Review
of Units During the First Commitment Period
An independent review of the 2009 net position
has been completed by the Australian office
of AECOM (www.AECOM.com), a global environmental
and engineering consulting company.
The key findings of
the review were that the central projection
was a reasonable estimate of future emissions
and that the process for preparing the emissions
projection was sensible and well constructed.
The review team found no issues that would
materially affect the central estimate.
The review team did make recommendations
that will improve the treatment of the scenarios
and sensitivities around the central net
position estimate and made useful suggestions
that will make it easier for readers to
locate emissions data that is held across
different government agencies. Officials
from across the Ministry for the Environment,
the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry,
and the Ministry for Economic Development
will make some of the improvements recommended
by AECOM to the net position process.
Executive summary
The New Zealand Government
prepares projections on an annual basis
to track its expected future level of emissions,
particularly in relation to whether it will
meet its Kyoto Protocol target. AECOM was
selected to review these projections (Review
of the Projected Balance of Kyoto Protocol
Units) and assess whether they were a reasonable
estimate, as well as provide advice about
improvements that could be made to the New
Zealand Government’s process of preparing
emission projections.
AECOM assessed the projections
as presented in the Projected Balance of
Kyoto Protocol Units (2009) and, while noting
that there are always uncertainties about
projecting future trends in human activities
and resulting emissions, determined that
the ‘best’ projection was a reasonable estimate
of future emissions.
The review team also
determined that the process for preparing
the emissions projection was sensible and
well constructed. New Zealand has developed
a practical system for estimating future
levels of emissions that is reflective of
its national circumstances.
The review team did
note, however, several areas where revisions
to approaches would provide more consistent
results and help stakeholders in better
understanding the projections process.
This included treatment
of a number of technical issues within each
sector. While these were typically minor
and specific to individual sectors, there
was a lack of clarity around the treatment
of scenarios and sensitivity to particular
assumptions.
The review team also
noted a number of cross-sectoral issues.
These primarily related to consistency of
treatment and clarity in explanation for
preparation of high and low estimates and
uncertainty. It would therefore be beneficial
if a common template was prepared to categorise
and highlight assumptions used in each sector.
Addressing these issues would provide greater
confidence in high and low projection estimates
but would not alter the ‘best’ estimate.
The review team also
found a number of areas of improvement for
addressing over the longer term. These include
ensuring the projections were based on more
than one model, or at the very least, that
there was some form of cross-check using
a different approach. The review team also
noted issues with documentation and ensuring
the underpinning processes for preparing
the projections were explained well. Although
it may take several years to fully address
these issues, improvements in these areas
would lead to better transparency and the
capacity to more easily assess future projections
of emissions: they would not change the
projections themselves.
