Roxburgh's efforts to make
the Clutha River cleaner will cost about $285,000.
The Roxburgh Community Board has to change the way it deals
with treated wastewater from the town and rather than
discharging it into the Clutha, it has agreed to dispose of
treated effluent on land.
"The consent for that [discharging into the river] expires on
April 30, 2011, and the rules have changed since we put in
oxidation ponds," Central Otago District Council development
engineer Peter Morton told the board yesterday.
"The bar has been raised by the Otago Regional Council so
we've been working on solutions for some time."
Roxburgh needed a "low-cost, low-tech" solution, he said.
The regional council now required discharge of treated
wastewater to land unless land disposal was inappropriate for
the site.
The board decided to seek consents for treated effluent to be
discharged on land next to the existing oxidation ponds. The
ponds will still be used in the upgraded system, but instead
of discharging the treated wastewater into the river, it will
go through a series of berms on the ground that filter it.
The extended site is part of the Roxburgh Plantation Reserve
land, about 500m from the town. The land is dredge tailings,
vested in the council as a local purpose reserve.
Several regional and district council consents will be needed
before the work begins, including a discharge consent and
designating the extended site for wastewater treatment and
disposal.
The board will also need to seek permission from the Minister
of Crown Lands to change the reserve status of the land.
All going well, with no appeals at any stage, the new
wastewater system could be constructed by the end of next
year.
"In the future, you'll be able to put your hands up and say
Roxburgh's not contaminating the Clutha," council consulting
engineer Paul Jacobson said about the improvements.
A groundwater monitoring bore 70m from the Teviot River and
70m from the Clutha would be used to sample the quality of
the water.
Because the dredge tailings were pre-1900, the site was
defined as an archaeological site and an archaeological
assessment would have to be carried out before any work
began, he said.
A figure of $200,000 was set aside in the long term council
community plan for upgrading Roxburgh's wastewater system in
the coming financial year.
- lynda.van.kempen@odt.co.nz
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