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For Stuff’s climate election survey, we asked parties about plans to improve the quality of Kiwi houses.
You can find a quick-compare table, summarising parties’ environmental policies, here.
New Zealand homes are comparatively cold, damp and draughty. With heat leaking through under-insulated walls, windows and doors, houses use more energy to maintain the same temperature. These homes consume more natural gas or electricity (some of which comes from coal and gas power stations).
In 2009, National and the Greens paired up to launch a residential home programme that provided 33% of the cost of insulation for older houses – with Community Service Card-holders eligible for nearly double that. Grants for cleaner heaters were also in the mix.
The Labour Government increased the share of funding provided. It now provides up to 80% of the cost for ceiling and underfloor insulation and 80% of an approved heater. The cash allocated in Budget 2023 is expected to retrofit more than 100,000 homes over four years. There are now subsidies for highly efficient LED bulbs as well.
The eligibility criteria have been tweaked over the years. Currently, houses need to be in a location high on the official “Deprivation Index” to qualify.
Earlier this year, an alliance of consumer and public health organisations called for government funding to improve at least 200,000 homes.
Here’s each party’s views.
The Green Party has announced a policy to provide a $6000 grant and an interest-free loan of up to $30,000 to pay for better insulation, rooftop solar and swapping fossil appliances for cleaner tech such as heat pumps.
Labour pledged to maintain its current programme, retrofitting 100,000 homes.
In a policy announced a few weeks after the survey, Labour said it would help homeowners and landlords to ditch fossil-fuelled appliances. A homeowner could be eligible for a rebate of up to $18,000 if they undertook a deep energy retrofit of a home, with smaller amounts to encourage the switch from gas or the installation of insulation and highly efficient windows.
Landlords could also receive $3000 to replace gas systems with electric appliances.
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The party wanted the scheme to cover 200,000 homes.
The party said it “has yet to announce our policy in this area”.
Act doesn’t support grants for home insulation or heating.
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