Wellington local government meeting
Friday 27 October
Waste policy
Recycling, reuse and community
- The glass issue is highlighting the need to develop markets for recycled materials.
- There is no mandate to implement Waste Strategy targets so this may not be occurring.
- The profile of the 2002 Waste Strategy needs to be raised or amended to adapt to the present. A bit more encouragement/prodding may be needed to increase uptake.
Hazardous waste management
- Hazardous waste is a significant issue.
- Every health board in New Zealand is sending hazard waste overseas, as most local incinerators have been shut down.
Education and information
- There needs to be coordinated education and messages around waste issues and waste minimisation. We need to consider how to best get public involvement.
- Education in schools is fundamental to get the behavioural change at a generational level.
National environmental standards
Infrastructure
- Transpower are upgrading their lines. There is a need for national consistency in district councils’ plans.
- It would be good to have national consistency on telecommunications.
Climate change
- Why worry about policy/structure when one event could knock everything out? A lot of time is wasted on esoteric thinking. Because we spend time on this development has suffered. In China they are not so concerned about the environment or talking about things, but things still get done, and no one dies.
- Development gets held up because of interest groups delaying the process, so roads do not get built. We consult to the hilt.
Septic tanks
- District Council and Regional Councils are not sure who should be looking after septic tanks. Rural areas are being infiltrated and they have septic tanks, by city people and septic tanks need to be upgraded. They may not be an issue, but the homeowner needs to upgrade the entire system. In Te Horo septic tanks are affecting the water supply. Subdivisions cause additional stresses on the environment. On rural properties, storm water is often connected to the septic tank. Roles and responsibilities for managing septic tanks are not clear.
- Septic are a topical issue in Kapiti and Te Horo. National guidance is needed.
Wind turbines
- Wind turbines are dirty energy. We need to use energy from the past like nuclear energy.
General comments
- We need to find new energy sources.
- We need to manage overseas interests in our waters so our resources, including our fisheries, are not plundered.
- Shortcuts get taken when planning urban centres and the result is very unappealing. Green space gets sold off and turned into housing.
- Projects needs to be done quickly. Local Government does not understand the development process. Local Government is too pedantic and holds back development. Their approach is piecemeal.
- Local Government should provide services and deliver, not worry about things like climate change.
- Industries are needed to create growth in New Zealand. They cannot do that if development is stymied or too difficult.
- Resource consents get caught up right at the end. MfE should make it easier for developers. If rules are too prohibitive or costly subdivision development may not go ahead which is terrible for the community.
- There is concern that National Environmental Standards do not translate into real change at local level.
Water
Flood risk management and catchment management
- The floods of 2004, 2005, and 2006 resulted in millions of dollars being spent on repairing damage.
- A more catchment based management approach is needed using the Regional Policy Statement and the District Plan.
- Central government has to play a part in the maintenance of infrastructure.
- Upgrading is needed to maintain a standard of service to deal with hazards.
- There needs to be research on better flood hazard analysis. There has been no recent investment in this.
Climate change
- Mitigation and adaptation need to be balanced.
- Adaptation is a pragmatic option.
- What measurement/evidence is there that there has been a climate change effect e.g. rising sea levels? Is this just scare tactics?
- The plan process is too slow to have an immediate effect. Resource consents are still being granted.
- A national policy or standard could prescribe how to deal with rising sea levels.
- Use / work with local government as a means to achieve outcomes / goals for climate change.
- The RMA amendments to take account of climate change are not strong enough.
General comments
- The Kapiti ‘green team’ has lots of benefits.
- A water campaign around urban people and urban water issues was suggested. Be the difference worked in school programmes.
- Water meters are needed in every home.
- Pilot cisterns / water system projects.
- Funding should be provided for water audits.
- Bring back the roof tank.
- Put into the Building Code the need for two water systems, one for washing and one for drinking.
- When should Government step in? The earlier the better.
- Government should be partnering with local government. Policy should recognise that the means to achieve outcomes is through local government.
- Prioritisation of funding in councils is needed – to encourage behaviour change.
Environmental reporting
General comments
- The web is under utilised by some councils as a way to present information.
- Are we reporting on estuaries and ecological health? Lots of councils are putting effort into monitoring.
- More information is wanted on Coastal Environmental Indicators.
- It is important that the ENZ07 report is comparable with the 1997 state of the environment report.
- Reporting should be at different levels and use different mediums as appropriate.
- Wetlands should be included – including information on the number and health of wetlands and estuaries.
- The report should indicate limitations resulting from the methods of data collection that are used.
- There should be an acknowledgement that the report is not all inclusive regarding all things that are important to the environment.
- The structure of the proposed report was liked.
- Material and data should be referenced and available on the web.
General interest
Air quality
- There is a spur in the hills in Upper Hutt that traps smoke from home fires and causes smog. Because the local monitoring station is below the spur, the smog is not picked up.
