Ref: 2223-2036

 

Kia ora J Bruning,

On behalf of the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment I
acknowledge your email of 10 March 2023 requesting under the Official
Information Act 1982 (the Act), the following:

“Please provide

 

1.           All plans/reports/forecasts from 2017 onwards, analysing
projected energy needs to 2035 by sector/industry (industrial, transport,
commercial, residential, agriculture) to support the wellbeing of the
citizens of Aotearoa New Zealand and the New Zealand economy.

 

2.           Allowing for transitional shifts in energy supply, please
supply all plans/reports/forecasts from 2017 onwards detailing breakdowns
of percentage/units of each energy sector expected to supply energy to
each of the above sectors over this time:

a.           renewable electricity (by renewable sector
water/hydrothermal/wind /sea etc);

b.           coal

c.           gas

d.           biofuel

 

3.           All reports/estimates/reviews and information detailing
sources of biofuels (including feedstock).

 

4.           All papers/plans/reports advice and information outlining the
changing ownership structure of the energy sector to 2035 from 2020
onwards. I.e., publicly owned assets, public-private or private.

 

5.           All available New Zealand-based literature reviews of the
scientific information and white and grey papers assessing costs, human
rights implications and pollution impact of renewable energy
infrastructure development in (a) low-income and (b) high-income nations.
This includes total energy required to mine, manufacture and ship
infrastructure and technologies to New Zealand. This includes projected
lifecycles of the renewable energy infrastructure.”

Your request is being processed in accordance with the Act and a response
will be sent to you in due course. If you have any enquiries regarding
your request feel free to contact us via email [1][MBIE request email] or
using the contact details below.

 

Nâku noa, nâ

Ministerial Services

 

Ngâ Pou o te Taumaru

Ministry of Business, Innovation & Employment

15 Stout Street, Wellington 6011 |  PO Box 1473 Wellington 6140

 

References

Visible links
1. mailto:[MBIE request email]

Kia ora J Bruning,

Thank you for your Official Information Act request of 10 March 2023, asking for:

1. All plans/reports/forecasts from 2017 onwards, analysing projected energy needs to 2035 by sector/industry (industrial, transport, commercial, residential, agriculture) to support the wellbeing of the citizens of Aotearoa New Zealand and the New Zealand economy.

2. Allowing for transitional shifts in energy supply, please supply all plans/reports/forecasts from 2017 onwards detailing breakdowns of percentage/units of each energy sector expected to supply energy to each of the above sectors over this time: a. renewable electricity (by renewable sector water/hydrothermal/wind /sea etc); b. coal c. gas d. biofuel

3. All reports/estimates/reviews and information detailing sources of biofuels (including feedstock).

4. All papers/plans/reports advice and information outlining the changing ownership structure of the energy sector to 2035 from 2020 onwards. I.e., publicly owned assets, public-private or private.

5. All available New Zealand-based literature reviews of the scientific information and white and grey papers assessing costs, human rights implications and pollution impact of renewable energy infrastructure development in (a) low-income and (b) high-income nations. This includes total energy required to mine, manufacture and ship infrastructure and technologies to New Zealand. This includes projected lifecycles of the renewable energy infrastructure.

We have attempted to scope your request for information, however, based on the breadth of your request we believe that substantial collation and research will be required to prepare a response.

This is because your request seeks “all reports” etc, over a significant period of time on a number of topics, and would require us to manually identify items, across a range of energy areas (electricity, gas, biofuels, energy transition, etc.) over five years. Given the breadth of the request, it is likely that the scope as drafted could capture almost all papers produced by
MBIE’s energy policy teams. Given the time period, this could lead to tens of thousands of documents, taking a dedicated resource many months to collate.

I also note the last part of your request could be interpreted to be seeking a range of public literature available to MBIE, that may have been referenced when considering renewable energy infrastructure development. We do not believe such information would necessarily be ‘held’ by our agency, and wanted to make sure any refinement makes clear whether you’re seeking MBIE commissioned reports or just studies that touch on the negative impacts of different renewable energy options.

Please note that should we determine that the response requires substantially collation and research, we may decide to refuse the request under section 18(f) of the Act.

Based on the above, we would like to invite you to refine your request to a more manageable size. There are a number of ways to do this, by identifying the type of documents you are referring (e.g. Briefings/reports to specific ministers on a particular issue), narrowing the timeframe of your request, and by reviewing information that is already publicly available to help identify further sources of advice.

You can search through publicly available documents on our website at:
https://www.mbie.govt.nz/document-library/

We recommend this as a useful place to begin your refinement, as I note an initial search of documents published since 2017 using the search term “renewable energy” returns 184 documents, a search for “energy transition” returns 16, while a search for “biofuels” returns 102 documents. It may be the case that much of the information you’re interested in finding is already available, and a review of this information may provide you the ability to request specific documents that may be of interest.

Ngâ mihi

Matthew

Senior Ministerial Advisor
Building Resources and Markets

show quoted sections

Kia ora J Bruning,

Please find attached a response to your Official Information Act request.

Ngā mihi

Matthew

Principal Ministerial Advisor
Building Resources and Markets