Climate Action LedgerTracking climate leadership · Aotearoa NZ
LL-005··Labour-led coalition (with NZ First)·legislation

ETS reform - auctioning and unit limits (2020)

Win +1

What happened

Climate Change Response (Emissions Trading Reform) Amendment Act 2020: introduced ETS unit auctioning (from 2021), annual unit limits, cost containment reserve, phase-down of industrial free allocation, and pathway for agricultural emissions pricing.

Why it matters

Strengthened NZ's primary carbon pricing instrument - central to meeting domestic budgets.

Impact assessment

Major ETS strengthening; agricultural pricing leg of reform not implemented by term end.

Limitations: Ag pricing deferred; later partially reversed by successor government.

Attribution

shared (high confidence) -Labour, Greens

Labour-led ETS reform package; Shaw as Climate Minister.

Coalition period: Labour-led coalition (with NZ First) (26 October 2017 - 16 October 2020)

Categories

governancemitigation

Sources