Town sewage treatment plant upgrade
The Central Hawke’s Bay District Council (CHBDC) has to renew its resource consent for the disposal of treated sewerage effluent in the next few years.
It has been working on plans to reduce the discharge of treated effluent, which is currently pumped into the Tukutuki River, by irrigating this onto land which has been planted with trees. The land was purchased by the Hawke’s Bay Regional Council for this purpose, and made available to the CHBDC.
It was subsequently discovered that the land was nowhere near as suitable as was originally thought, that the soil type was not suitable for irrigation, and that parts of the land were too steep. As a result of this, the CHBDC has withdrawn its application for resource consent, and is investigating another option for treating effluent to a far higher standard.
The revised plan and intention is that it will then be less objectionable to discharge this cleaner, treated effluent, into the Tukituki River. The land that has been planted with trees will still be a repository for this treated effluent however only during times of the year when the risk of effluent run-off is low. This plan is still being worked on, and details will be made available when known.