Source: Greenpeace
Today, the Court of Appeal has ruled against Greenpeace in its challenge to the High Court’s ruling to greenlight consent for hydrogen expansion of synthetic nitrogen fertiliser production at the Kāpuni factory in Taranaki, but despite this ruling, Greenpeace is calling on Hiringa Energy to commit to a timeframe for transitioning from fertiliser production to transport fuel.
Greenpeace Aotearoa programme director Niamh O’Flynn says, “This is a loss for the climate and for fresh water in Aotearoa, as well as for local hapū of Ngāruahine, who also have issues with the project, but we call on Hiringa Energy to do the right thing and commit to a transition out of fertiliser production within five years as well as honouring the wishes of local hapū with regards to the location of the wind turbines.”
“Climate justice is interconnected with te Tiriti justice, so working with iwi and hapū must be central to all new energy infrastructure developments. It is vital for the success of these projects to do right by local Māori and the environment,” says O’Flynn.
Greenpeace and local hapū of Ngāruahine will regroup to determine the next course of action relating to the project.
O’Flynn says, “With their dogmatic refusal to put an end date on the proposed plant’s use for producing climate-killing urea, Hiringa and Ballance agri-nutrients are giving wind energy a bad name in one of the regions where important opportunities exist to use wind as a means of transition away from oil and gas.”
“Of course, Greenpeace supports wind power and green hydrogen, but not if it’s being used to create the products that cause climate change, kill rivers and contaminate drinking water.
“Fonterra and the dairy industry are New Zealand’s biggest climate and freshwater polluters, and it is synthetic nitrogen fertiliser that drives that pollution,” says O’Flynn.
Urea is the primary form of synthetic nitrogen fertiliser, and to make it, you need hydrogen. For urea synthesis, hydrogen is the building block for ammonia compounds, which are used as a feedstock for urea production. In the process of making ammonia and urea, hydrogen is the most sought-after commodity because it does not freely exist in nature.
The Kapuni factory, built in 1982 under Robert Muldoon’s “Think Big” program, is the only place in New Zealand where urea is made. The dairy industry uses 63% of all synthetic nitrogen fertilisers in New Zealand (including those imported by the other fertiliser giant Ravensdown) to drive highly polluting forms of intensive animal farming.
Synthetic nitrogen fertiliser is added to the land to supercharge pasture growth so the land can be crammed with too many cows. Here in Aotearoa, it is directly responsible for more climate pollution than the entire domestic aviation industry. Synthetic nitrogen fertiliser is in large part responsible for pushing dairy farming to extreme levels of intensity – making dairying New Zealand’s most polluting industry of the land, freshwater, the climate and the marine coastal environment.
The dairy industry is New Zealand’s primary source of methane and nitrous oxide (from urea and cow excreta), which are superheating greenhouse gases – cooking the climate far faster than carbon dioxide. It is also the main cause of nitrate contamination of groundwater (from cow urine and urea) which is turning rural people’s drinking water carcinogenic.
O’Flynn says, “If we are to solve climate change and protect our rivers and drinking water sources, we need to phase out the use of synthetic nitrogen fertiliser and significantly reduce the number of dairy cows.”
