An iwi tribal council is at the forefront of a renewable energy development, backing an ambitious green hydrogen and methanol project to benefit its region's people.

The electricity venture signals the first significant Māori push beyond established primary-sector investments in New Zealand/Aotearoa in large-scale clean energy infrastructure.

The mandated council, Te Rūnanga o Ngā Wairiki-Ngāti Apa, represents the Ngā Wairiki and Ngāti Apa tribes, which have deep ancestral roots in the Rangitikei and Whanganui regional districts.

Their consolidated mana whenua — the authority to run the land — stretches along the eastern coastline of Te Ika-a- Māui (North Island), north of Wellington.

The council's Rohe (boundaries) predominantly surrounds rural farmland across the districts, and could prove central to New Zealand's renewable energy aspirations.

Tāhūhū rangapū/chief executive Grant Huwyler has confirmed the iwi has been exploring a 280-megawatt wind and solar-powered hydrogen development on a block of land where traditional Māori Harakeke plants lie, close to Whanganui, over the past five years in partnership with a Taranaki-based clean energy company.

The iwi can visualise the potential development of not only as a commercial opportunity capable of generating long-term returns, but also as an environmental contribution to reduce emissions in heavy transport, one of the nation's hardest sectors to decarbonise.

"We've spent a lot of time positioning ourselves to play a role in renewable energy," Mr Huwyler told the Local Democracy Reporting website.

"Our Rohe is affected by hydroelectricity that has already impacted our three main catchments — Whangaehu, Turakina and Rangitīkei — and we want to promote renewable energy that has no further impact on water flows and aquatic ecosystems in our Rohe.

"We have a good wind resource that comes across land we own, and we have got two (energy) groups talking to us."

One is a renewables corporate multinational which wants to build a wind farm south of Turakina, a historic Māori settlement, while the other is the Taranaki clean energy provider, Hiringa Energy, with whom the iwi's Te Rūnanga o Ngā Wairiki-Ngāti Apa hold an evenly-distributed development partnership.

Hiringa — a Māori word meaning perseverance, energy, determination and vitality — currently operates a green hydrogen refuelling network, and has begun to develop a hydrogen supply chain across the Asia-Pacific region.

Mr Huwyler described the development plans as "massively ambitious", and admitted the project could be either boom or bust, but is worth the risk.

The proposal originally sought to combine wind and solar generation to power electrolysis — splitting water into hydrogen and oxygen — to produce green hydrogen.

If realised, the project would produce commercial quantities of a low-carbon fuel aimed at decarbonising New Zealand's emissions-intensive heavy transport sector.

The focus has since broadened to include green methanol for marine transport, and potentially sustainable aviation fuel.

"We changed our focus from green hydrogen distribution to green hydrogen, then onto green methanol production," Mr Huwyler said

"There's strong demand for that product out there in Asia, where it's used to fuel ships."

The integrated wind and solar-to-hydrogen and methanol project also centres on around 100 megawatts of electrolysis capacity to produce approximately 15,000 tonnes of green hydrogen per year.

That amount of hydrogen could be combined with green carbon dioxide to manufacture 90,000 tonnes of green methanol per year.

The project, according to backers, is set to benefit from a high-quality wind resource, affordable renewable electricity, access to biogenic carbon dioxide from excess forestry biomass, existing methanol infrastructure and developing offtake discussions with shipping companies which build vessels for the Asia-Pacific region and the local New Zealand market.

For iwi leadership, the project represents economic opportunity and prosperity, and a new-found expression of kaitiakitanga (principle of guardianship) across iwi ancestral lands which is shaped by generations of Paerangi, Turi and Apa-Hapai-Taketake descendants.

"I think we're quite fortunate to own significant areas of land where there happens to be a really good wind resource coming across that land," Mr Huwyler said.

"It puts us in a position to take a massive step forward with our entire picture of development."

While the project remains in the business case phase, Ngā Wairiki-Ngāti Apa's ambition remain quite clear: equity, ownership and long-term returns.

Mr Huwyler said this kind of opportunity is "quite rare".

"We're a landowner, but one thing we've learned from watching other iwi, who have had similar or related opportunities, is that there are ways you can structure these developments where you do get an equity interest," he said.

"It's not just about opening up our land for development - it's about doing that plus achieving some level of equity and ownership in businesses that are set up there.

"That's definitely our ambition.

"You're constantly looking for people who have those same values and that kind of empathy for Indigenous development, who would welcome that opportunity to have you as an owner in their business."

The iwi tribes are looking to finalise their business interests by 2028.