Dam flyer causes distress
Opponents resorting to ‘‘desperate scaremongering’’, says MP
A couple in their 80s have been frightened by a flyer’s claims that an 8m-high wall of water could hit their town if the proposed Waimea dam fails.
The Smiths – Geoffrey, 84, and Wendy, 83 – live in the growing settlement of Brightwater. Like many residents, they received a flyer in their letterbox last week, headed: Time for the truth on the Lee Valley dam. How the Waimea dam could affect you, your family, your home and its value.
The flyer contains several claims about the proposed dam, including fears of a ‘‘tidal wave’’ if the structure should fail.
Scientist and former Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment Dr Morgan Williams is one of several people who have hit back at the claims in the flyer and its anonymous authors.
Williams labelled the claims ‘‘scaremongering’’. He said the claim that the dam could burst and create an 8m wave in Brightwater 20 minutes later was ‘‘pure fantasy’’.
The flyer says there is an active earthquake fault line on either side of the proposed site of the dam in the Lee Valley, near Brightwater, and that a quake on the Alpine Fault is ‘‘overdue’’.
The dam site sits between the Wairau Fault, which is a section of the Alpine Fault, and the Waimea-Flaxmore Fault System.
‘‘You should be deeply concerned,’’ the flyer says. ‘‘If the dam failed, collapsed or breached and released its 13 million cubic metres of water, it would hit the Brightwater township in a tidal wave up to eight metres high. It would take all before it with catastrophic effect and a huge risk to human life and properties. The school is in its direct path.’’
Tasman District Council has the right to register the potential inundation risk on each property title on the flooding map via a Land Information Memorandum (LIM), the flyer says.
‘‘So, once the dam goes ahead . . . what would your property be worth? Would it be saleable? Is your property insurable? And if so, at what cost.’’
However, council environment and planning manager Dennis Bush-King said the council would not be putting a notation on LIMs if the dam was constructed. ‘‘It has to be a credible risk.’’
The flyer says the information is provided by a ‘‘group of local residents/ratepayers’’, but no names are included.
Geoffrey Smith said the flyer was ‘‘a bit frightening when you look at it’’.
However, after the initial shock, he thought that the dam designers and decision makers would have taken into consideration all the potential risks, such as earthquakes and floods.
‘‘I couldn’t believe responsible people wouldn’t have taken it into account,’’ he said.
The Smiths sought reassurance from some councillors. They also contacted Nelson MP Dr Nick Smith’s office.
The MP said he had also spoken with ‘‘mothers in tears’’ over the flyer at the Nelson A&P Show during the weekend.
‘‘I am appalled that dam opponents have resorted to this sort of desperate scaremongering,’’ he said.
‘‘Nobody should be publishing or distributing made-up claims on issues as serious as earthquake and tidal wave risks.’’
It was bad enough that those responsible had not put their name to the flyer, he said, but worse that ‘‘they have tried to give it credibility by using the good names of [geologist] Dr Mike Johnston . . . and [consultants] Tonkin & Taylor’’.
Williams said Johnston had been quoted ‘‘out of context’’ in relation to earthquake risk.
Johnston said he had not seen the flyer, but from what he’d heard ‘‘it would seem that I am being misquoted’’.
The activity on the Wairau Fault and on the Waimea-Flaxmore Fault System, and the size and type of earthquakes they could potentially produce, had been taken fully into account in the design of the dam, he said.
‘‘Both the seismic data and the dam design have been peer reviewed.’’
Johnston last year said the dam would be designed ‘‘so that it won’t catastrophically collapse’’.
Nick Smith said he believed the anonymous leaflet had been timed to try to influence decisions in Parliament today, regarding a local bill to enable land access for the dam, and at the council on Friday.
‘‘I urge anybody who has information on who is publishing and distributing these false claims to contact me,’’ he said. ‘‘People should not be able to scare the hell out of a community like Brightwater with these sort of reckless claims, and they should be exposed for their reckless behaviour.’’
‘‘People should not be able to scare the hell out of a community like Brightwater with these sort of reckless claims, and they should be exposed.’’ Nick Smith, Nelson MP
Share subscribers in Waimea Irrigators Ltd have confirmed their subscriptions for more than 3000 water shares in the Waimea dam project.
Waimea Irrigators Ltd (WIL) in October issued a replacement product disclosure statement for its planned investment in the multimillion-dollar project to build a dam in the Lee Valley, near Nelson. WIL and Tasman District Council are proposed joint-venture partners in the project.
WIL’s replacement product disclosure statement (PDS) detailed additional investment of $11.5 million by WIL. The extra funds were needed after updated pricing took the remaining capital costs for the project from an estimated $75.9m to about $99m, leaving a $23m gap for WIL and the council to plug.
The details in the replacement PDS include an increase to subscribers in the cost of water charges, from $600 per water share a year to $650.
A new ‘‘investor vehicle’’, made up of a group of local family businesses on the Waimea Plains, has committed to invest $11m in WIL.
Share subscribers had until November 15 to review the replacement PDS and return a confirmation notice to reconfirm their subscriptions.
Under its original PDS, WIL had applications for more than 3000 water shares. WIL project manager Natasha Berkett on Monday confirmed the company had received confirmation for more than 3000 shares.
‘‘Our final position was a net gain in terms of the shares originally applied for and those on our register of interest,’’ Berkett said. ‘‘WIL is very pleased with the result, which indicates the ongoing support and commitment from land owners who appreciate the value of water for their businesses and lifestyle blocks.’’
The council is due on Friday to make a final go/no-go decision on the dam.
‘‘[Waimea Irrigators Ltd] is very pleased with the result.’’ Natasha Berkett, WIL project manager