WWW meet with SIRRL
SIRRL announced plans to return to Waimate in March 2023 for what they called public information-sharing sessions. These sessions were to occur in Glenavy (two sessions) on Tuesday, March 14, and Waimate (four sessions) on March 15.
This announcement came some 18+ months after the company first came to Waimate with their incinerator proposal and over 6 months after lodging a resource consent application. This is despite the company claiming on its website and in a Timaru Herald article that it would return to Waimate for public information sessions before lodging a resource consent.
WWW invite SIRRL to meet.
Upon receiving the news of SIRRL’s pending return to Waimate, WWW offered another invitation to the company to meet with its committee to have their concerns finally heard by the company. This request was accepted, and the two sides met at Glenavy in a closed-door meeting on Tuesday, March 14th. This meeting was attended by four WWW committee members and four SIRRL representatives, including SIRRL directors Paul Taylor and Herman Sioen, Babbage Consulting’s Paul Duder, and Erin Jamieson from public relations firm Convergence, employed by SIRRL.
Below is a list of some of the questions WWW put to the company and their responses.
Why Waimate?
Mr Taylor stated that Waimate was first explored as a possible location because of its central South Island position to acquire waste from Christchurch (71%), Dunedin (15%), and Central Otago (14%)
Mr Taylor then stated that up to four locations within the district were explored before settling on the Glenavy/Morven site. The company then approached the land owner (Murphy Farms) about acquiring the land.
He also stated that the site made perfect sense because of the adjacent railway line, its proximity to State Highway 1, and neighbouring industry.
WWW asked Mr Taylor if he was referring to Oceania Dairy when mentioning neighbouring industry and whether SIRRL had any agreements with Oceania.
Mr Taylor admitted that SIRRL had no agreement with Oceania.
Mr Taylor was then asked if SIRRL had an agreement with Kiwirail to transport waste to the site via rail.
Mr Taylor also admitted there was no agreement in place with Kiwirail.
Budget
WWW asked if SIRRL was still confident they could provide what they have been stating on the $350 million budget, given that the budget was provided about two years earlier and inflation has seen building costs rise significantly since then.
In his response, Mr Taylor stated that the $350 million budget was “now, probably unrealistic” but also said, “inflation worked both ways, which meant SIRRL stood to make more revenue from the operation of the plant.” It was quickly pointed out to Mr Taylor, “You need to build the plant first.”
No alternative budget has yet to be provided, some eight months later.
Two phase budget
WWW asked Mr Taylor what the proposed two-phase budget involved: phase one was $240 million, and phase two was $110 million.
Neither Mr Taylor nor his colleagues present acknowledged knowing anything about the two-phase construction. Instead of answering, Mr Taylor asked where we had gotten this information. They seemed more concerned about where the information came from than answering the actual question. It was pointed out that the information came from SIRRL’s own Project Kea website.
Mr Taylor and his PR company representative assured WWW they would endeavour to provide an answer to our question and response in due course. The following day, at one of the information-sharing sessions in Waimate, Mr Taylor was asked again if he had an answer to the two phases of the construction budget question. His reply was no. Some eight months later, WWW is still awaiting an answer.
Flood zone
Mr Taylor was asked how SIRRL could claim the chosen location to site Project Kea was ideal when it was within a flood zone.
This question was responded to by Paul Duder, who stated that Project Kea would go above and beyond the required regulation and would be built to withstand a one-in-five hundred-year flood event by raising the ground level by 150 mm. This is not an above-and-beyond requirement but the minimum requirement as set out in the district plan. The chosen site is part of what is termed a low flood-risk zone. However, the site selected for Project Kea was under significant water in July 2022 after a localised rain event. Residents have stated that the area floods frequently, and the July 2022 flooding paled significantly compared to previous flooding events.
Land subdivision
The land at Glenavy, chosen as the proposed location, was listed for sale by way of a deadline treaty sale, concluding in February 2022. Soon after, the Waimate District Council received a resource consent application to subdivide 15 hectares from a much larger parcel of farmland. The consent application provided an email from Environmental Canterbury regarding a query about the flood zone by WDC. This email stated that the area was within a low-risk flood zone, but there was very little documentation to accompany the actual risk. ECan’s response said that locals in the area may be able to provide further information about flooding.
WDC stated the following in their decision to accept the application: “The resource consent should be considered on a non-notified basis as Council was satisfied that the adverse effects of the activity on the environment would be no more than minor and, in terms of Section 95E of the RMA, no persons have been identified as being directly affected by the activity. Also, it is considered that there are no special circumstances requiring notification of the application.”
The application was granted on April 5, 2022, without the Council contacting the landowner who has lived downstream of the proposed site for over 30 years to discuss flooding, despite communication from ECan advising that locals may have relevant flooding information.
Any groundwork on the proposed site would likely affect natural watercourse movements, impacting neighbouring properties. WDC knew that the subdivision was regarding a forthcoming W-t-E incinerator proposal that had been discussed on numerous occasions by senior Council staff. They should also have been aware that a pending resource consent application lodgement for a W-t-E plant would likely affect neighbouring properties. Still, they granted the application without public notification anyway.
Project Kea website
WWW asked SIRRL why the company continued to provide misleading and false information and inflated figures on their website despite a resource consent application stating contradictory information. This included;
- Stating that the company will recycle the ash into aggregate for use in roading and as construction material, despite knowing full well that regulations in New Zealand don’t allow this.
- Inflated figures of how much metal Project Kea would recover and recycle.
- Misleading attempts to compare Project Kea to historic landfilling practices like that of Fox River on the West Coast to talk up their proposal.
- Stating that New Zealand was in a “landfill crisis” without basis.
- They use European waste-to-energy practices to Eurowash their proposal while distancing themselves from WTE practices in China. On their website, they provide next to no information about the Chinese technology or the Chinese company behind this venture.
- Stating that Project Kea was a better solution to global climate change than modern landfills without basis.
- The website stated that the company would return to Waimate before lodging a resource consent application when, in reality, the company lodged its application six months before returning to Waimate.
In their response, the company admitted that some adjustments needed to be made. When asked why it took WWW’s intervention to make this happen, Erin Jamieson bizarrely stated, “Well, that’s a matter of intention.”
This was a matter of providing the public with false information, misleading statements, and inflated figures that should have been rectified in the first instance, not after a resource consent application was made, and only when prompted to.