NZ Engine

Source: Radio New Zealand

Bromley community leader Jackie Simons has made an emotional plea for more help to be provided to those affected by the foul stench pouring from a sewage plant.

Simons, who sits on the Waitai Coastal-Burwood-Linwood Community Board, made the plea at a Christchurch City Council meeting on Wednesday morning.

It comes after some residents walked out of a fiery council-led public meeting on Tuesday night in frustration over the fire-damaged plant.

Offensive odours have plagued the city’s eastern suburbs after a fire damaged key infrastructure at the Bromley Wastewater Plant in 2021.

Complaints about the odour have spiked recently.

Simons told councillors the situation facing locals had now reached crisis point.

“The wastewater plant still stinks. It’s always stunk. It’s been stinking for the last four years,” she said.

“The last couple of weeks we’ve seen an influx of horrendous smell across the whole city. A crisis has come and everyone is in crisis mode.”

The Canterbury Regional Council had received more than 2000 reports about the plant in this year alone.

One Bromley resident told Morning Report the stench from the city’s sewage plant was so bad it had left her coughing up blood.

The city council said the recent heavy rain had affected the health of the oxidation pond and it was using all available tools to improve water quality.

An emotional and frustrated Simons told elected members she was regularly fielding complaints from the community.

There was a perception the council would have acted sooner if it was happening to more upmarket parts of the city, she said.

“When they come to me and they say ‘if this was happening in Fendalton you would’ve fixed it by now’, ‘the council doesn’t care about us in the east’, ‘they don’t give a toss’, ‘they’re not listening’, ‘when are they going to fix it?’ How am I supposed to tell them that you do care when it took the rest of the city to smell it to stand up and show that you cared.”

The council needed to provide more on-the-ground support for those worst affected, Simons said.

“I’d like to see those people asked ‘what do you need?’. Because a gift basket is no good to someone who needs a lift to the doctor. A supermarket voucher is no good to someone who can’t pay for a prescription,” she said.

“They can’t open their windows, they can’t hang their washing out, they have physical symptoms of ill-health, they have respiratory issues, they have depression, they have mental health challenges because of this situation. They are in crisis every day.”

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

Police have cordoned off streets in Hamilton and the entrance to a hotel has been taped off after reports of gunfire.

A motel staff member inside the cordon says they heard gunshots about 10am on Wednesday.

A police spokesperson said cordons were in place along Ulster Street and Abbotsford Street in the suburb of Whitiora.

The spokesperson said they were responding to an incident but did not provide further details.

An RNZ reporter at the scene said police cars can be seen parked in the street and police officers are going door-to-door speaking with people.

They declined to answer questions.

A resident who wanted to go home had been told by police he was not able to at this time.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

Three boys have been stood down from an Oamaru high school while police investigate a serious bullying incident at the school’s hostel.

St Kevin’s College says it is supporting the victim’s family.

In a statement, principal Jo Walshe says the incident was reported immediately and the school acted swiftly.

She says the school can’t provide further comment while the incident is under investigation.

The Otago Daily Times is reporting the incident relates to “waterboarding”.

More to come…

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

A Wellington-based fusion energy company says funding is in place to build a new research facility with the potential to put Aotearoa at the forefront of clean energy development.

OpenStar Technologies has secured a $35 million commitment from the Regional Infrastructure Fund to further their research towards creating a clean fusion power source capable of being scaled up to commercial output.

The Fusion Energy process forces light atomic nuclei to merge – releasing large amounts of energy without the radioactive waste associated with nuclear energy.

OpenStar’s current prototype device – named “Junior” – achieved the crucial milestone of First Plasma – where the device creates and confines the super hot ionized gas needed to trigger the fusion reaction – within two years of development.

The company said Junior – which used a unique approach called the levitated dipole – was the only one of its kind developed with the intention of upscaling to commercial levels of energy production.

Open star chief executive Ratu Mataira said the government was backing New Zealand researchers to forge a pathway towards developing the next step towards safe, clean and virtually limitless energy.

“By backing this critical infrastructure, the government is effectively de-risking the development of deep-tech in New Zealand.

“In delivering Junior, a machine once considered near impossible, we proved that New Zealand could give birth to a global fusion player. Now with this government commitment, New Zealand has decided to show up as a nation, for the vision of a fusion energy industry here in Aotearoa,” Mataira said.

Regional Development Minister Shane Jones said the technology could provide global benefits while the government’s support would help solidify the country’s role in the rapidly developing Fusion Energy sector, creating highly skilled jobs for years to come.

