An exclusive look at NZ's largest dam to be built in decades & More News Here

The Waimea Dam at the highest of the south is the largest public dam to be built in New Zealand in greater than 20 years. While it is due to begin filling with water later this 12 months, it is not on time and approach over funds.

1News took a tour of the dam that hopes to ultimately present water safety for the Tasman area for the following 100 years.

It’s about 75% full with the big 50-metre excessive concrete face principally in place.

Over the following few months, the spillway and parapet will be the main target.

Waimea Water is liable for the challenge. CEO Mike Scott says it has been difficult.

He factors to the hill on the left-hand aspect which had to be carved into for the dam’s building.

“We have found that this geology on the left-hand side hasn’t been what we expected. So rather than a nice hard sandstone we’ve got a much softer argillite material which has been, which breaks up very very easily,” Scott says.

The funds blowout

The surprising points with geology are the primary cause for the dramatic price will increase, alongside Covid-19 and provide chain points.

When it was initially signed off by the Tasman District Council in 2018, the funds was $105 million. At final depend, it is now $185 million.

Scott says all the pieces doable has been accomplished to hold prices down.

“Yes. I can assure ratepayers that we have worked our backsides off and engineered as hard as we can to keep the cost as low as possible.”

Tasman Mayor Tim King says it is possible prices will rise.

“So given all the challenges around supply chains, material costs. I’m expecting to receive news of a further increase at some point in the next few months.”

The challenge is a joint partnership between the Tasman District Council and native irrigators who had been a driving pressure behind the dam.

Once the dam is full, 51% will be owned by council and 49% by Waimea Irrigators. They share the price of building too, although precisely the way it’s funded is complicated.

The predominant difficulty is that every time prices go up who pays the additional is re-negotiated.

Tim King says: “Currently the responsibility to pay the bills remains with the council. Then the council has to determine how that’s going to be recovered from various different parties.”

Waimea Irrigators chairperson Murray King says he is assured irrigators are paying their fair proportion “and then some”.

The case for the Waimea Dam

The Waimea Dam was first mooted round 20 years in the past. It was sparked, in half, by scorching summers when rivers nearly ran dry.

Multiple choices had been regarded at to present water safety earlier than the dam, situated in the Lee Valley, was chosen.

Murray King says water allocations at that point had been oversubscribed.

“It means the consents for irrigation had been over-allocated and so there wasn’t enough water to go around and it also meant that we were under restrictions on a regular basis.”

For a area like Tasman that depends on horticulture, water safety is vital.

“I mean you spend all year growing a high-value crop and then for it to fall over at the last minute because you can’t finish it off because of irrigation restrictions t doesn’t work for anyone,” he says.

But it is not nearly irrigators, Murray King says.

“At the end of the day, it’s about water reliability and making sure that they can turn the tap on and they’ve got water when they want it.”

Tim King says there are three key advantages to the area as a complete, which he says contains Nelson.

“The resilience and water supply to both urban – so that’s houses – commercial businesses and industries. The same security and future provision of water for horticulture and agricultural industries on the Waimea plains.

“And the third and possibly and one of many least recognised is the advantages recreationally and environmentally to the move in the river,” King says.

‘Pull their finger out’ – Ongoing criticism

The issue of the Waimea Dam has been fraught for many years. At one point the council itself voted against it because of the cost to ratepayers.

When 1News visited Queen Street in Richmond, it was nearly unimaginable to discover residents with something optimistic to say about it.

One says it is taking too lengthy and costing an excessive amount of. Her message to the council is “they need to pull their finger out”.

Another says she isn’t sure the council knows what it’s doing and is concerned that future generations would be paying for it.

“As a ratepayer, it simply looks as if we’re spending increasingly cash. Where’s it going to finish?”

One resident, out of more than a dozen, says she thinks it will benefit the region and supports it. But, she declined to be interviewed on camera.

Murray Dawson is a long-time dam opponent and says the case for it has been misrepresented.

“Well look, I’ve slightly phrase. It’s not wanted and it will not work.”

He says the dam was built in the wrong place and there was poor public consultation.

“I feel, in basic, what’s occurred is the dam promoters have regarded at best-case situations all over the place.”

Dawson says there should be a high level, independent public inquiry.

“I feel there are a lot of classes to be taught right here that are wider than Tasman.

“I think the biggest impact is this, and this is important. This is going to crimp capital expenditure for decades.”

The infrastructure deficit

Once ultimately built the reservoir will maintain up to 13 million cubic meters of water, or 13 billion litres.

It’s an enormous endeavor and the largest public dam to be built since Clive 30 years in the past.

Some say the problems with the Waimea Dam are a mirrored image of how laborious it’s to construct long-lasting infrastructure in New Zealand.

Waimea Water’s Scott says he thinks it is harder than elsewhere.

“New Zealand personally, I think, is a tough place to build infrastructure. We probably don’t have the fiscal or regulatory framework that other countries enjoy.

“We’ve been by means of 30 years of probably not constructing any type of important massive water infrastructure equivalent to dams.

“In that time, the population has grown 45%. Obviously as most folk now the infrastructure in New Zealand has become decrepit and deficient and here we are building the first dam in a long time.”

The Government’s Three Waters reforms are designed, in half, to sort out a few of these water infrastructure points. But most individuals 1News spoke to mentioned there is not sufficient details about it to know what affect it could have on tasks just like the Waimea Dam.

Tim King says he does not assume the reforms will essentially assist.

“I don’t think it’s exactly going to make the projects easy to deliver. It may make the decision around whether or not they go ahead and some of those political challenges that the current system has slightly easier to work through.”

Construction of the dam is anticipated to be accomplished in the spring and it is doable water from it might be used this coming summer season.

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