Ministry makes inexplicable greenhouse gas errors

Questions need to be asked as to how the Ministry of Economic Development could get its calculations of greenhouse emissions from gas fired power stations so wrong, Green Party Co-Leader Jeanette Fitzsimons says.

Ms Fitzsimons was commenting on a Ministry of Economic Development press release that its original figures had been incorrect, and had needed to be reprinted in its Revised New Zealand Energy Greenhouse Gas Emissions 1990-2005.

"A million tonnes out of 8 million is a huge error. If it had been emissions from agriculture or forestry that were miscounted it would have been understandable - those sectors are notoriously hard to measure.

"But the electricity companies know how much gas they buy, the gas companies know how much they sell, and the electricity generated also gives an accurate measure of how much gas had to be used.

"It is vital that our emissions calculations are reliable as you can't manage what you can't measure - or mis-measure, " Ms Fitzsimons says.

"The public needs to be able to have confidence in the official numbers."

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