Tarawera River & the Pulp & Paper/Tissue Industry
A Regional Council Historical Perspective
The Bay of Plenty Regional Council (Environment BOP) was formed as part of the major institutional local government restructuring that took place in October 1989. Initially, many expected that the long-heralded RMA would become law soon after. It took, however, a further two years before the RMA was enacted in October 1991. Paul Dell from Environment BOP reports on its involvement with the pulp and paper industry at Kawerau.
In May 1991, Environment BOP called a public meeting in Whakatane attended by approximately 250 people, to discuss the community's resource management concerns regarding the Tarawera River and its catchment. Many issues were raised at the meeting, with the majority focusing on concerns over the impact that discharges from the two pulp and paper/tissue mills were having on the river. It was clear from the meeting that people wanted action to clean up the degraded state of the Tarawera River.
In trying to work through the issues, it became apparent that an appropriate process needed to be found. Following submissions from the public in late November 1991, a Technical Liaison Group was formed with industry and Crown research institute representatives to review water quality issues in the Lower Tarawera River. The three prime issues identified were colour, dissolved oxygen (DO) and toxicity. This work was of a purely technical nature and was undertaken with no preconceived ideas.
To enable the transition to be made between technical information and policy formulation, a Tarawera River Liaison Group was formed in mid-1993. This group brought together some 20 representatives from different iwi authorities, industry, environmental groups, community groups and local authorities.
The process, involving presentations and field visits, allowed all members of the group to achieve a reasonably consistent level of understanding of the complex technical information. The group was chaired by the chairman of Environment BOP. Staff's role was to ensure the group was supplied with information requested from both internal and external sources.
Fifteen workshop sessions were held, with each meeting considering policy drafted to cover issues raised at the previous meeting. This process was considered successful, with the release of a Proposed Regional Plan for the Tarawera River Catchment in February 1995.
Running parallel with this process was the processing of resource consent applications for the two pulp and paper/tissue mills to discharge their treated effluent into the Tarawera River. This process involved various pre-hearings and the formal hearing, with the outcome predominantly defined by the Proposed Regional Plan.
Both the Plan and the consents were appealed. Following numerous meetings with all parties. A two-day meeting was held using retired Judge Trapski as a facilitator to try and resolve the outstanding issues. The process was successful, with agreement being reached on a number of issues and the companies holding further separate meetings, particularly with the iwi groups to work through other matters.
One outcome was an agreement between industry, Environment BOP and the Department of Conservation to fund an independent study into the effects of low DO on the fishery.
At the time of writing, draft consent orders have been prepared for submission to the Environment Court in July 2001, six years after the consents expired and the Proposed Plan was released. Negotiations are still taking place and some matters will need to be debated before the Environment Court.
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Paul Dell Group Manager, Regulation and Resource Management Environment Bay of Plenty Whakatane Paul has worked in local government since first starting work in 1977. He left the University of Waikato with three papers to finish in his Earth Science BSc and commenced work as a lab technician at the Hauraki Catchment Board. In 1980 he was appointed resource scientist and completed a part time MSc degree. In 1985 he moved to the Waikato Valley Authority as a Water and Soil Scientist in the planning section. In 1987 he was appointed Resource Planning Manager. In 1989 Paul took up the position of Director, Regulation and Monitoring with Environment BOP. |
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