Blog

Sep 05, 2023

'The sheer bureaucracy of it': Red tape holds up dredge move

You are not permitted to download, save or email this image. Visit image gallery

You are not permitted to download, save or email this image. Visit image gallery to purchase the image.

But any hope of a move this year had drowned in a pool of bureaucracy, the company's director says.

Cold Gold Clutha Ltd has applied to four councils for consents to operate a mining operation on the Upper Clutha River.

It has operated a dredge on the river in the Clutha River between Roxburgh Dam and Tuapeka Mouth for the past 10 years.

It is now looking at moving the dredging operation to an area on the river from the Luggate Bridge to the confluence of the Clutha and Lindis River.

The company will be seeking consents from the Otago Regional Council, Clutha District Council, Central Otago District Council and Queenstown Lakes District Council. The company asked the application be publicly notified.

Cold Gold Clutha Ltd director Peter Hall said the aim had been to get the dredge working in the new area sometime this year, but that was now unlikely.

‘‘We were looking at this year but it has taken a lot longer than we had hoped. There is more regulations that we have to go through than we thought,’’ he said.

Testing showed there was more consistent gold found in the upper part of the river. Gold prices were holding up, which was still making it worthwhile to mine the river, he said.

‘‘We’re optimistic, but you have to be. Things are getting really, really difficult. Just the sheer bureaucracy of it. We have to engage consultants, the councils have to get consultants, then they have to be reviewed by more consultants. And I have to pay for it all.’’

The consents between Roxburgh Dam and Tuapeka Mouth were recently re-consented and will expire in 2035, authorising mining over more than 900ha of the riverbed.

The dredge is a self-powered commercial vessel being a steel pontoon catamaran 23.9m in length and with a beam of 6.6m.

It is a suction-type dredge using hydraulically driven high-pressure water pumps to generate water flow/suction in the main pipe via induction jets.

The main suction pipe has an internal diameter of 350mm and is controlled by an operator located in the wheelhouse. The pipe is lowered to the river bottom by hydraulically driven winches and river gravels are entrained into the main pipe as a slurry.

‘‘Despite the perception of the activity being large-scale, a significant proportion of the Millers Flat and Roxburgh community do not even know of the dredge's presence. The understated way Cold Gold Clutha carries out their business, in conjunction with a clean record of compliance, offers an insight to the effects of the activity on the community and receiving environment,’’ the application said.

Areas were spot mined, where a site was identified that was favourable for gold accumulation, and then worked.

The company had found that gold in the mid-reaches of the Clutha did not lie uniformly in the gravels bank to bank across the river, rather in narrow non-contiguous longitudinal bands. Those areas were found by spot dredging until an economic band was found and then mined.

No work would be done within 150m of designated camping or recreation areas between December 24-January 3 or at Easter weekend. The hours of operation were between 7-10pm seven days a week with some restrictions over the Christmas-New Year and Easter periods, it said.

Noise testing was undertaken in 2013 to assess environmental noise effects and determine a distance boundary from the dredge.

The minimum distance from the dredge to the boundary of any residential dwelling would be maintained when dredging.

- Staff reporter

SUBSCRIBER

SUBSCRIBER

SUBSCRIBER

SUBSCRIBER

SUBSCRIBER

SUBSCRIBER