The National Party has recently released its energy policy. National says it would promote gas-fired power stations and as such it would overturn a current ban by the Government on the building of new base-load thermal power stations. The policy is a step backward from New Zealand’s goal of 90% of electricity generated from renewable resources by 2025. Under present policy existing fossil fuel generation will be phased out as it is replaced with more environmentally sustainable means of generating electricity, such as wind and hydro.

National’s policy has, unsurprisingly, been criticized by the Green Party:

The policy has no security of supply where fossil fuels are concerned. It’s a false promise. The cost of all fossil fuels are going through the roof all over the world and the National Party wants us to commit to another 30 years of it, when in fact renewable energy options are cheaper. New geothermal and wind power stations are being built right now. Just as bad generals always plan for the last war, the Nats are planning to solve the problems of the past.

said co-leader Jeanette Fitzsimons in a press release.

Meanwhile the fourth Australia-New Zealand Climate Change and Business Conference that begins tomorrow has identified using biomass made from cow dung for electricity generation as a possibility for New Zealand’s future. Such a plan would surely be beneficial, not only would it contribute to renewable electricity generation, it would also utilize a by-product of the dairy industry that usually contributes to environmental degradation though methane emissions and farm run-off into rivers. That the plan was identified as “one way New Zealand could make billions” however seems to show priorities are in the wrong place.