Latest news with #SouthTaranaki
RNZ News
21-07-2025
- Politics
- RNZ News
Waitangi Tribunal pushes pause on seabed mine claim
The Tribunal parking the seabed mine claim is a rare setback for mana whenua who've resisted Trans-Tasman's plans since before the first application in 2013. Photo: Te Korimako o Taranaki The Waitangi Tribunal has rejected the application to halt a fast-track bid to mine the seabed off Pātea - but has left the door open if the process turns out to be unfair. Trans-Tasman Resources (TTR) has applied through the new Fast-Track Approvals Act (FTAA) to mine for iron, titanium and vanadium in the South Taranaki Bight. Multiple South Taranaki hapū and iwi sought a Tribunal injunction to block processing of the fast-track application, and an urgent hearing into alleged Crown Treaty breaches. But Tribunal deputy chair Judge Sarah Reeves agreed with the Crown that the fast-track needed a chance to be proven fair. The Crown argued a panel had not even been appointed - and that iwi will contribute to that selection and get a say once the decision-making panel is working. The Waitangi Tribunal grants urgent hearings in exceptional circumstances: applicants must be suffering - or likely to suffer - significant and irreversible prejudice from current or pending Crown actions. "I do not agree that the risk of significant and irreversible prejudice has crystallised, and the application is premature," said Judge Reeves. "The application does not yet meet the high threshold required to divert the resources and disrupt the Tribunal's inquiry programme that would result by granting an urgent inquiry," she ruled. "However, leave is reserved for the applicants to renew their application if circumstances change." Claimants said they had already suffered prejudice from their decade-long fight against TTR's mining application, right through to defeating the company in the Supreme Court. Mana whenua said government bias made the fast-track process unjust. Judge Reeves said the claimants believe "the Crown's vocal support of the [seabed mining] project and the FTAA appears to make meaningful engagement with the applicants or delay of the project to pursue alternative remedies 'highly unlikely'". On Friday in New Plymouth Shane Jones - the minister of oceans and fisheries, and of resources - called opponents a [ "belligerent, well-organised, rowdy] bunch of activists." He had previously dismissed mana whenua objectors as "pixie-like hapūs" - which many felt was an insult that still rankles in South Taranaki. Taranaki mana whenua claimants to the Tribunal are: Trans-Tasman Resources boss Alan Eggers says the seabed mine would bring jobs and riches without harming the environment. Photo: Te Korimako o Taranaki Other parties include Climate Justice Taranaki, Ngāruahine's school Te Kura o Ngāruahinerangi and from outside the region Te Rūnanga o Ngāti Porou ki Hauraki who also face an FTAA application. For the fast-track bid to be rejected the mine's negative impacts must significantly outweigh national and regional benefits - meaning environmental and cultural damage must be deemed greater than the money the mine makes for Taranaki and New Zealand. Last Thursday the organisers of the fast-track decision process ordered TTR to [ show where it had updated its evidence] since losing in the courts. "Almost all of the technical appendices are dated 2015 and were obviously prepared to support the 2016 application. Only a handful of those reports were updated in 2023 or 2024," noted panel convener Jennifer Caldwell. "The Cultural Values Assessment report, prepared by an independent consultant in 2017, was not updated despite what must have been new information as to the Māori concerns." A month earlier panel conveners ordered the Environmental Protection Authority to dig into the proposed seabed mine's [ environmental and economic impacts]. Every day of operation for at least 20 years the mining ship would discharge 180,000 tonnes of unwanted seabed sediment, a recognised pollutant, into the abundant waters of the Pātea Shoals. TTR claims region benefits of: A report for the miners predicted annual national gains of: LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ on Air.