“Over a century ago, New Zealand scientist Ernest Rutherford pioneered nuclear science. Today we are backing New Zealanders to lead the next big breakthrough in harnessing fusion energy, a technology that could deliver significant benefits for our country and the world,” Jones said.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

Auckland’s beachgoers well know the frustration of being told to keep out of the water after heavy rain due to wastewater overflow, but researchers at Auckland University have been piloting flushable sensors designed to detect underground sewer faults.

The sensors are about the size of a USB stick, made from plant plastic and use ultra-high radio frequency to allow them to be detected as they move through the networks.

With some 8000 to 9000 sewer pipes under Aucklanders’ feet, the sensors can help find misconnections, where wastewater pipes are wrongly connected to stormwater or where there’s a blockages in sewer pipes causing an overflow.

Two field trials have already been completed with Auckland Council and Watercare in Browns Bay.

Dr Wei-Qin Zhuang is the project’s lead researcher based at the university’s Civil and Environmental Engineering Department.

He said he wanted to find ways to remove nitrate from waterways safely without the creation of significant greenhouse gas emissions.

He also wanted to look at water quality to detect indicator micro organisms in waterways and drinking water, he said.

There was discussion to identify the water problems specific to Auckland and consider how to use research to mitigate them, he said.

Problems identified included the overflow of the city’s sewer systems, as well as misconnections, Zhuang said.

The research team tried to come up with solutions to identify where there were misconnections on the basis it was less challenging than trying to deal with the overflow issue, he said.

“We developed this UHF-RFID [ultra-high radio frequency identification] based censors to identify illegal connections and we also found that it can be used to identify blockages of our pipes.”

They did not want the censors to be intrusive to avoid having to visit a house and install a bunch of devices to detect the issues, he said.

“So initially we were trying to develop something that can be flushed through our toilet bowls without clogging the pipes, the sewer lateral, and we purposely looked for small devices that has the size that is small enough to be flushed.”

They designed the censors to ensure they could be flushed and then could float on the water “so their sensitivities won’t be compromised by water,” he said.

“After they’ve been flushed into the sewer lateral, they’ll be washed and they’ll flow with the water flow and then get into the sewer mains and then we can install detectors at manholes to detect these censors.”

The censor sends out an ultra-high radio frequency which is then picked up at the various sites, Zhuang said.

“So you flush your censors through toilet bowls and then supposedly all the censors need to go through the sewer manhole, but if we catch some of the censors in the stormwater manhole then we instantly know that which household has a misconnection.”

Blockages can be detected when the censor takes much longer than expected to reach a certain point, he said.

“Then authorities can send CCTV cameras down pipes and see whether the blockage is severe or has just started building up.”

The first generation of the censors could be collected and then composted, while the second generation of the censors dissolve in water after two hours so it did not worsen the blockage situation, he said.

That provided a one hour window to use the censor to detect if there had been a blockage, he said.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

Moa Point Wastewater Treatment Plant has been shut down and staff evacuated from the site, with an equipment failure causing multiple floors and key areas of the plant to be inundated with water.

“This is a serious situation, and we anticipate the plant will be shut down for an extended period,” says Wellington Water chief executive Pat Dougherty.

He strongly advises the community to stay away from the South Coast beaches.

Untreated wastewater is being discharged into the water and this may occur for some time.

Earlier, Wellington Water had started discharging raw sewage off the city’s south coast, and issued two other wastewater discharge notices, after a mechanical failure and heavy rain.

The mechanical failure, at 3am on Wednesday, caused it to start an unconsented discharge of untreated wastewater from its Moa Point treatment plant.

The water agency said the sewage would emerge at the short outfall into the ocean at Tarakena Bay and may cause the water to appear cloudy or murky.

Meanwhile, during a night of heavy rain, partially treated wastewater was discharged into Wellington’s Karori Stream at 10.45pm on Tuesday. That would also flow into the sea on the south coast.

About half an hour before that, fully treated sewage was released at 10.18pm into Waiwhetū Stream in Lower Hutt, which flows into the sea near Petone beach.

Water monitoring body Land, Air, Water Aotearoa advises people to stay out of the sea for two or three days after heavy rain.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

Police have cordoned off streets in Hamilton and the entrance to a hotel has been taped off.

A spokesperson said cordons were in place along Ulster Street and Abbotsford Street in the suburb of Whitiora.

The spokesperson said they were responding to an incident but did not provide further details.

An RNZ reporter at the scene said police cars can be seen parked in the street and police officers are going door-to-door speaking with people.

They declined to answer questions.

A resident who wanted to go home had been told by police he was not able to at this time.

Sign up for Ngā Pitopito Kōrero, a daily newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand