Government weighing second sea bed mining application

Sunday, 7 July 2024

Iwi, conservationists and the fishing industry are all opposed to environmental harm from seabed mining.

The Government is considering a second application for seabed mining off the coast of Taranaki.

In a protracted and often controversial battle, Trans-Tasman Resources (TTR) aims to extract up to 50 million tonnes of iron sands each year from the seabed, over four decades.

Now the Sunday Star-Times can reveal that officials are considering a request for a prospecting permit from another company that hopes to mine for vanadium south of surf town Ōpunake.

Ngarara Exploration Limited’s (NEL) sole director Andrew Stewart is a former chief financial officer of TTR.

Documents released under the Official Information Act reveals NEL is focused on the common, but relatively unknown, metal. Its application covers almost 500 square kilometres in waters beyond the territorial sea, which extends to 12 nautical miles.

For many years vanadium was used to strengthen steel in car chassis, high-rise buildings and bridges. But increasingly it is seen as a safer and more renewable alternative to lithium in batteries.

“There exists worldwide a great interest in strategic minerals which are required to be used for the materials essential in the production and storage of renewable energy for the transition to a lowcarbon economy,” NEL’s application says.

“This application proposes to add to the existing knowledge of the vast potential for strategic minerals in the South Taranaki Bight area.”

Environmentalists and iwi have fought a near-decade-long battle to prevent extraction, after TTR was granted a minerals mining permit for iron sands in May 2014.

Opponents argue that as well as dredging up seafloor, the mining also involves dumping unwanted matter back into the sea, creating a sediment plume that smothers marine life.

In 2017, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) granted marine consents, but the decisions was subject to continued legal challenge.

Four years later, the Supreme Court upheld previous High Court and Court of Appeal decisions quashing the marine consents.

The court referred the matter back to the EPA for consideration, and 20 environmental groups, fishing companies and iwi voiced their opposition.

TTR claims the project to mine iron, titanium and vanadium will bring $1 billion a year in export receipts, $250 million annually in royalties and corporate taxes, and an overall wealth boost of $150b to economy.

But the Australian company backed out of the process in April. Critics believe it was hoping to get approval through the Government’s new fast-track legislation, designed to speed up nationally important infrastructure projects.

Kiwis Against Seabed Mining’s chairperson Cindy Baxter said the proposed regime, expected to pass into law later this year, will create “open slather” for seabed mining companies.

Baxter said that TTR is hoping for consent to mine a 66-square-kilometre area, but is also applying for an extension.

“In total, it wants to mine over 800 square kilometres of the bight. This is the plan it's using to attract investors.

“With this new prospecting permit [from NEL] we're looking at another 500 square kilometres on top of that.

“These companies are tone deaf. Kiwis don't want seabed mining, even the fishing industry opposes it.

“New Zealanders love their ocean. We have a huge amount of support from across the political spectrum, from Taranaki dairy farmers to hippie surfers.”

Trans-Tasman Resources wants to mining 50 million tonnes of seabed annually from a 66km² area in the South Taranaki Bight.

Baxter said the courts “have been very clear” about the potential impact on the marine environment.

“There is absolutely no way that seabed mining that kind of area for that amount of time would cause no material harm and no way it could be re-mediated.

“And now one TTR’s former execs is prospecting.

“Before TTR's first application was turned down, there were mining and exploration permits right down the west coast of the country.

Mining company BT mining and its predecessor, Solid Energy, have spent tens of millions of dollars trying to clean up the West Coast's Ngākawau River.

“Most companies walked away after the EPA refused the first consent. If TTR gets its first permit under fast-track then it'd be open slather.”

The new NEL application was lodged with MBIE’s New Zealand Petroleum & Minerals branch in December 2022.

The agency confirmed it is under “active assessment.”

The initial stage of prospecting is desktop and research-based and doesn’t yet require marine consents, documents reveal. NEL then hopes to move to electronic and instrumentation surveys “unlikely to affect the seabed”.

Ngarara Exploration have applied for a two year prospecting permit for a 495 km2 area in the South Taranaki Bight, south of Opunake.

In March, national manager of petroleum and minerals John Buick-Constable wrote to eight affected Taranaki iwi and hapū asking for feedback on the proposal. No submissions were received.

Buick-Constable said there is no set timeframe for assessing or deciding applications. “Each application brings its own complexities and must be assessed against the relevant statutory tests,” he said.

“When a recommendation on the application has been made by permitting officers, it will progress to the delegated decision-maker under the Crown Minerals Act 1991 within the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment for statutory decisions.

“We note that the Minister for Resources [Shane Jones] can, at any time, exercise his right to make an application decision.”

NZ First's coalition agreement with National says the Government intends to 'investigate the strategic opportunities in New Zealand's mineral resources, including vanadium, and develop a plan to develop these opportunities'.

However, in March Jones told Greenpeace that he has stepped aside from TTR’s bid to mine the seabed because of his dual role as Minister of Oceans and Fisheries and opposition from the commercial fishing industry.

Stewart could not be reached for comment this week.

What do you think? Email sundayletters@stuff.co.nz. Please include your full name and address.