Pressure on Wairoa’s landfill has been eased, with the Ōmarunui Landfill Joint Committee agreeing to take up to 4,000 tonnes of waste from Wairoa for the next three years as a short-term solution.

The new approach will see waste transported to the Ōmarunui Landfill, near Napier, which will give the Wairoa District Council time to plan how it will manage its waste in the future.

Wairoa Mayor Craig Little was extremely appreciative of the Committee’s openness to allowing the waste transfer to occur. “Two floods within 18 months meant our landfill cell filled up at an exacerbated rate and much faster than anyone anticipated. Following Cyclone Gabrielle alone, the landfill received three times its annual tonnage in just one month.

“We are grateful that the decision by the Ōmarunui Landfill Joint Committee will give us the time needed to determine how we are going to manage our district’s waste in the future.

“Our Council is very lucky to be supported by our neighbouring Councils and we extend a big thank you to the Hastings and Napier Councils. From a cultural perspective, we are deeply appreciative to mana whenua Ngāti Hinepare, Ngāti Maahu and Ngāi Tawhao and also Ngāti Pārau for their support and understanding. We are aware of the sensitive nature of this work and engagement with mana whenua will be ongoing.”

Wairoa’s Fraser Street site will still service the community, and the recycling will continue from the site, but it will function as a transfer station instead of a landfill, with waste transported to the Ōmarunui Landfill, about 125km from Wairoa. 

Mr Little said the Council had traditionally taken the view that it should manage its own waste, which was echoed during the consultation period of the Long-Term Plan. However, based on the additional pressure placed on the landfill cell as a result of the June 2024 flood event, the Fraser Street Landfill cell filled up quickly, and the Council has had no choice but to arrange a temporary solution.

The three-year agreement will allow the Council to complete the consultation and decision-making process with regard to the future of the Fraser Street Landfill and enable the Council to re-apply for consent and construct a new cell should the decision be made to continue landfilling at the site.

Mr Little said it is important to now look at the sustainability and long-term costs of waste disposal. “The cost of compliance and carbon, i.e. greenhouse emissions to the government, is a massive expense for Wairoa ratepayers. We cannot just continue to increase the landfill gate charge to cover costs. We need to explore all our options.

“Throughout New Zealand, smaller landfills like Wairoa are closing and transporting their solid waste for disposal at larger facilities. “The management of solid waste has become significantly more expensive, meaning smaller landfills struggle to comply with the latest consent conditions imposed upon them. Operating a landfill to these new standards requires sufficient waste (and therefore revenue) to account for increased fixed and operational costs without having to set a gate charge that is unrealistically high. Cells are expensive, and the carbon [fees] you have to pay out of a landfill are just unbelievable. It is incredible that transporting waste out of town is more cost-effective than managing our waste within our district. However, we also need to balance that with other risks such as possible SH2 closures.

Mr Little said even before the flooding events, Wairoa’s rapidly filling landfill and increased compliance costs had prompted the Council to look for alternative, cheaper and more efficient options for waste disposal.

“We need to work with the community to find the best-suited, most efficient, and most cost-effective option. That includes focusing on waste minimisation which will help reduce the costs with less waste going to landfill. We also still need to work through what waste can and can’t be sent to the Ōmarunui Landfill to adhere to their requirements.

While the decision allows for 4,000 tonnes of waste per year, Wairoa’s waste to landfill is typically 3,000 tonnes. The Ōmarunui Landfill is currently receiving around 95,000 tonnes of waste per annum. From a technical viewpoint, Ōmarunui has the capacity to accept 4,000 per annum from Wairoa without impacting the overall life of the landfill to any great degree.

The Ōmarunui landfill is currently constructing a new area of the site which will take 30 years to fill at a rate of 100,000 tonnes per annum. This new area will open in mid-2025.

In making its decision, the Ōmarunui Landfill Joint Committee acknowledged it could, in the future, be looking for additional waste if existing volumes are reduced because of legislative changes, competition by new landfills and/or new disposal technologies. Solid waste received from Wairoa could help the Ōmarunui continue to be a financially and economically viable operation well into the future.

The Chief Executive of the Hastings District Council, which is the administrating authority of the Ōmarunui Landfill, will complete negotiations regarding the arrangement and it is envisaged the charge rate would be based on the “Municipal Refuse” rate plus a margin to cover the cost of capital that is currently being incurred by the Hastings and Napier Councils in expanding the site.

23 September 2024

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