World first: This incredible town in New Zealand is about to go carbon-zero

Which brings me to Queenstown, on New Zealand's South Island ... literally. When I was young, my parents brought me here on family holidays. Those ginormous jade-green lakes beneath those snow-capped mountains were so different from where I grew up.

But it's the noises I remember most. Jet-boats roaring across Lake Wakatipu, and up and down the Shotover River, spinning round in circles, inducing screams. Chairlifts transporting me to the tops of mountains: the clickety-clank of those chairs, the constant whirring of the big engines firing them along. Big 20-person gondolas, too, which took me right to the top of the mountain just behind town. Everything was fast and furious in Queenstown; even then, it was fast becoming the adventure capital of the world. It didn't just run on adrenaline ... it ran on fuel.

Now Queenstown has declared its intention to become the first tourist town on Earth to have a completely carbon-zero visitor economy. That's carbon zero, mind you; not carbon neutral. Carbon neutral means you can offset your carbon using carbon credits, like planting trees. Carbon zero means no carbon is emitted at all - not a single fossil fuel burnt. And to achieve this by 2030? Why, that's barely six years away. While the United Nations Climate Change Council meets every couple of years to thrash out a carbon-zero target hopefully by 2050, a community of about 50,000 relying almost entirely on tourism to feed their families just shaved 20 years off that target.

"2050? A lot of us are going to miss that, aren't we?" the man orchestrating the plan, Destination Queenstown CEO Mat Woods, asks me rhetorically. "2040? That's too far away. But 2030 creates urgency. 2030 seemed so hard that it got the community excited, just the enormity of it; we're already breaking it down to how many days we've got."

I've just landed and am navigating through traffic-clogged Queenstown in my first-ever electric vehicle, a Tesla Y. By 2030, visitors may be able to travel to the centre of town from the airport via an electric gondola; or by self-driving electric mini-coaches, or by electric hydro ferries along Lake Wakatipu.

Those fuel-operated chairlifts and gondolas operating on the ski mountains around Queenstown, so vivid from my childhood, will be replaced by electric motors. Even the TSS Earnslaw - the oldest coal-fired passenger-carrying steamship in the Southern Hemisphere, which has transported families on Lake Wakatipu since tourism began here - will be converted to hydrogen, or electricity.

Jet boats too will be fully electric - leading local operator, Shotover Jet, are right now holding trials of the planet's first fully electric jet boat. "We might be saving the world," a local restaurateur tells me. "But everything's going to be so quiet, we may all get run over doing it."

Hotels, too, will run entirely on alternative energy. One already is well on target. The Headwaters Eco Lodge is a collection of 14 luxury chalets in Glenorchy, a ridiculously picturesque town about 45 minutes north of Queenstown. Built practically among the Southern Alps, it's the first accommodation on Earth to be recognised by the Living Building Challenge, the most rigorous of all assessment programs only completely self-sufficient buildings can pass.

It's made of recycled building materials - some of it from the 2011 Christchurch earthquake, some of it from car bonnets. My toilet doesn't flush: it's of the compost variety, and all the water I waste is used to irrigate a wetlands existing right in the middle of the property. "I think it's a beacon of hope, this place," John Pope, the maintenance manager who keeps this joint ticking, tells me. "We're not just being innovators in New Zealand, this place is being watched by the whole world. We get so much energy out of this place that we power our shop down the road out of it."

It helps that staying here is as pretty as a picture; I feel like an environmental crusader just waiting on my four-course tasting menu with a glass of wine in hand while the sun sets beside 2830-metre-high Mt Earnslaw, framed squarely in the window.

But The Headwaters Eco Lodge is hardly the lone ranger. That's the thing with this carbon-zero goal, everyone has to get onboard to make it happen. "We went to even the most remote parts of the Queenstown-Lakes region and everyone wanted to be involved," Woods says.

I take a drive next evening to the outskirts of Queenstown, to an old 1980s motor inn repurposed as boutique accommodation with an already legendary restaurant. Sherwood Queenstown runs primarily off 248 solar panels: one of the only hotels in this hemisphere powered by the sun, its solar output is the largest of its type in New Zealand. It's also ranked in the world's top 10 most sustainable hotels by Expedia. I take a walk along the three hectares of hillside it's built on, looking out across Lake Wakatipu in a chilled dusk that smells of pine trees.

This hillside was covered in bracken, now it's been converted to extensive market gardens whose produce dictates what executive chef, Chris Scott, cooks for us. "We were a wee bit surprised - but delighted - to see such a huge (carbon zero by 2030) goal set," general manager Hayley Scott tells me as we wander through the vegetables. "But we've got a lot of things in the pipeline to help us achieve this goal. This is just the beginning."

Next morning I'm ankle-deep in chook poo, out the back of my new abode, the Millbrook Resort, built on 263 hectares of prime green valley north-east of town. Mat Woods says it's important local businesses break down carbon-zero goals year-by-year, and don't get put off by the sheer magnitude of the 2030 goalpost. That's where people like tattooed biodynamic farmer Mikey Dahlstrom come in.

