Mike's Minute: Nimbyism will kill us

Another swing and a miss.  Contact Energy wanted to build a wind farm in Southland. They have been turned down. They are not the first and they will not be the last.  Close to $300 million and hundreds of jobs are now not happening because of it.  Also, the need to build 15GW of additional capacity in the next 25 years will not be happening either. So far, we have built less than 3GW.  We are entering yet another winter where it is touch and go on power supply.  The Minister has been busy wagging his finger at the gentailers.   The climate campaigners bark on about the role of renewables, yet we continue to import record amounts of coal to cover the gap.  We have cut a deal to keep Huntly going ever longer because the renewable dream is getting further and further away. Renewables may or may not be the answer to our problems at all.  The simple truth about water, sun, and wind is they are beyond our control.  Coal and nuclear isn't. But we seem to insist renewables are what we want to do, and yet we don’t.  Nimbyism will kill us. We seem happy to be shocked every year at the coal pile and we seem to be happy to be unhappy at the idea we don’t have enough power to get us through a winter.  The industry tells us they are investing in wind and solar. But are they?  How many get turned down vs how many actually get the go ahead? Are we actually progressing, or taking a step forward and a step back?  Here is the ultimate irony: there's been a lot said about this Government's fast track law. Their fast track law is actually just an extension, or an amendment, of the old fast track law, which Labour produced during Covid.  Under that fast track law this wind project got turned down.  So, is a “no” fast tracking? Or no tracking?  If you can't get a wind farm through under fast track, are we actually into solving issues or not?   See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.