Protests set for seabed mine hearing
Protests are expected from iwi and others opposed to a controversial plan to mine the seabed off South Taranaki as a public hearing begins in Hāwera tomorrow.
A new independent decision-making committee from the Environmental Protection Agency is considering evidence and submissions for an application from Trans-Tasman Resources Limited (TTRL) to mine iron sands off the south coast of Taranaki.
For a decade, TTRL has tried to win the required consents to extract up to 50 million tonnes of sand each year from the seabed within the South Taranaki Bight.
The first attempt was rejected by the authority in 2013, but a follow-up application three years later was successful.
However, court action followed involving a number of parties including iwi, and that decision was ultimately overturned.
In late 2021, the Supreme Court dismissed an appeal brought by TTRL, and upheld previous High Court and Court of Appeal decisions.
Following the Supreme Court decision, the application was sent back to the authority for reconsideration.
TTRL boss Alan Eggers said he was feeling good about the hearing.
“For us it’s business as usual, we are getting on with it, we have provided the information that has been requested.
“Our opponents are very skilled at creating doubt and uncertainty for the decision makers, it’s up to us to provide evidence to counteract that,” he said.
However, lined up against the TTRL legal and expert team is a large opposition group including Kiwis Against Seabed Mining (KASM) Climate Justice Taranaki, Greenpeace, Forest and Bird, fisheries interests, Te Kahui o Ngāti Ruanui Trust, the trustees of Te Kahui o Rauru Trust, and Te Ohu Kai Moana Trust Ltd.
KASM chair Cindy Baxter said a big contingent would protest outside theTSB Hub in Hāwera, on the first day of the hearings, being held from Wednesday to Friday, followed by more hearings on April 16 and 17, and May 27-29.
Baxter alleged TTRL had barely done any more science since its 2016 application.
“It's clear this company has spent more cash on lobbying the government to get onto a fast track list and bypass any serious environmental test, a test that has been set out by the highest court in the land and one that we argue seabed mining will absolutely fail.”
Te Pati Māori co-leader Debbie Ngarewa-Packer, who led Ngāti Ruanui iwi through years of campaigning against the mining plan before she entered Parliament, said she was annoyed the process was back at this point.
“Iwi have made it known what they think about this activity.
“Despite winning all the court cases ... we have proved beyond doubt this company can’t meet the environmental threshold, but here we are, back at this point.
“Now we have a government that is really aggressive with the way it thinks economic wealth should be above environmental protection.”
She said the Government and TTRL may have underestimated the weight of opposition to the application.
“I don’t think they realise the strength of our community.”
Seafood New Zealand chief executive Dr Jeremy Helson said as well as the direct impact of mining activities on fishing and fish health, the proposal could harm New Zealand’s reputation globally as a world-class manager of fisheries and a producer of high quality seafood.
TTRL’s initial analysis of the impacts of the proposal on commercial fishing was “simplistic, flawed, and not based on the latest information”, and it had sought leave last week to file a new report on commercial fishing to rectify significant gaps identified in its application, he said.
“We consider that providing a new report two working days before the hearing is set to commence is inappropriate and unlikely to address the significant information gaps identified.”
South Taranaki District mayor Phil Nixon, whose council last year described the seabed mining plan as “environmental vandalism”, said the proposal offered little benefit for the region.
“Yet there is the possibility of doing damage to the seabed, untold harm to the seabed plus the marine ecology.
“I truly believe at this stage we would be better focused on building on and offshore wind farms. We need them to meet the climate goals, we need that sustainable energy.”
In 2022, a petition signed by 35,000 New Zealanders called for a complete ban on seabed mining.