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RNZ News
14-05-2025
- General
- RNZ News
Dismantling of historic Dunedin Gasworks chimney begins
The Dunedin City Council says the chimney at the Dunedin Gasworks Museum is in worse condition than first thought. Photo: RNZ / Tess Brunton Workers will start the careful, brick by brick dismantling of a historic Dunedin landmark - aiming to repair it and put it back together in the future. The Dunedin Gasworks Museum was closed last month to assess the safety of the 25-metre tall chimney after possible earthquake damage. Dunedin City Council owns the Category 1 historic place, and said a recent update found it was in worse condition than first thought. The chimney - a relic of the country's only gasworks - has stood proud over South Dunedin since the 1800s. But last month, an assessment found there was an imminent risk to public safety. The latest news painted a grim picture: once work to repair the cracks got underway, the chimney might collapse. Naylor Love is tasked with the urgent work. Its project and interiors manager Paul Stevenson said it was a big job ahead. "The cracks are appearing quite considerably. We're having corrosion inside the chimney, which is expanding, which is opening up those joints now," he said. A crane carrying what looked like a skip hovered near the top of the chimney, as workers secured the walers - 12 metre long timbers - to minimise the risk of it falling down. Naylor Love project and interiors manager Paul Stevenson. Photo: RNZ / Tess Brunton Below the chimney is a no-go zone. "We have to bring it down piece by piece, record it with the hope in the future of rebuilding it and the concern was if we didn't put the walers around we'd lose a lot of that ... it'll just naturally want to fall out," Stevenson said. At least the top four to six metres will come down before the chimney is reassessed, but he was not ruling out more going if that was what it took to make it safe again. He was working within tight rules because the gasworks is a Category 1 historic place. "So we photograph, we pull them out, we number them, we record them, we bring them down, we put them on pallets and store them so we can, in theory, piece the whole thing back together," he said. "Each layer, three bricks all the way around, also maintaining the ladder rungs that are in there and all that, we need to record all that with the hope of being able to rebuild it in the future." Dunedin City Council property services group manager Anna Nilsen said it was trying to save as much of the chimney as possible. It had been a difficult time for the Dunedin Gasworks Museum Trust, which operates the museum. "It's not their best news, for sure, but they're supportive of the work that we're doing. They're supportive of keeping the bricks aside for future restoration so we're working together pretty closely," Nilsen said. Last year, an engineering review recommended the council do a more detailed seismic assessment of the chimney. Dunedin City Council property services group manager Anna Nilsen said detailed inspections had been carried out using drones and crane access. Photo: RNZ / Tess Brunton Anna Nilsen did not believe the problems and risks should have been noticed earlier. "The review that we did last year was a starting point so it was the beginning of a seismic assessment," she said. "That first step was a desk based seismic assessment where it was just the start, we were getting ready to do the full seismic assessment which would have uncovered these things that we now know." It was not known how much the work would cost, but she said it had to be done. "I'd hate to give you a ballpark [be]cause I'd just be guessing at this stage. Look, it's health and safety. It's human life that we're talking about so we're always going to be able to find funds to do that and that's what we're challenged to do," Nilsen said. The dismantling is expected to take about three weeks. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
13-05-2025
- Business
- RNZ News
As insurance gets harder to buy, NZ has 3 choices for disaster recovery – and we keep choosing the worst one
By Ilan Noy and Belinda Storey of Scenes on Surrey Street, South Dunedin, Friday evening. Photo: RNZ / Nathan Mckinnon Analysis -The number of climate change-related extreme weather events is on the rise, making it harder for many people to buy affordable home insurance. The industry has already signalled it is pulling out of some places in Aotearoa New Zealand, leaving the government and homeowners to question what happens next. This is not something that should be ignored, or met with ad-hoc, unplanned responses. Since insurance is required for residential mortgages, the retreat of insurance companies will have significant consequences for property prices and local economies. With the retreat of insurance companies a future certainty in some communities, the government must decide how to respond. In our new research), we developed the "trilemma" framework, outlining the policy trade-offs governments face in adapting to climate change. We found effective adaptation policy needs to achieve three goals: But any policy can satisfy only two of these three goals. The government has to make trade-offs. When it comes to responding to the retreat of private insurance, the options include: Each one of these options involves giving up on at least one of the three policy goals. Let us consider "Macondo", a hypothetical community in a flood-prone area where insurance has "retreated". Do nothing The "do nothing" option is when the government does not take a policy position on flood or storm insurance. This option has little to no cost for the government and, as long as people don't expect buyouts, would incentivise risk reduction. But it leaves homeowners completely exposed to the increasing risk. In "Macondo", some homeowners will have reduced the risk for their own properties (raising their houses, for example). Others won't be able to do so and remain completely at the mercy of the elements. Destruction of homes and vehicles in the Esk Valley. Photo: Tom Kitchin Those whose houses have been deemed uninsurable would have their mortgages automatically put into default. Some may have to sell their home at a much lower price and may remain indebted even after the sale. Local councils might offer to invest in defences for the community by building stopbanks, but that is less likely for poorer and smaller local councils. When an extreme weather event does happen, causing significant losses, the uninsured who own their homes may be unable to repair or rebuild and will be left destitute. Public replacement insurance In 1945, New Zealand's government introduced public insurance for some natural hazards with the Earthquake and War Damage Commission. This later became the Earthquake Commission (EQC), and more recently, the Natural Hazards Commission (NHC). The commission was established as private insurers withdrew earthquake cover in the 1940s and landslip cover in the 1980s. The government could choose to extend NHC policies to fully cover weather events such as floods and storms (NHC now provides only partial cover for damage to land from these hazards). Or it could establish a different public insurance scheme to cover these hazards. When designed well, this option makes fiscal sense. For example, after 2010-2011 Christchurch earthquakes EQC cover for residential properties didn't carry extra costs for the government. Public replacement insurance could also make recovery fairer for everyone. But providing a blanket safety net through a public insurance scheme would discourage risk reduction. With the greater sense of financial safety may come a higher appetite to build on more risky sites, and spend less to defend existing homes. This would result in even more exposure and more damage. Publicly-funded defences and buyouts Successive governments across a range of disasters have opted for the ad-hoc approach. This inevitably turns out to be a combination of publicly-funded defences with generously provisioned buyouts. This combination of defences and buyouts may be the most politically appealing in the short term, but it is also the least affordable and the least efficient option. This option leads to reduced risk (especially if buyouts are used) and can lessen hardship and even inequities. This policy was used in Westport after its damaging floods in 2021 and 2022. Similarly, the Auckland Anniversary Flood and Cyclone Gabrielle triggered large investments in buyouts and in new flood defences that will end up costing billions. Unfortunately for the affected residents in both cases, the process was not done preemptively following a carefully designed process. Instead, the response to each event was designed on the fly, was lengthy, and full of frustrating uncertainties, missteps, and missed opportunities. Currently, every successive government in New Zealand chooses to do nothing and then switches to a defence and buyout choice when disaster strikes. This is the worst of all the trilemma policy options. A more proactive policy, even if well-conceived, cannot achieve all three of the goals we listed. But at least the choice between these trade-offs would be clear and transparent. It would also avoid all the inefficiencies created by the reactive policy choices our elected governments make now. Science writer Jo-Anne Hazel contributed to this analysis.
