Hokitika Wastewater Treatment Plant project

Hokitika Wastewater Treatment Plant

Key Projects

Resource consent for the current Hokitika Wastewater Treatment Plant will expire in April 2026. Council has been investigating and consulting with the community on the best way to continue to provide wastewater treatment to the Hokitika area.

Current progress

Following the second workshop in October 2021, the Hokitika Wastewater Treatment Plant Project Oversight Subcommittee adopted the outcome statement:

Improving health, environmental and cultural outcomes. By delivering a fit for purpose resilient wastewater treatment system for Hokitika.

In 2023 a short-list of preferred schemes was presented to the committee for Stantec to undertake detailed assessment.

Timeline

In 2019 Council was offered the opportunity to work with Westland Milk Products and share the cost of the ocean outfall pipeline that they were in the process of building. We consulted with the community through the Annual Plan 2019/2020 on the options available and Council agreed to work with Westland Milk Products and undertake an ocean outfall pipeline project at the cost of $1.9m.

Project tendering by Westland Milk Products attracted tenders at a significantly higher cost than expected. The successful tender increased the cost to Council to $3.37 million, a $1.47 million increase. In light of the sizeable increase of cost to the Council, a review of alternative methods of wastewater discharge was undertaken and Council consulted again with the community through the Annual Plan 2020/2021.

Members of the community, particularly our iwi partners, expressed their distaste for an ocean outfall pipeline, and asked that Council consider a land-based option. The Council accepted this as the preferred option and began a process of securing funding for a feasibility study and setting up a governance structure for the project.

In 2020 Council received $6.9m from the Three Waters Stimulus Funding Delivery Plan and earmarked a portion of the funding towards the feasibility study. Consultants, Stantec, were appointed to prepare a cost proposal and commence a stakeholder engagement process.

The Hokitika Wastewater Treatment Plant Project Oversight Subcommittee (the subcommittee) met for the first time in August 2021. The subcommittee is a genuine partnership with mana whenua, consisting of four members of Council, two members from Ngāti Waewae and two members from Ngāti Maahaki. This partnership reflects Council's commitment to the Manatu Whakaaetanga Partnership agreement.

Visit our Council Committees page for the current subcommittee membership.

Since 2021 the subcommittee has:

agreed the problems and benefits of investment
defined the technical elements of the project
reviewed the draft Strategic Case Report
reviewed the potential options
undertaken a fatal flaw assessment
completed a traffic light assessment, incorporating mana whenua feedback
identified a short-list of potential WWTP schemes.

Next Steps

Stantec will commence detailed investigation of the short-list of potential WWTP schemes to guide a multi criteria analysis. This is expected to take 12 months to include a full season of weather conditions.