Additional climate projection data released
More detailed data on projected changes to New Zealand's climate between now and the end of the century is available for download.
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Additional data about projected future changes to Aotearoa New Zealand’s climate is now available.
The Ministry released new climate projections last year, making the data publicly available at no charge for the first time. The projections show potential changes to temperature, wind and rainfall over the rest of the century. They can be accessed as a downloadable dataset, a map, or a summary dashboard.
The projections were developed by the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA), using information on New Zealand’s unique landscape and climate conditions alongside global data and science.
Making climate information easier to access is a focus of the Government’s adaptation framework and climate strategy.
We have now released projections for an additional climate change scenario.
Scenarios are plausible stories about how future climate change might impact our lives, environment, financial systems and wellbeing.
The additional scenario is the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) ‘fossil-fuel intensive development’ scenario. Projections for the IPCC’s ‘sustainability’, ‘middle of the road’ and ‘regional rivalry’ scenarios were already available.
The additional scenario is expected to support councils and other organisations in planning how to adapt to climate change. The new projections are available to download now, and in future will be added to the map and summary dashboard.
We have also added the individual data for each of the six climate models which NIWA used to develop the climate projections. These six models were combined to generate average values for the projections.
The individual climate model data is expected to be useful for technical experts and researchers and is available to download. We do not plan to add this data to the map or summary dashboard.