Composting will be moved from Bromley
The processing of Christchurch’s organic waste is finally heading to a new purpose-built facility across town, but it will take three years to become operational.
Christchurch City Council announced yesterday New Zealand-owned company Ecogas will build a fully-enclosed plant on Aruhe Rd in South Hornby.
The council insists there will be no odours associated with the operation, unlike the existing plant in Bromley, which has emitted offensive smells for about 14 years.
Residents have begged the council to close the Living Earth-run plant for a number of years.
They say they are prisoners in their own homes, and children have even talked about being unable to play outside and walk to school because the smell can be so bad.
The new solution comes more than two years after a decision in September 2021 to look at potential new sites and new composting technologies.
The facility will use anaerobic digestion technology to convert the waste into fertiliser, biogas and biofuel.
The technology has been used in cities including London, Sydney and Madrid, the council said.
Ecogas signed a 20-year contract with Auckland Council in 2019 to dispose of up to 70,000 tonnes of the city’s food waste each year at a new facility in Reporoa.
Mayor Phil Mauger said the Hornby location had been carefully considered and was in an industrial area, zoned for this type of activity. “The plant will deliver a totally different system from how we do things at the existing plant.”
Mauger said the council was confident the new facility would provide an industry-standard, sustainable practice for organics processing, serving the city and the region.
The new plant will reduce emissions by 80% compared to the existing operation.
The council would not say how much money was being spent on the new Ecogas plant or how much the contract was worth.
Council transport and waste head Lynette Ellis said Ecogas was investing in the plant and the council would pay the gate fee for processing the organics
material. Both amounts were “commercially confidential”, she said.
However, the council did say the cost would be met within existing budgets, so would not affect rates. The council currently pays $112m a year to process the city’s organics.
The new plant is expected to be operational by late 2026.
In the meantime, the council will make changes to the way it composts organics to provide relief for besieged residents.
The council decided yesterday to continue operating in Bromley, but only for the first indoor stage of the process. The rest will be done at Kate Valley Landfill in North Canterbury.
At an additional cost of $276,000 annually, it was the cheapest alternative option and was the most environmentally friendly of the five options considered. It was also supported by 51% of the 2764 people who submitted their views during public consultation in September. An assessment of this option found the risk of offensive and objectionable odours in Bromley would be nil, since there would be no outdoor storage.
It is expected to be up and running by April.
Bromley residents wanted the plant closed immediately and all the material dumped at Kate Valley. This was one of the more expensive options at an additional $42m across five years and the least environmentally friendly.
Waitai Coastal Burwood Linwood community board chairperson Paul McMahon urged the council to have a back-up plan if the Bromley site kept on stinking past April.
He said the community would not rest until the plant was closed for good.
Board deputy chairperson Jackie Simons read out a letter at the meeting from Bromley resident Vickie Walker, who was too unwell with another lung infection to attend the meeting.
In the letter, Walker said people who wanted to keep using the Living Earth plant in the interim did not have to live with the smell on a daily basis.
“They don't suffer every day with not having air quality in their homes and properties. They can hang their washing out, garden, walk in their community, have family over for barbecues, have normal lives. We don’t.”
She urged the council to right the wrongs it had committed for so long with the plant and send all material to Kate Valley now.
“Do the right thing. We deserve better here in the east.”