By Robert McLachlan
I’m enjoying John Boshier’s “Power Surge: How Think Big and Rogernomics Transformed New Zealand”. For New Zealanders of a certain age, Think Big has cast a long shadow. I wonder if the generally negative popular view of Think Big played a role in opposition to the Lake Onslow project. Boshier gives a much more positive and nuanced view – Muldoon was faced with numerous crises to deal with simultaneously and oil imports were costing 15% of GDP (vs 2% now). In those circumstances, even the riskiest and least successful project, the synthetic petrol plant, made a kind of sense.
Incredibly, about a quarter of one year’s GDP was invested in eight Think Big projects over the six years from 1979 to 1984. That would be like spending $100 billion today.
Six of the eight are still operating successfully today. These are the ammonia-urea plant, the methanol plant, the third potline at Tiwai Point, the NZ Steel expansion, electrification of the North Island Main Trunk, and the Clyde dam. The eighth one, the Marsden Point oil refinery expansion, operating profitably for many years before closing in 2022 due to Chinese competition.
The final chapter, “Climate Changes Everything”, is fascinating, both for the relevance of Think Big to today’s decarbonisation challenge and for just how much has changed since the book was published in May 2022. Boshier’s examples of changes underway include:
– Tiwai Point closure (since reversed)
– Marsden Point closure (confirmed)
– possible complete electrification of the NIMT (looking less likely now the whole network is under threat)
– gas pipelines to carry 20% hydrogen by 2030 and 100% by 2040 (very unlikely)
– offshore oil and gas ban (reversed)
– NZ Steel under threat (will now decarbonise thanks to government co-funding)
– NZ Battery Project (cancelled)
– iREX ferry project (cancelled)
– 1500 hydrogen trucks ordered for 2026 (none here yet, and the supplier is nearly bankrupt)
Elsewhere, Boshier has written
Perhaps the biggest problem is to change people’s consumption patterns. The Climate Change Commission hopes that reductions in carbon emissions will be achieved by a societal shift in attitude as their costs begin to bite through the emissions trading scheme. Its approach is that no one will be forced to sell their petrol car or install solar electricity, for example. We can but hope this is the case and that deep intervention by government, as seen with Think Big, can be avoided.
Perhaps the key word here is “deep”, for there is certainly intervention happening all the time. There are great possibilities for bioenergy and electrification, but the risks are such that investors will want government support, like the support they can get already in other countries. At the same time, despite the Zero Carbon Act, we don’t yet have a commitment to phase out fossil fuels. Without that, the demand for the new renewable electricity the government wants to see may not materialise.
The final words of “Power Surge” are
There is every reason to look forward with confidence. We have done this before. Ka huri taku aro ki te pae Kahurangi, Kei reira te oranga moku. We turn our attention to the future, That’s where the opportunities lie.
Planetary Ecology 
Nobody has come up with an alternative to pumped-hydro at Lake Onslow. Nobody can tell me if ubiquitous PV with domestic batteries and solar hot-water panels with a smart grid would solve much of the problem.
Two Otago (foreign) professors have recently argued in the ODT (one op-ed, one letter) the benefit of the aluminium smelter, but it seems to me both missed the point: what is the cost of installing new generation to replace its consumption? Could the storage gained obviate Onslow?
NZ will get nowhere until more tax is raised, and that means a capital gains tax. This would also release funds for investment in wealth producing enterprises (now sold off to overseas buyers), not buying houses you don’t live in because it’s a way to make lots of money – tax free.
Finally, many farmers are in trouble because they pay too much for the farm. Again, if you can survive, the tax-free gains are phenomenal – thanks to population growth and other costs to the taxpayer, like infrastructure.