Record rain helps New Zealand emissions fall – but the path to net zero won’t be so simple

Aniwaniwa Falls near Lake Waikaremoana, New Zealand. Record rainfall has helped to push renewable energy use to the country’s highest level in decades. Photograph: Marc-Philipp Keller/Alamy

In a small coastal settlement, shrouded by the dense forest ranges of Te Urewera on New Zealand’s North Island, three hydropower stations are hungrily fed from a lake that is filled to the brink.

Over the past year, heavy rainfall has kept the clear waters of Lake Waikaremoana full and the lights of homes in the local district on. Thanks to extreme flooding from Cyclone Gabrielle earlier this year, the reservoir has exceeded its usual levels.