WHAT WAS CLAIMED
The NZ government has commissioned more renewable energy projects in the last 18 months than in the previous 15 years.
OUR VERDICT
False. Significantly more projects were commissioned in the previous 15 years.
AAP FACTCHECK - New Zealand's coalition government has not commissioned more renewable energy projects in the last 18 months than in the previous 15 years combined.
Energy Minister Simon Watts has repeatedly made this claim and Prime Minister Christopher Luxon has also made a similar claim.
In fact, data shows that at least three times as much renewable generation was commissioned over the past 15 years as in the past 18 months.
Mr Watts has made the claim on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, and in a speech at the COP30 climate change conference in November 2025.
Mr Luxon made a similar claim in an interview on RNZ's Morning Report program (timestamp six minutes and 10 seconds) on January 26, 2026.
In defending his administration's environmental record, the prime minister said: "You know, we've signed up more renewable energy projects I think in 18 months than in the previous 15 years."
On other occasions, Mr Watts and other ministers have referenced the claim, while more broadly citing "generation" or "electricity generation".
The minister first made the claim in a press release on October 1, 2025, announcing NZ was on the cusp of a renewable energy boom due to the government's policies.
"More new generation has been commissioned in the last 18 months than in the last 15 years because of our work to knock down regulatory barriers," Mr Watts said.
The press release included a fact sheet prepared by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE).
"More generation has been commissioned in the last 18 months than in the previous 15 years," the document reads.
When asked for the source of Mr Watts's claim, the minister's office confirmed he referenced this line from the ministry.
Mr Luxon's office did not respond to AAP FactCheck's requests for evidence to support the claim.
The ministry told AAP FactCheck the figures came from the Electricity Authority (EA) and that the term 'commissioned' referred to new generation completed and brought online before February 2025.
While commissioned means electricity generation has begun, projects usually take months to reach full output.
"The EA advised MBIE in mid-May 2025 that over the 18 months until February 2025, more capacity had been built than any period since 2010/11," an MBIE spokesperson told AAP FactCheck.
However, an EA spokesperson told AAP FactCheck that the figures it provided to the ministry did not show that more new generation had been commissioned in that 18-month period than in the previous 15 years combined.
Rather, they showed that more new renewable generation had been commissioned during that period than in any other 18-month period since May 2010.
The EA provided figures to AAP FactCheck showing that 724 megawatts (MW) of new renewable generation was first brought online in the 18 months to February 2025.
However, these same EA figures showed that in the previous 15 years, 1158.9MW of new renewable generation came online.
In addition, 400MW of gas generation began producing electricity during that 15-year period.
Mr Watts and Mr Luxon have suggested that their policies encouraged the renewable capacity that started generating in the 18 months to February 2025.
However, this period includes nearly four months of the previous Labour government's term, which formally ended on November 27, 2023.
In those four months, 243MW of renewable generation projects were completed, more than a third of the 724MW of generation the coalition government claimed credit for.
The overwhelming majority of renewable projects that first came online in the 18 months to February 2025 were also approved under the previous Labour government, or earlier.
In fact, it's unclear whether any of these projects were approved under the Luxon coalition government.
The EA also provided figures up to January 2026, when Mr Watts and Mr Luxon last made the claim.
These figures show that 434MW in new renewable generation was first brought online in the 18 months to January 2026.
However, more than triple this renewable capacity - 1491.9MW - started generating in the 15 years prior to that period.
During that 15-year period, 400MW of new gas generation also started producing electricity.
The vast majority of the 434MW in renewable generation brought online in 18 months to January 2026 was also approved under the Labour government.
This figure is also lower than the 465MW that came online in the last 18 months of Labour's term, which ended in November 2023.
Completion rates do fluctuate due to the scale of renewable projects; in six of the years since 2008, no projects were completed.
Electricity consumption remained largely flat in NZ between the mid-2000s and 2024, following decades of growth, according to the Electricity Authority.
While the coalition government is implementing policies aimed at increasing renewable generation, these don't appear to have resulted in any project completions yet. Such projects typically take many years from approval to completion.
The government has listed 22 renewable energy projects in the Fast-track Approvals Act, which aims to reduce consent requirements, but none have been built yet.
It also amended the National Policy Statement for Renewable Electricity Generation which came into effect in January 2026 to encourage more projects.
The Luxon government hopes to spark more generation by replacing the Resource Management Act, but that law hasn't passed yet.
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