RNZ News
07-07-2025
- Business
- RNZ News
Wanganui-Manawatu Sea Fishing Club leader raises alarm over seabed mining project
Jamie Newell, diving off South Taranaki, says large areas of one of New Zealand's most important fisheries could be wiped out by seabed mining. Photo: Supplied The commodore of the Wanganui-Manawatu Sea Fishing Club is raising the alarm over a seabed mining project he never believed would happen. "With it being turned down by the Supreme Court and there being a court-ordered environmental hearing, I never, ever thought it would get to this point," Jamie Newell told Local Democracy Reporting. The Whanganui diver, fisherman and business owner said large areas of one of New Zealand's most important fisheries could be wiped out by an Australian miner's desire to mine minerals off the South Taranaki coast. Trans Tasman Resources (TTR) wants to extract up to 50 million tonnes a year of seabed material a year. It would recover an estimated 5 million tonnes of vanadium-rich titanomagnetite concentrate and then dump unwanted sediment back into the sea. TTR withdrew from an environmental hearing to apply for marine consents via the coalition government's new fast-track approvals regime. Newell, who manages family-run fishing and outdoors business Marine Services Whanganui, said low reefs in the South Taranaki Bight would be smothered by the dumping of 45 million tonnes a year of "dredge tailings" for 20 years. Recreational fishers and local businesses could be left reeling for decades, he said. "That's extremely concerning. I'm extremely worried for what that sediment would do to our marine environment and how dramatically it could change recreational fishing off there." Newell said he feared the impact of silt pollution on precious reef life. "I was brought up diving the coastline and my father dived it as well. I've done a lot of exploratory diving out to 45m. I've seen personally how clear it is out there - and I'm worried. "We have some very diverse ecosystems off this coastline - some of the most scenic you could ever hope to see. The reef life is some of the best in the world. "It's a very unreal place, one of the only places we have like this in the whole of the North Island. "You can be out there with 60 to 100 kingis swimming around you, being inquisitive. No movie could ever replicate that." Wanganui-Manawatu Sea Fishing Club commodore Jamie Newell. Photo: Supplied Over the past six or seven years, Newell has mapped many of the reefs he's dived using new marine electronics. "The detail we can see now is far beyond what we've been able to see before. You can know every rock and gully and face on those reefs." Pumping 90% of the extracted materials back into the ocean would result in a huge volume of displaced sediment, he said. "Niwa and TTR have done research around and inland of that area, but I've yet to see any research on the reefs downcurrent of there - the ones that will be affected. "Most of the tailings will follow the east to west currents and flow back to Whanganui. "TTR knows there will be problems in those areas, so they've left that research undone." TTR proposes mining from waters 20m to 50m deep, between 22km and 36km offshore. While inner reefs were quite tall, with faces 5m to 15m high, and would not be as affected by the dredging, some deeper reefs were low and flat, lying only about a metre and a half high. "It won't take much at all to cover them." Ocean contours dropped off into a hole about 30-40m lower than the dredging zone, he said. "That's one of our main reef structure areas. The silt's going to settle on that area between the mining zone and the back of Graham Bank, and it will hit all the reefs there." Jamie Newell and partner Melissa Churchouse. Newell says dredging tailings will wipe out a swathe of the area's reef fisheries. Photo: Supplied Newell said from a depth of around 30m, wave action did not disturb the seabed. "Pumping silt back onto it will silt up reefs that don't naturally get silt on them." Niwa had reported that tailings dumped into water 35-70m deep would move up to 20km from the mining site and Newell feared the sediment would cover a swathe of low-lying reef structure. "Reef life will lose its habitat. The tailings are going to wipe out a large part of our reef fisheries, the likes of our blue cod, terakihi and hāpuka. It's where 90 percent of our terakihi get caught. "Our numbers of snapper and crayfish and kingis are recovering and growing faster than ever. We have an exceptional recreational crayfishery here. What's this going to do to them?" Newell has been with the sea fishing club in Whanganui for more than 10 years. "At no point has TTR engaged with us. We have more than 250 members, all fishing in that area. We would be the largest recreational user of the fishing grounds east of the seabed mining zone. "They've never talked to us. As part of a consent process, I would have thought that would have been part of what you'd need to do." Newell said smothering reef fisheries would affect his and other businesses. "If people can't go out to catch a feed of fish as easily, they're going to stop trying. We'll lose customers if the habitats are no longer there, and there will be flow-on effects for other businesses. "We've been a family business for 34 years. We employ 22 staff - that's 22 families that rely on our business." Newell has raised his concerns with Whanganui MP Carl Bates. He called a fishing club meeting on Thursday to discuss the issue and spoke with Infrastructure Minister Chris Bishop during the Minister's visit to Whanganui on Friday. Bishop is one of the ministers overseeing the Fast-track Approvals regime. LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air
