Mount Industrial Community E-Newsletter -April 2021Tēnā koutou, Welcome to your April edition of the Mount Industrial Community newsletter. Please read on for updates on the following: 1. Air Quality Working Party Hui Air Quality Working Party HuiThe Mount Maunganui Air Quality Working Party held their third hui on Wednesday 6 April. The Working Party has representatives from Mount business and industry, iwi and hapū of Whareroa, Clear the Air community group, Tauranga City and Bay of Plenty Regional councillors and commissioners, health agencies and special interest groups. The meeting was focussed on prioritising key issues regarding contributors to air pollution within the Mount Maunganui air-shed and immediate, medium and long term solutions to be realised. There is unanimous agreement that current air pollution is impacting on human health and everyone has a role to play, but business and industry in particular have a key stake in reducing air pollutants – which many of the large industrial sites have already been working towards with large capital expenditure in new plant, equipment and air discharge mitigation. It is pleasing to note that so far in 2021 only three breaches of National Air Quality Standards have been recorded in the airshed and all were attributed to a single activity which was traced and ceased once identified. Black dustRegional Council has received many complaints about black dust over the years and our Science Team have done a thorough investigation into it. Read the report here. We have also done more recent investigations where the findings were similar to this report. We do dust monitoring as part of an extensive live air quality monitoring network across the Mount Maunganui industrial area. For more information, please visit www.boprc.govt.nz/mountindustrial. If you find, see, or smell pollution, call our 24/7 Pollution Hotline on 0800 884 883! Where to find current notified resource consents onlineResource consents help us sustainably manage our environment. Keep up to date with the latest publicly notified resource consents on our website at www.boprc.govt.nz/environment/resource-consents/notifications. There you can download a form and make a submission if you wish to have your say. Pollution Hotline Regional Awareness Campaign – Help us help the environment!To raise awareness of our 24/7 Pollution Hotline service across the region, we ran a multi-channel media campaign over six weeks in February and March. It included digital billboards in Tauranga and Rotorua, radio ads on 1XX in Whakatāne and the Eastern Bay and a youth focused social media campaign. The key message was a call to action, “if you find, see or smell pollution, call the 24/7 Pollution Hotline,” while drawing attention to the various types of pollution we can assist with. The Pollution Hotline received over 100 additional phone calls across the region last month, coinciding with this awareness campaign. Timaru Oil Services consent appeal updateThe independent commissioner’s decision to decline the Timaru Oil Services resource consent applications to construct a new jet fuel storage facility on Totara Street was appealed by the applicant. A court mediation date with all parties is being set up and planned for next month. We understand this application is of interest to the community and we will keep you informed as this process progresses. For more information on this case, please visit our website. Oil spill exerciseLast week we had our biannual multi-agency oil spill response training exercise at Fergusson Park and the wider Matua area. This regular training helps ensure we are prepared to respond in an oil incident and that our Oil Spill Response Plan is coordinated and effective. We used booms, oil skimmers, boats and PPE to contain and clean up the oil. This inter-agency exercise included staff from the Regional Council response team including the Regional Harbourmaster, Maritime NZ, Tauranga City Council, Department of Conservation, iwi, Waikato Regional Council & Gisborne District Council. For more information on oil spills, please visit: www.boprc.govt.nz/oil-spills Did someone forward this newsletter to you? Click subscribe to receive the next edition straight to your inbox. |