo / Supplied

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Finance Minister Grant Robertson came to Dunedin last week to dish out $85 million to KiwiRail's Hillside workshops for wagon assembly and other great stuff. Trains are back in favour.

Grant Robertson said rail is one of the best industries to invest in because it creates jobs and deals with climate change issues. He's right. Getting freight and people off the road and electrifying the entire route will reduce our emissions.

I love trains. KiwiRail recently took me from Wellington to Auckland. It was marvellous. As a kid I drank from sturdy NZ Rail cups and ate scalding mince pies sold in Taihape by white- aproned ladies. Nowadays the white-aproned ladies have gone but the Wishbone food is still microwaved to scalding point. The Raurimu Spiral still makes me ridiculously happy and the viaducts over Mt Ruapehu's deep river gorges still give me wobbly knees. I chatted for hours with a train enthusiast about trains, the climate crisis, life and the universe. You can do that on trains.

But wait. KiwiRail also carries coal, the dirtiest fossil fuel in the world. Every day one train carries 76 tonnes of coal from Bathurst Resources' mine in Southland, through my home town of Dunedin, to be burned in Fonterra's Clandeboye milk factory in Canterbury. That's like putting 2500 extra cars on the road every day. KiwiRail even contributed $5 million of our taxpayer money to maintain the line between Nightcaps and Invercargill that exclusively carries coal - Bathurst and Fonterra's private line if you like. How is that dealing with climate change issues, Mr Robertson?

KiwiRail also hauls coal across the alps to Lyttelton to be burned in other countries, and picks up Indonesian coal in Tauranga to be burned in Genesis' Huntly power station.
All up KiwiRail aids in the yearly dumping of more than 5 million tonnes of carbon dioxide into our atmosphere.

David Clark, Minister of State Owned Enterprises, said if KiwiRail stopped hauling coal it's likely the task would move to road and create further emissions from increased vehicle movements.

He's right, but misses the point. The point is we need a fast and fair phase-out of coal, beginning yesterday. The point is the Government needs to deal with the climate crisis the way they're dealing with Covid and the point is, they're not. They're not prepared to phase out coal until 2037. That's close to another 100 million tonnes of CO2 dumped into our children's atmosphere.

The climate crisis is real and here now. Like Covid, to go slow is to lose. The Government has promised to phase coal out of schools and hospitals by 2025. Good for them, but we can't stop there.

I remember the bustling affair that was the Wanganui East Town Railway workshops. Their gates closed in 1986 putting 450 people out of work. But Covid has revealed the cracks in our global supply chain. Local jobs and manufacturing, the likes of Hillside and East Town, have a big part to play in our future low-carbon economy. We need to recreate the skills right here at home, and fast.

I was 19 years too late to get the train home to Dunedin from the North Island. You can still catch rail from Picton to Christchurch on winter weekends and the Coastal Pacific scenery is glorious, but KiwiRail abandons passengers at Christchurch.

Here's my wish to ministers Robertson and Clark: an electric passenger train from Whangarei to Invercargill, and a liveable future climate for my grandkids.

Rosemary Penwarden is a Whanganui-born-and-bred grandmother, now living an off-grid low-carbon lifestyle on 4 hectares of land near Dunedin.