Key takeaways
Electric transport is becoming more available to screen productions across Aotearoa, but using it well takes more than booking an EV.
Understand the full picture before you commit. Range, charging, locations, scheduling, infrastructure and cost all shape whether an electric vehicle will work for a given production. Confident transport decisions come from understanding these factors up front, not from assuming an EV will slot straight into a diesel workflow.
Early planning is everything. Electrification works best when Sustainability, Transport, Locations, Facilities and Production are talking early, before decisions get locked in. A conversation at the planning stage about where vehicles will charge, how schedules account for range, and what infrastructure a location offers can make the difference between electrification being workable or not.
Know what’s possible now, and where the limits still are. There’s more available than many productions realise, but the technology and infrastructure aren’t a like-for-like replacement in every situation yet. Being clear-eyed about both the opportunities and the current limitations helps teams make choices that actually stick.
Our choices shape what’s available next. This is the bigger picture for our screen sector. Early adoption, infrastructure investment and supplier demand all influence how quickly lower-emission options become the norm. Every production that asks for and uses electric transport helps build the case for more of it, which matters as future productions increasingly arrive with sustainability requirements of their own.
Transport is one of our clearest opportunities. Our first Carbon Emissions Review found that vehicles and generators together make up around a third of the sector’s measured emissions. That concentration isn’t a failure, it’s a map. It shows exactly where focused effort can move a production’s total footprint.
Resources to help you go further
If the webinar has you thinking about your own productions, here are some tools and next steps to put these ideas into practice:
Greenlit Sustainability Action Plan: a practical, end-to-end template for planning and executing a sustainability strategy on any production. Download it here.
Green Power Meeting Guide: a simple framework for bringing your HODs together during prep to problem-solve how to plug into grid power, use batteries, and reduce diesel reliance on set. Download it here.
Mileage calculator: helps productions weigh up the cost and emissions of vehicle choices, so you can factor charging savings in when comparing vehicle hire. Download it here.
North Harbour Rentals electric truck fleet: find out more about the electric vehicles available for productions. Learn more here.
Find Sustainability Crew: connect with experienced sustainability crew for your production. Contact hello@greenlit.org.nz.
Building capability across the sector
Greenlit, with support from NZ On Air and the New Zealand Film Commission, is running Producer Sustainability Training. If you’re a producer at any level and want to learn how sustainability can benefit your productions, register your interest here.
If you’d like support putting any of this into practice on your production, get in touch with us at hello@greenlit.org.nz. The mahi of decarbonising transport is one of the clearest opportunities our sector has, and we’re here to help you make it work.