Education and information
- Awareness of the environment needs to become a core part of all decision making and general public awareness. The environment should not be seen as something that operates alongside the economy, health and social wellbeing but rather as a core part of all of these issues.
Resource Management Act
- The RMA is perceived to stop development and there are an increasing number of attempts being made to weaken it. People forget what came before the RMA. The RMA is one of the most inclusive pieces of environmental protection legislation in the world. It would be very difficult to change the RMA.
- By introducing fees for people who are not immediately affected (marginal interests) by the proposal people would be forced to put a value on their submissions and the effect of the proposed work. Concern was expressed that fees could stop those with little money making submissions, a fee of $25-$50 was suggested.
- People expect black and white results from the RMA and the Environment Court which is often not the case.
- People like the RMA or regulations stopping their neighbour doing ‘annoying’ things but do not generally want to be stopped from doing things themselves.
- Work should be done to educate the public about the RMA so that they can make applications and appeals by themselves. There is no real need for the middlemen in the RMA process, they add to the cost. People do not need lawyers to do the work for them.
Transport
- There is a need for increased public transport, both as a means of contributing to air quality and for reducing congestion.
- Some factors limit the uptake of public transport, including walking distance and limited parking.
- Park and ride can address some of these issues (but is very expensive because of the need for large areas of land). Urban planning is important for encouraging public transport.
- User pays congestions charges would/could replace all other transport related charges (fuel levy, road user etc). Different rates would be charged at different times and rural users would be better off under a user pays system.
- It was noted that there is a critical mass for some of these charges to work and that for most of New Zealand the numbers are not there.
- It is difficult for the Greater Wellington Regional Council to source rolling stock to meet increased demand for travel by train. Sydney has recently placed an order for 600 double deck carriages and Wellington just ca not compete with that scale.
- Parents need to be made aware of the benefits of walking to school. Schools should be planned from the kids’ point of view rather than from the adults who drop kids off at school.
- There is a need for incentives for change. People are more likely do some thing if they gain from their action
- The MTA estimated that an extra 1000 staff and equipment would be needed for high quality testing of exhaust emissions hence the five second smoke rule.
- New Zealand needs to improve fuel quality to improve exhaust emissions. This is a ‘fairly easy fix’ and some improvement happened as a result of the upgrade of the New Zealand refinery.
- A cleaner fuel for use in the future is diesel. Diesel engines use more advanced technology and result in ‘cleaner’ emissions.
- Technology is outstripping legislation (but legislation is slow to advance for a reason). New Zealand needs to get the ‘dross’ off of the road which is difficult to do as people with low incomes tend to run their cars into the ground.
- There is a national need to increase and improve all aspects of reporting that apply to vehicles and vehicle emissions.
- New Zealand should link vehicle imports to minimum standards.
Energy
- There is a need to balance supply and demand to avoid spikes and dips. Small scale intermittent generation is difficult to coordinate.
- Using wind power in a house requires ‘huge’ battery storage.
Water
- There are limits with home storage of water.
- New Zealand is taking the Australian water standards and labels. Australia is making users pay for water to change their behaviour.
- The use of automatic timed showers in prisons is saving huge amounts of water.
- Quality of water rather than quantity is the issue in New Zealand.
- MfE provides standards/guides rather than an enforcement arm. Local government enforces regulation/legislation.
- Water collected off the roof still needs to be filtered. A filter is only as good as its maintenance.
- The Government needs to encourage private investment in water quality and quantity.
- What about educating the population about water issues? New Zealand is seen as having more than enough water, is this the case?
- The water situation in Australia is dire.
- What about the effects of medicines in waste water? These remain even after filtering and are consumed along with the water. Reservoirs are drying out and rain patterns are changing.
- Provide education so that children know how much water their house uses.
- The Ministry needs to work with and educate farmers about water quality issues or they may ‘tell you where to go’. The message needs to be sold in the right way
- Government at all levels needs to work with people, not tell them what to do about water (environmental issues).
- One third of Auckland’s electricity is used to pump water.
- The first in first served method of allocating water can mean that some people get more water than they need.
- On the Kapiti Coast, there is limited storage and no new development of catchments to ensure storage seems to be taking place.
- Even a big external domestic storage tank does not last long when watering your garden.
- In Wellington it costs $10,000 per m3 per annum for water.
General comments
- The operation and maintenance of steam trains by enthusiasts has negative impacts. The trains are smoky, noisy and disruptive when operated in the weekend. The smoke from trains is not addressed by regulations and the operation of trains along seldom used lines is seen by some people as breaching their privacy.
- The Beacon Pathway House Now House was cited as an example of what can be achieved at no extra cost.
- As there is no extra cost involved in building the Now House should we legislate for efficiency?
- It is possible with existing technology to build houses that do not need heating in 95% of locations in New Zealand.
- It is possible to manage the environmental impacts of buildings at low or no cost and improve efficiency.
- Incandescent light bulbs which waste 95% of the energy used.
Last updated: 27 February 2008
