Rotten egg smell at Greymouth landfill detailed
By local democracy reporter Brendon McMahon:
A 'rotten egg' smell at a private landfill on the West Coast could be caused by crushed and wet gib board, recently released documents show.
The West Coast Regional Council has accepted fresh applications from Taylorville Resource Park (TRP), 5km east of Greymouth, to vary its consents.
It includes a new assessment for the applicant, which details the cause of the pungent odour that has resulted in numerous complaints to the council in the past 15 months.
The air assessment says the saturation of gib board in anaerobic conditions significantly enhanced rotting, causing the generation of a rotten egg smell at the site.
"The best way to address the production of sulphide gas is to prevent it at the source," the Davis Ogilvie report said.
It is not yet clear if latest application by TRP will result in a public resource consent hearing.
The controversial site was recently hit with an abatement notice from the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA), after council called in the authority in January to take over its investigation of the site.
It followed a string of complaints and previous abatements in 2023, including neighbours raising concerns about a pungent smell.
The EPA slapped down an abatement in mid-March after finding contaminated leachate water collected in a landfill cell at the site was being released from a sediment pond.
Taylorville Resource Park has three months to meet the "required environmental standards". In the meantime, the landfill is allowed to operate, the EPA said on March 18.
LDR approached Taylorville Resource Park on April 18 for comment on its latest applications.
A WorkSafe investigation into an incident at the site last August, in which two workers were overcome with gas, is still ongoing.
The landfill has now applied to bring the operation in line with the Class 3 Managed Fill guidelines under the Waste Management Institute New Zealand Technical Guidelines for Disposal to Land.
It is also seeks to vary its discharge consent for water containing "landfill leachate", and a separate consent to discharge landfill gas to air.
The periods sought are for 25 years.
A bundle of documents lodged with council include a discharge to air assessment by Davis Ogilvie for Taylorville Resource Park in February this year.
It says the potential for gas generation at the site was originally assessed to be "less than minor" in 2021, and possible adverse effects beyond the site were thought to be unlikely at the time.
What had subsequently emerged could be attributed to:
* Expansion of the site beyond the area originally assessed;
* The deposit of "a large volume" of shredded gib board;
* Disposal of tomato vine material, which may have accelerated hydrogen sulphide gas;
* Issues with the leachate drain and sump from one of the site's cells leading to about 1.5m of water ponding in the base.
Davis Ogilvie also said gas generation at the site could increase when demolition gib board material was crushed, compacted or hit by rainwater.
Repair of a sump to limit water ponding in a dump cell, sealing of the leachate discharge system to minimise emissions, and installation of a gas treatment system to absorb gas had all been undertaken to try and fix the issue.
The documents also include an asbestos management plan and an assessment of environmental effects (AEE) from May 2023.
The assessment notes planning and hazard information held by the Grey District Council did not consider the site "prone to landslides".
Another memorandum backgrounds Taylorville Resource Park's desire to simplify the acceptance of contaminated soil at the site to move beyond the current case by case basis requiring council approval, which it says is onerous.
It noted existing lined cells and the collection and treatment of leachate at the site exceeded current monitoring and engineering requirements.
And the 2024 Prospa Local Business Hero is...
A huge congratulations to mother and son duo, Mary and Sam Danielson from The Puketapu Hotel.
The votes for all finalists have been tallied and they have been chosen by Neighbourly members across the country as the Prospa Local Business Hero of 2024.
The Puketapu Hotel was nominated by a local called Margaret and the nomination reads:
'On Feb 14, 2023, Cyclone Gabrielle flooded many of the rural areas. Puketapu Hotel went under perhaps half a meter of water. However, immediately Mary Danielson and her son, Sam Danielson, along with their loyal staff pulled it together to cook copious amounts of food that without electricity would have been wasted. Throughout the years many of us have been treated with a pub gathering where we can reconnect and a free meal. At Christmas there was Santa, games, gifts for kids, donated patchwork for adults, an ice cream truck and lots of camaraderie.
This February on the cyclone anniversary, they again pulled out the stops to give hundreds of us a special night. We are all tired of the cyclone cleanup and they understood that it was needed.'
Such a deserving business and team, well done Mary and Sam. And thank you to all those who voted!
Share your New Zealand music memories...
It's NZ Music Month and New Zealand really has some beautiful songs from artists that we call our own.
Whether it's April Sun in Cuba, Don't Forget your Roots, or How Bizarre or Bic Runga's 'Sway' - songs have a way of unlocking memories and evoking old feelings.
In honour of NZ Music Month, share a New Zealand song or artist that is special to you and explain why.
Type 'Not For Print' if you wish your comments to be excluded from the Conversations column of your local paper.
Hearing for Hokitika seawall extension pending
Further work on a project to extend the Hokitika Seawall is currently "on hold" pending further consultation.
However, a broad range of resilience work for Hokitika was canvassed during the 2024 annual meeting of the Hokitika Rating District Joint Committee this week.
Just one member of the public attended the midday meeting in the Westland District Council chambers on Monday.
However, the committee was warned the next step to progress the Hokitika Seawall extension would be "contentious" with high public interest.
West Coast Regional Council chief executive Darry Lew said they were now awaiting a hearing date to further that process.
It would include retrospective consent for the emergency works on the rock buffer north of Beach Street, following the storm in April.
Lew said a 50/50 split in submissions either for or against the proposed seawall extension showed strong feeling either way.
"This consent process will be contentious."
But at this stage he had put the consent process "on hold to consider other matters".
This was partly to allow the new group manager responsible for the project's oversight to get up to speed.
That manager would start in about a fortnight but the process now needed careful consideration or even a pre-hearing process to "perhaps settle matters" before a formal hearing, Lew said.
Mayor Helen Lash said a local residents group formed to advocate against needed to be approached "with a very open mind".
"They have done their homework," she said.
Lew agreed.
However, at this stage the only people across the engineering details was council's own consultant on the matter, he said.
"Nobody has talked to the community about this (yet). I'm confident that my new group manager will do a good job on this," Lew said.
The joint meeting agreed to a total special rates strike of $101,562 in 2024-25.
Sluggish progress on the next, Gibson Quay, stage of the Hokitika River flood resilience work - due to KiwiRail requests, and the next phase for new CBD protection from the sea inundation risk up from the Hokitika River were also aired.
Council staff defended their approach to emergency work following the April storm impacting near Beach St.
Council engineer Jordon Mandry said they had contacted joint committee members about the need to immediately deal with the rockfall risk to beach users.
The risk "was quite significant" and it was undertaken under emergency work provisions allowed under the Resource Management Act.
At the same time restoring the rockwork exactly was conservative given the pending seawall extension proposal.
Mandry said they recommended continuing the permanent seawall consent process at which point the rockwork could be built to the appropriate design standard.
Lash asked what the risk in April had been perceived to be.
Acting catchments group manager Shanti Morgan said their thinking "evolved".
"The risk to beachgoers was the main one. We were dealing with King tides."
At the same time communication over it "could have been better" and the risk to land still remained.
Lash said her big concern was the alignment of the emergency work with the future potential project.
Mandry said the April repair work "was a temporary solution".
"There's no point in doing something unless you go down the track with permanent rock wall building."
Lew said the risk to children was very real given the big seas in April had undermined some of the rockwork.
"With very little pressure, some of that big rock would have turned on a small child - inevitably people do move across to play on rock."
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