RNZ News
06-07-2025
- Climate
- RNZ News
'Dodge a bullet': New Plymouth mayor relieved after heavy rainfall spared most
Flooding at Puke Ariki Landing in New Plymouth. Photo: ROBIN MARTIN / RNZ A small number of South Taranaki residents are still cut off after the weekend's deluge . Two-hundred and eight millimetres of rain fell over 24 hours across the region over the weekend, but South Taranaki Mayor Phil Nixon told RNZ the district has held up "pretty well" given the extensive flooding . Nixon said the priority now was to get roads reopened, as some people still had no access in or out. "We certainly do have a few. We still haven't got a number of how many, but opening up the Waitotara Valley Road at the weekend we're freed up a few. "But there are still some people isolated at this stage,." Several roads remained closed across Taranaki, and only one lane was open through Mt Messenger due to a large slip. Phil Nixon. Photo: RNZ / Robin Martin Nixon said some rivers, such as the Waitotara, were at their absolute maximum levels. "It was at 10.5m and the tipping point is 11m, so we were very close, and that's what we were up against. We had the odd blocked culvert, but in the main we were at the max and managed to dodge a bullet." In the town of Eltham, a car was submerged in floodwaters and the large lake-like pool was dubbed 'Lake Eltham' by locals . "We had a huge pile-up of water in the centre of Eltham… we've got an investigation to do there," Nixon said. Meanwhile, New Plymouth mayor Neil Holdom was nervous about the region's resilience after stormy weather cut off arterial routes. Crews were still working to fully reopen the main state highways north out of Taranaki after heavy rain caused widespread flooding and slips last week. Neil Holdom said in some areas the infrastructure was pushed to its limits. "It's a real concern to us, that loss of connectivity, because there's a huge amount of trucking that comes in and out of Taranaki - so the impact on our economy, plus of course it's the middle of the school holidays, a lot of people travelling, a lot of uncertainty, and that's continuing now." State Highway 3 was down to a single lane in parts after slips at Mount Messenger and between Mōkau and Piopio. Geotechnical experts were expected on the other main route north out of Taranaki, SH43, closed by a slip between Whangamomona and Taumarunui. Holdom said that was putting a lot of pressure on the freight industry. "Massive impact for the trucking sector, someone who drove through there told me it looked like a battle zone. "That will take quite a lot of time to reinstate the highway to two lanes, which really shows how important it is to get this bypass through as soon as possible." Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
04-07-2025
- Climate
- RNZ News
Watch: Several South Taranaki families cut off following floods
Several South Taranaki families remain cut off on Saturday following this week's flooding . South Taranaki District mayor Phil Nixon said some roads remain impassable and crews were working to clear slips and debris. "We still have some families isolated in the Tangahoe Valley and the Waitotara Valley. We're keeping in touch with them and able to look after any welfare needs if there is any. "Our crews are working their way up through those valleys and getting as much of the slips and that cleared as they can, but we still don't totally know the state of some of those roads until the crews work their way up." Nixon said the families were resilient, but in the case of a medical emergency, helicopters could be used to reach them. "They are used to being cut off at times. And so most of them are pretty well prepared for these sorts of events. And as I say, we're we're able to go and get help into them if we absolutely need to." It was unclear how many families were affected. Nixon said the situation with the Waitotara River was stable. "So, currently we do have some light grizzly rain. We have had for a while, and we're not expecting a lot of rain today, just misty, grizzly rain. "The Waitotara River has dropped overnight, although in the last few hours, it has been very, very slowly rising, so more or less I'd call it stable, but about three or four metres down on what it was at its peak yesterday." A further update is expected midday Saturday. Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero , a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.
RNZ News
02-07-2025
- Automotive
- RNZ News
Driver dies after car hits power pole
Photo: RNZ / Nate McKinnon A person has died when the car they were driving crashed into a a power pole in South Taranaki. Emergency services were called to the scene on Livingstone Road, Tokaora at 11.16pm on Wednesday. The driver was the sole occupant of the car, central road policing manager Phillip Ward said. The driver died at the scene. Police said they were investigating the cause of the crash and the death would be referred to the coroner.
