Floodwaters washed through Te Paranui Animal and Farm Sanctuary, near SH1 at Tuamarina, in Tasman, overnight between 27 and 28 June, 2025. Photo: Supplied/ Facebook
Councils and government have been told they can't keep bailing out flood and storm victims, but that will be a hard sell when expectations are already in place
The 100-year floods are rolling in on a regular basis; the rain doesn't let up; no one wants a cliff-top property anymore.
Climate change is no longer just about things you can't see or touch. It's about running from rising water and bailing out the basement.
"I think there has been a lot of emphasis both in reporting and in people's understanding of climate change ... and the science behind that and how it's getting worse," says RNZ In Depth reporter Kate Newton.
"We're now starting to shift our focus because of these severe weather events that we're seeing more frequently, and at a greater level of severity, to what that actually means for us now, and the fact that climate change is no longer this far-off, distant prospect, but something that is affecting real people and real lives, at this very moment."
Today on The Detail we look at how we adapt to this new normal, and who will pay for it, after a report by an Independent Reference Group recommended essentially that the days of property buy-outs have a limited life.
The reference group included economists, iwi, bankers, insurance and local government representatives and was set up by the Ministry for the Environment.
Newton goes through the findings on climate mitigation and adaption, which she says are politically unpalatable, and extremely expensive.
"There's a whole lot that goes into it and every step of it is complex and every step of it is expensive. But we also need to remember that even if we do nothing, it's still expensive.
"I think the top estimates of costs involved with Cyclone Gabrielle was $14.5 billion - it's a huge amount of money.
"But you're looking at things like, even just understanding where the risk is, and how severe that risk is, and how it might change in the future - it's a huge amount of work."
The government wants bipartisan support on decisions because future certainty is required but also, Newton points out, because of the bleak message it's likely to send - in the words of one critic: "You are on your own".
But firm decisions are unlikely to come any time soon.
"It's something that's been a long time coming and I think [climate change minister] Simon Watts is running into similar problems to his predecessor James Shaw, who tried for six years to pass a climate change adaptation act," says Newton.
The main issue with that failure was around the complexity of how we do it and who pays for it.
"This is one of those big thorny issues that if you're changing the rules and changing how people adapt every three or six or nine years, it gives nobody any certainty in the future."
Earth Sciences NZ (which is the merger of NIWA with GNS) has done a huge amount of modelling work around the country, mapping coastal inundation risks, and its next body of work due out soon is on inland inundation.
Other bodies of work have pointed out that we need spatial planning to avoid destruction by weather in the future. That includes identifying areas of particular risk, and having a plan for them, whether that is creating a wetland or building a sea wall or stop banks, or if a retreat from an area should be mandated.
But councils aren't required by legislation to do such work; and if the government puts a cap on rates as it's discussing, it's likely they won't be able to. They just won't have the money.
Small councils also have the issue that their planning departments might consist of one or two people, and the job is far bigger than that.
As well, specialists who were doing such work have had job cuts - and those experts have gone overseas where their skills are in demand.
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