Port Otago gets permission to deepen harbour channel

Monday 20th June 2011

Port Otago has been given permission to carry out dredging work to deepen the Otago Harbour despite plenty of opposition from locals, worried about environmental damage.

An independent resource consent hearing panel, appointed by the port's owners, the Otago Regional Council, on Friday approved the proposal, subject to conditions on ongoing monitoring and research into the effects of the dredging and soil disposal.

The port has permission to deepen the channel from 13m to 15m and dispose of up to 7.2 million cubic metres of material at sea, in about 27m of water, some 6.5km northeast of Taiaroa Head, over the next 20 years.

Seventy-five percent of the 200 submitters to the scheme opposed the dredging. Opponents have 15 working days to appeal the decision to the Environment Court.

Port Otago had spent four years and $2.8 million preparing its case and chief executive Geoff Plunket said he was very happy with the consent conditions.

"They are in line with what we proposed," he told NZPA.

The port anticipated that vessels would increase in size in the coming years and it was necessary to deepen the harbour so larger vessels could continue to use the port, he said.

Currently vessels more than 11.8m below the waterline need to come in on higher tides.

It also has permission to extend the existing multipurpose wharf and build a public-use fishing jetty at the end of Boiler Point.

Plunket said the modelling work was done by Niwa and had been peer reviewed twice. The port would monitor the effects of dredging in case the scientific predictions were not accurate and it would review the dredging work if needed.

The consent panel admitted it was "almost entirely dependent" on the hydraulic modelling undertaken by Port Otago on the effects of sedimentation on ecology and on waves passing over a deepened channel and spoil disposal sites.

It said the port had been in operation for almost 150 years but there was no serious evidence serious damage had been done in previous dredging.

It was "of some importance" that a significant majority -- 75 percent of the 200 submitters -- opposed the decision, however the panel believed the worst of their fears could be dealt with.

Opponents' main concerns were around the effects of sedimentation on the harbour and offshore, soil disposal offshore, channel deepening on nationally recognised surf breaks at Aramoana and the effects of noise from the port on residents.

Surfbreak Protection Society South Island representative Nicola Reeves told the Otago Daily Times she was "gobsmacked" at reading the decision and its comments about the nationally protected surf break at Aramoana.

The panel had not heard or understood the society's concerns about dumping of the soil at the inshore site near Aramoana, she said.

The society did not have the funds to appeal the decision, she said.

Comments from our readers

No comments yet