To all those people who pushed on all those 10 years. As KASM and as those behind the scenes. The Iwi, the fishers. The ones that had to stop because of health reasons and those that stayed. Those that repesented Maori and Pakeha against seabed mining. Those that send in the applications and spoke truth to power. I am proud to have stood with you and to have had my say and I am absulutely overjoyed that wisdom has prevailed!
A powerful environmental committee has refused to give consent to an application to mine the black sands off the oceanfloor in the southern Taranaki Bight.
TransTasman Resources wanted to vacuum up iron-rich seafloor sands and extract titano-magnetite or iron ore for export, returning 90% of the sand back to the seafloor.
In its decision released today, the committee, which was appointed by the Environmental Protection Authority (EPA), said the major reason for the rejection “was uncertainty around the scope and significance of the potential adverse environmental effects, and those on existing interests”.
The EPA says the committee “was not satisfied that the life-supporting capacity of the environment would be safeguarded or that the adverse effects of the proposal could be avoided, remedied or mitigated, given the uncertainty and inadequacy of the information presented”.
The $70 million marine consent application was the first to be processed by the EPA under the new Exclusive Economic Zone legislation which took effect in June last year.
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Aotearoa: A Wider Perspective 