Confusion on biogas grants

Press, 3 December 1982, Page 2

Confusion on biogas grants

Christchurch Drainage Board members are wondering whether the Government knows its own mind when it comes to the board’s new biogas installation. The Government declined a board application for a 25 per cent C.N.G. refuelling station grant towards the installation cost, saying that biogas was a produced rather than “naturally occurring” gas and that the board did not qualify for the scheme. ■ But board members were told yesterday that the Minister of Energy, Mr Birch, had already said the board was eligible for the grant. The operations and services committee recommended taking its case to the Minister and local members of Parliament. Mr M. J. Dobson said that the board needed to keep the pressure on. “It seems the Government

is having a little difficulty making up its mind,” he said. About $220,000 will be spent this year on the installation at the Bromley sew-age-treatment works, the largest yet seen in New Zealand. Work has started on the refuelling plant and converting board vehicles to use biogas made from sludge. The board’s chief engineer, Mr H. P. Hunt, said the Minister had told a staff member last February that the board was eligible for the grant and indicated that the Government had changed the wording of legislation to include biogas in C.N.G. incentive schemes. An earlier newsletter from the Ministry of Energy also quoted Mr Birch as saying that the grant was of particular interest in the South Island, where natural gas was not produced and more attention was given to biogas: .