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New Zealand could have up to 58,000 fewer fully or partially electric cars on the road in a decade's time, as a result of moves to weaken carbon emissions standards, government modelling suggests.
The modelling, prepared before Cabinet lowered the country's emissions standards for imported cars, found there could be 39,000 fewer fully electric vehicles and 19,000 fewer plug-in hybrid electric vehicles by 2035.
The biggest impact was in 2027, when registrations of both fully and partly electric vehicles could be up to 20 percent lower than predicted under standards in place earlier this year.
Clean car lobby group Better NZ Trust got the figures from the Ministry of Transport.
The ministry advised the government to lower the standards because car importers said they were unachievable, so the benefits of cleaner air, lower emissions and cheaper fuel bills would not be realised.
But the trust's chair Kathryn Trounson said the figures showed the change would have a bigger impact than the government suggested.
"Sixty thousand fewer low emissions vehicles and two megatonnes more emissions, we just can't afford that.
"Suggesting nobody wants to bring EVs to this part of the world is just a nonsense."
Transport officials concluded the import standards could still save more than nine million tonnes of emissions from the nation's car fleet between now and 2050, even after the standards were weakened.
They said the full benefits of tougher standards were unlikely to be realised even if they stayed in place, because they were unachievable for the car industry.
That conclusion was based on information from the car industry saying it would not be able to source enough electric and low-emissions cars to meet the tougher standards, and would be stung with hundreds of millions of dollars in fines for not meeting them.
Sourcing electric utes was a particular problem, after they failed to arrive in New Zealand as soon as expected.
Transport Minister Simeon Brown. Photo: Calvin Samuel / RNZ
Transport Minister Simeon Brown said the industry's estimate that importers would pay $800 million in penalties by 2027, which they would pass on to consumers, could not be checked independently by transport officials, because only car importers had access to supply information.
When environment officials saw the emissions modelling, they suggested it missed "important nuance" about how car emissions responded to carbon prices.
The Ministry for the Environment tried to change its advice to Cabinet to warn that the changes could make it "materially" harder to meet the country's climate targets.
"MfE's view is that this paper would have benefited from considering additional options that could better balance the impact on consumers and ambition for emissions reduction..
"This could include options to support industry to meet existing targets, options to adjust the level of charges for exceeding targets, and options for more moderate reductions in targets. Substantially reducing ambition from short-term targets should not be the only option considered in response to missing those targets," read the advice the environment ministry wanted to add.
However, it was told the Cabinet paper had already been lodged.
Documents show Brown directed his transport officials to engage with only three groups about the timeline and scope of the changes: the Motor Industry Association, the Imported Motor Vehicle Industry Association and the Motor Trade Association.
He ignored a suggestion from his officials that "you may also want to direct us to approach organisations that would have a high level of interest in the review, such as Drive Electric".
Brown said targeted consultation was appropriate "due to the technical nature of the proposals and because vehicle importers are most affected by any policy changes".
After consulting these groups, transport officials concluded the targets were unachievable and recommended Cabinet should change them.
Critics had an opportunity to present to the parliamentary committee considering the law changed needed to allow the weaker standards.
However Trounson said it felt like a "box-ticking exercise".
"It appears as if they don't want to hear the opposing view."
