ISSUE #6: Environment

AKA: climate change, pollution

What this graph shows

• Emissions intensity = greenhouse gas emissions divided by GDP. In other words, greenhouse gas emissions relative to economic output.
• We can't rely on emissions alone, as changes in economic activity and population growth can distort the picture. For example, emissions might increase overall while emissions per capita or per unit of economic output are declining, or vice versa.
• 2010 Q1 onwards, which is when this data series began.

Key notes

• The environment consists broadly of air/space, waters, land/plants, animals, and climate, however, the KPI most commonly discussed is human GHG emissions.
• We originally tracked absolute emissions, but realised during the 2023–2024 recession that a shrinking economy could make emissions appear to be improving, even without an improvement in emissions efficiency. The data was also only available annually, and there was a 1.6-year delay in getting it.
• The Covid-19 restrictions and lockdowns, which began on 19 March 2020 nationwide, and continued at various times until the final Auckland lockdown ended on 15 December 2021, including retrictions on international travel, obviously had a significant impact on reducing emissions for some of this timeframe. but it also reduced GDP, so the trend remained relatively similar. However, they also reduced GDP, meaning emissions intensity did not necessarily improve to the same extent. This is another good reason why emissions intensity is a more informative metric than emissions alone. Context and judgments like this are subjective, so they are impossible to show in a graph. It is up to each reader to evaluate the proportion of responsibility they place on each government over the timeframe shown, versus factors outside of their control.
• External factors can also influence these results, and context is important, but governments are ultimately accountable for New Zealand's performance.
• Remember that each Labour-led or National-led government has had coalition or support partners that share in their successes and failures. A full list of governments for this time range is at the bottom of this page.

Why this KPI?

• The most commonly referenced environmental statistic is human greenhouse gas emissions, or GHG for short.
• The correct technical term is anthropogenic emissions (human-induced), which means/isolates the changes humans have made in their surrounding environment.
• GHG emissions are measured in million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (C02-e) by creating a combined metric of various greenhouse gases:
  • CO2 = Carbon dioxide (approximately 45% of NZ’s anthropogenic GHGs)
  • CH4 = Methane (~43%)
  • N2O = Nitrous oxide (~10%)
  • Combined F-gases (~2%)
• The Ministry for the Environment measures both:
  • Gross emissions.
  • Net emissions after accounting for emissions and removals from land use, land-use change and forestry, including carbon sequestration from activities such as planting trees.
• Stats NZ then combines emissions data with its GDP data series to create the Emissions Intensity metric.
• The policies of the two largest political parties reference 2030 targets in nominal terms, and also the net zero target by 2050. However, we haven't shown absolute emissions for the reasons given above. We believe emissions relative to GDP is a superior measure of emissions efficiency.
• Emissions per capita would also be useful and we will share this as resources allow.
• It’s important to note that GHG measurements are contested. Some argue the science, some question the accounting, and others believe that New Zealand’s natural sequestration of carbon from all plant life, e.g. grasses, seaweed, mangroves, and plankton too, already exceeds the additional emissions from New Zealanders each year.

Discarded

Temperatures

• Earth’s temperatures throughout history have risen and fallen during different geological periods, e.g. the ice ages, periods associated with the extinction of the dinosaurs, and major volcanic events, so this is a very difficult and contested measurement, and not a great one for the environment KPI.

Data sources

https://www.stats.govt.nz/information-releases/greenhouse-gas-emissions-industry-and-household-june-2026-quarter/

Data timing

• Frequency: Quarterly
• Update delay: ~4 months
• Last update: April-June 2026 = 21 October 2026
• Next update: July-September = 4 February 2027

Related facts

Some of these articles contain historical data and analysis that may not have been updated since publication. Please check the dates when interpreting the findings.

• Hawke's Bay flooding mid-February, 2023
• North Island flooding late-January to mid-February, 2023
• Auckland flooding Jan 27, 2023
• Drinking water quality by supplier size
• Coal imports vs. exports
• Coal use

Wishlist

With support, we’ll be able to add multiple KPIs for each issue:

• Updates on many of the KPIs listed above.
• Landfill per capita
• True recycling (not just what is collected)
• Air quality/pollution
• Lake/river/ocean quality
• Drinking water quality (coming on www.theFacts.nz soon)
• Renewable electricity generation
• Rainfall over history
• Temperatures over history
• Trees (can be misleading if the pastures replaced aren’t counted, or native plantings aren’t counted)

Governments over the timeframe shown

• 2008 = National + ACT, United, Māori
  2011 = National + ACT, United, Māori
  2014 = National + ACT, United, Māori
  
  
• 2017 = Labour/NZ First + Green
  2020 = Labour + Green

• 2023 = National/ACT/NZ First

/ = Coalition partners
+ = Other formal governing agreements, including confidence and supply, support and cooperation.

Sources:1,2 (table 5).

© Copyright

Data published by Stats NZ
© Crown Copyright
Licensed for use under the creative commons attribution licence (BY) 4.0

Analysis and graphics © KPI.nz 2026. Please share widely! You're welcome to reproduce our work with attribution and a link to the original post.

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