A former backpacker with a degree in environmental sustainability from the University of Utah, he's now employed full-time to produce food for the resort's three restaurants and cafes. "See this?" he asks as we stroll. "That's thyme, there's oregano, that's kale, that's cabbage, and that's just the start. All spray-free, everything's recycled, and see those hens over there, they create enough compost so I never need buy any in. We've got beehives, too, I even make kombucha out of my roses over there."

Yep - while Air New Zealand have slated the first demonstration of a green hydrogen or battery hybrid-powered aircraft for 2026 or 2027, in its goal to replace its entire domestic fleet - getting to carbon zero by 2030 is as much about Mikey and his 90 manure-producing chickens.

"There's extra costs for all of us, but if a small business can do (become carbon zero), then the big guys can too, all over," Better By Bike co-owner Matt Hirst says. "Making money won't save our planet. That's why all of us are doing this (establishing a carbon-zero visitor economy by 2030), we have children to think about."

I rent an e-bike from him in Arrowtown - 20 kilometres out of Queenstown - and ride a flat, wide trail beside the slow-moving Arrow River, then cross the emerald-green Kawarau River on two suspension bridges which sway as I ride. I ride right past bungy jumpers about to drop, and on to the wineries of the Gibbston Valley, one of the world's premier pinot noir growing regions.

There's now more than 130 kilometres of bike trails around Queenstown making it globally recognised as an e-biking destination, with trails easily accessible to accommodation that quickly lead to the backcountry. By 2026, it's estimated biking will reach as much as 50 per cent the size of the ski visitor economy, with nearly $150 million per annum coming directly from visitors coming here specifically to bike.

Nomad Safaris have also just started Tesla Tours, taking zero-emission electric vehicles on private tours to Queenstown's best natural attractions. They'll be the first private commercial operators in New Zealand to own an e-bus in their fleet by the end of summer. It'll take guests to and from the Routeburn Track, an iconic hiking trail just beyond Glenorchy.

I'm on one of their tours. We've driven beyond the sleepy hamlet of Glenorchy west along a narrow dirt road to a place actually called Paradise. There's not much more here than green farm pastures, which intersect with meandering beech forest, but I'm dwarfed by the snow-topped, triangular peaks of the Mt Aspiring and Fiordland National Parks.

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The road I'm on crosses through rivers so transparent it's only when I see the water rush up over the wheels that I can tell there's rivers at all. Film scouts chose right here to capture a lot of Middle Earth depicted in The Lord of the Rings trilogy, and The Hobbit.

We stop, and I step outside into the crisp mountain air. It's so wholesome I don't know whether to try to capture it somehow in a photo, or just breathe all that good air deep into my lungs.

In an age where our every travel extravagance bears environmental consequence, offsetting a little bit of carbon on my flights and reusing the towel in my hotel bathroom isn't going to stop grandma suffering from heatstroke next January. Or my brother's house deep in the bush from burning down. But for the first time in a long while, I feel a sense of hope. C'mon Queenstown.

Curbing climate change is one thing, but there's also a lot going on in the Queenstown-Lakes region to protect the biodiversity of the region.

The formation of the Southern Lakes Sanctuary could revolutionise the protection of native species from dangerous introduced predators. In the Queenstown-Lakes region alone there are 35 species on the verge of extinction. The area has already lost 40 per cent of its endemic species, with New Zealand home to the highest proportion of endangered species in the world.

But the Southern Lakes Sanctuary now manages more than 80 community groups and employs people to remove the predators in more than 660,000 hectares of land around Queenstown. Check out some of their hard work at Bob's Cove, 15 minutes' drive out of Queenstown. southernlakessanctuary.org.nz

Getting there: You can fly direct to Queenstown from Australia's east coast with Air New Zealand, Jetstar, Qantas or Virgin Australia, then rent a Tesla with Go Rentals. gorentals.co.nz

Staying there: Stay in one of the most eco-friendly accommodation options on Earth, the Headwaters Eco Lodge (from $742 a night, including hot breakfast); feel cocooned by nature at Millbrook Resort (from $420 a night); or, for the best views of Lake Wakatipu, stay at Azur Lodge (from $1080 a night, including breakfast, pre-dinner drinks and canapes). theheadwatersecolodge.com; millbrook.co.nz; azur.co.nz

Eating there: Check out Sherwood's sustainable cuisine, the Bunker uses only sustainable produce from local suppliers with zero waste in its kitchen, and the Dishery specialises in locally sourced ethical fresh food. sherwoodqueenstown.nz/restaurant; thebunker.co.nz; thedishery.co.nz

Playing there: Better By Bike offers e-bike rentals all over Queenstown with pick-up if required, while Nomad Safaris offer Tesla private tours and other eco-friendly tours around Queenstown. betterbybike.co.nz; nomadsafaris.co.nz

Explore more: queenstownnz.co.nz

The writer travelled courtesy of Destination Queenstown.