Fresh eyes will reconsider a bid from a company to mine iron sand from the seabed off the South Taranaki coast.
Trans-Tasman Resources Limited (TTR) has been trying for nearly a decade to obtain the required permits from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to extract up to 50 million tons of sand from the seabed within South Taranaki Bay each year.
The first step in seeking the necessary permits was rejected by the EPA in 2013, but a follow-up application three years later was successful.
However, court action followed in which several parties were involved, including Kiwis Against Seabed Mining and Te Rūnanga o Ngāti Ruanui, and that decision was eventually set aside.
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Last September, the Supreme Court dismissed an appeal brought by TTR and upheld previous rulings of the Supreme Court and Appeal that annulled the permissions.
In May, the Supreme Court issued an order that TTR pay $ 155,000 in costs related to the appeal.
Paul McCredie
The Supreme Court dismissed an appeal brought by TTR last September.
Following the Supreme Court ruling, the application was returned to the EPA for reconsideration.
In November last year, the government and other interested parties applied to the Supreme Court to seek guidance on the composition of the new decision-making committee (DMC), and what, if any, status the decision taken by the former panel would have. .
After a high court hearing in May, Judge Andru Isac’s ruling of 28 June confirmed the need for a new DMC with either three or five members.
Other elements of the decision include that all information given to the previous DMC should be provided to the new group and that all submitters have the opportunity to respond to any new evidence tabled by TTR to support its application.
Judge Isac’s ruling set out how TTR had the opportunity to rectify the “information deficiencies” identified by the Supreme Court by providing new evidence as part of the application reconsideration process.
KASM
A petition signed by more than 35,000 people calling for a ban on deep-sea mining was delivered to parliament last month. (File photo)
The judge stressed how all parties accepted the need to have a new DMC.
He further said that the newly formed DMC could consider the decision of the original committee, despite being rejected through a series of appeals, should he choose to do so.
Michelle Ward, EPA general manager of climate, land and oceans, said in a statement following the Supreme Court ruling that the government is now setting up a new decision-making committee to reconsider TTR’s application.
Meanwhile, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer, Te Pāti Māori co-leader and Ngāti Ruanui rangatira, were in Portugal to attend the United Nations Ocean Conference to build an international coalition against deep-sea mining.
She, along with others, was also active in their opposition to TTR’s application.
In early June, a petition calling on the government to ban seabed mining in Aotearoa, signed by more than 35,000 people, was submitted to parliament.