We need more active transport and more electric public transport and we should be reducing the number of cars on the road, but many New Zealanders still need a car. For those that remain, they should all be the more efficient electric versions. 

To give an example of the efficiency gain and reduction in energy from switching to an EV, with an electric motor, about 90% of the energy is put towards moving the car. In a fossil fuel car, 80% of the energy gets wasted as heat, vibration and noise and the waste is buried in the sky. It’s like buying a pizza and only eating two slices. 

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Approximately 40% of all global sea freight is in the transportation of fossil fuels so when you electrify your car, you also help remove the tankers from the water and the trucks from the road. 

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We agree that where possible, people should opt for active and public transport. But where cars are required, we are pushing to ensure that they are all EVs so that we can eliminate all need for fossil fuels in our transport sector, including the cost of fossil fuel distribution.

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Renters make up around one third of households in New Zealand. Some landlords may be open to installing solar panels and electric appliances, especially as it is likely to enhance the property value and attractiveness as a rental. You could calculate a value proposition and negotiate a slight rental increase in exchange for a larger power bill reduction, something often called a comfort levy. This means both the landlord and the tenants benefit - the landlord gets more rent and a more valuable property, the tenant gets a cheaper power bill, and the savings come from the sun.

Renters (especially if there is access to offstreet parking so they can charge at home) can get all the benefits of an electric vehicle and there are an increasing number of affordable second-hand options that can cope with most urban driving requirements, and portable induction stoves are available for those who don’t want to cook with gas, especially given the health impacts of indoor gas appliances. 

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Reducing carbon emissions is crucial to avoid the worst impacts of climate change. But if someone invented a machine that removes greenhouse gases from the atmosphere at an industrial scale and therefore ‘fixes’ climate change, would electrification still be worth doing? Our answer is ‘hell yeah!’ because electrifying everything can improve human wellbeing along multiple metrics. This depends on how we roll out the energy transition, and on whether we design energy markets, supply chains and policy mixes to avoid inequity and injustice. But if we get ahead of the curve, we can ensure that everyone enjoys the benefits of electrification, now and into the future.

People sometimes talk about ‘carbon tunnel vision’ – that is, the single-minded pursuit of emission reductions at the sake of everything else.

But this is the wrong way to think about electrification. It isn’t only about emissions. It isn’t only about the tech or the kit: the rooftop solar panels, the batteries, the electrified appliances and vehicles. These are just the means to an end.

Electrification is about people and it is a fundamentally better way to power our lives and livelihoods. By comparison to fossil fuel energy, renewable energy is cheaper, cleaner, more efficient, more abundant and more resilient over the long run. Consequently, the electrification of everything is set to enhance human wellbeing in various ways, often with immediate benefits.

Rather than tunnel vision, we like to look at electrification with panoptic vision.

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We will not reach our climate targets or reduce the impact of global heating by planting trees. We need to reduce emissions from fossil fuel use. 

As an example, on Forest Lodge Orchard, planting 9,300 cherry trees removed about three tonnes of Co2 emissions per year. But burning diesel pumped out around 50 tonnes of carbon emissions each year, or about 18 times the carbon being sucked up via the trees. 

If we relied solely on planting trees, we wouldn’t have enough land to suck up the carbon we are emitting; nor would the trees grow fast enough to solve the problem in front of us right now.

If the government needs to pay for offsets to meet its emissions targets, we believe it should instead consider paying New Zealanders to reduce their fuel emissions through electrification.

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This is really a categorisation problem and it goes back to the 1970s. Cars, for example, are counted as part of the transport sector. But the kind of car you buy is a household decision. And that’s where it should be counted. 

By recategorising where these emissions come from, we can show that households make up a much bigger number than conventionally thought and it’s low-hanging fruit for emissions reductions. That’s why we think the Government needs to prioritise household electrification in its emissions reduction plans. 

Around 25% of gross emissions come from small machines that households and businesses use. They’re decisions made around the dinner tables and boardroom tables and the emissions those decisions lead to are much larger than traditionally thought and able to be removed by switching to electric equivalents. 

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The main benefits of electrification are lower costs for households, but electrifying everything in your household or businesses is likely to have a bigger impact on emissions than any other decision you make - and you can do it right now. 

We call them ‘dinner table decisions’ and these decisions made by households are an underappreciated opportunity for the country to reduce its emissions. They make up around 30% of our domestic emissions, and electrification is low-hanging fruit for reductions. When you add businesses in, that number is even higher. 

When you compare household machines with domestic flights, you can see the significant impact they make over their lifetimes.

• If you buy a new petrol car instead of an electric vehicle, that is the emissions equivalent of 107 return flights between Auckland and Queenstown over the lifetime of that vehicle. 
• If you decide to install a gas hot water heating system rather than a much more efficient hot water heat pump, that is the emissions equivalent of 20 return flights between Auckland and Queenstown over the lifetime of that system. 
• Using LPG to heat your home rather than a heat pump is the emissions equivalent of 35 return flights between Auckland and Queenstown over the lifetime of that heating system. 
• And while gas cooktops don’t use a huge amount of energy in the home, the fuel you need to burn is the emissions equivalent of six return flights between Auckland and Queenstown over the lifetime of the cooktop

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Compared to a fossil fuelled home, the emissions savings over the lifetime of those machines is huge.

Our global emissions problem is primarily an energy problem. Around 73% of global emissions come from energy. 

Solving that energy problem in practice is a machine problem. 

Underneath all our energy emissions categories sit fossil fuel machines - from coal-fired power plants and industrial boilers to petrol vehicles and gas water heaters. If we want to avoid the worst of global heating, we need to swap those fossil fuel machines for more efficient electric alternatives and power them with renewable energy from the grid, rooftop solar and batteries. And we need to do it very quickly. 

Conventional thinking has focused on finding solutions for large-emitters, but we don't have enough electric planes or green steel and there is no such thing as a non-burping cow. Behaviour change is needed, but takes time - which we don’t have. By recategorising where our emissions actually come from, we have shown that the millions of "demand-side" machines like cars, trucks, tractors, space and water heaters have been under-appreciated when it comes to rapid emissions reduction.

These are the low-hanging fruit that we can eliminate now. Climate change is a cumulative emissions problem, so the faster we act, the less warming we get. By electrifying these machines now, we cut a significant chunk of our emissions immediately and buy us time for the more difficult, longer-term behaviour change and deep tech improvements that we need.