Twenty oppose water rights

Press, 20 September 1980, Page 5

Twenty oppose water rights

Nelson reporter A special tribunal will consider on October 28 and 29 the applications of Baigent and Sons for a right to take water for the proposed Eves Valley saw and pulp mill of the C.S.R.-Baigent consortium, and for its discharge into Waimea Inlet. The Nelson Catchment Board ’.as received 20 objections to the applications, and one submission.

The applicants seek to take from the Wairoa River system the same amount of water for the pulp mill, 113 litres per second, as was gmted by the board when Baigent’s first applied for a water right in 1975 for a pulp mill then proposed for Spring Grove. The application also seeks shortterm abstractions of up to 142 litres per second for a total of one hour in any one day.

The application for a right to discharge specifies a range of discharge from nil to.a maximum of 10 million litres a day depending upon demand. The company lists the irrigation of crops and pasture as one of the purposes ■ for which water would be discharged to make maximum use of the treated effluent and surface drainage waters from a sawmill and mechanical pulp mill. Such irrigation would only be at the request and with the full agreement of the owners of the properties concerned.”

It is proposed to build a pipeline from Eves Valley to the planned diffuser of the regional sewerage scheme at Bells Island in the Waimea Inlet. The pipeline would be buried but would be equipped with tapping points to allow treated water to be drawn off for irrigation.