At least the HB Regional Councillors say it’s an ‘Action’ Plan and were very self-satisfied for approving it this past week.
The Plan basically elaborates on ideas presented in more cursory form in the Regional Water Assessment (RWA) released by HBRC back in June 2023 with much fanfare.
That RWA included a water demand/supply scenario that has become the only narrative driven by HBRC ever since – that even with water savings of 1% a year, Hawke’s Bay would suffer a water shortage in the neighbourhood of 25 million cubes by 2040.
That was all the evidence needed to set advocates of dam building in motion.
There was no real analysis of what might be involved in reducing water demand by that 1% per year amount.
Moreover, the RWA also included another scenario projecting that if 2% water savings were achieved, the region would actually have a water surplus of 3.1 million cubes by 2040, reaching a 21 million cube surplus by 2060.
But of course there was no real analysis of what might be involved in reducing water demand by that amount either. Having offered the scenario, the report merely waved it off.
Logic would suggest that before committing to spending hundreds of millions, maybe a billion plus, on dams, we might look in depth at estimating and costing the possibilities for water savings, which by their nature would be less threatening – in fact, advantageous – to the environment.
However the water savings side of the equation has laid dormant at HBRC, even though funds had been earmarked for such investigation.
So finally last week HBRC adopted its Action Plan. It sets out these areas to pursue, (which include augmenting water supply, so it’s not exactly focused on savings):
- Lincoln Agritech Braided Rivers – Ngaruroro Riverbed Restoration to Enhance Natural Recharge
- Municipal Water Security – reducing water loss in urban networks/recycling/reuse
- Industrial Water Security – recycling food grade wastewater, water efficiency
- Central Hawke’s Bay Managed Aquifer Recharge – evaluating intake design and consenting
- Nature Based Solutions – Room for Rivers – mitigating flood impacts while enhancing biodiversity and ecosystem health
- Water Storage – Whanawhana E2, and Te Tua – withholding water in high flow events to release at later dates during low flow/high demand
- Regulatory / Policy – serving as a regulatory backbone to encourage efficient water use
- Water Use Efficiency and Education – improving irrigation practices and appropriate use of available resources to improve irrigation and water use practices
- Science – continuing to understand the regions water availability, changes in recharge and discharge levels, and the development of water use reporting tools to understand effectiveness of efficiency interventions/impact of demand.
- Land Use Intervention – Understanding the impact of new innovation on land use and their impact on water demand, and different practices that improve soil moisture withholding capacity.
Background material is available from HBRC providing more detail on these items.
What is still missing?
Estimates of the costs and savings outcomes of any of these initiatives, which of course would be required to assess where the most bang for the buck might be achieved in terms of savings. To say nothing of assessing whether achieving savings or greater aquifer recharge would be less expensive than building dams.
No overall target for water savings has been set … even aspirationally. Arguably Councillors could say to staff: Show us what combination of interventions might yield 1% savings, or 2% savings, or XX volume. What are we aiming for? Without a target, this exercise will continue to lack urgency and real prioritisation.
Which points to another gap. Water savings as a strategic objective has no dedicated champion, amongst either councillors or staff. Councillor Jock Mackintosh has declared he wants his grandchildren to see that he stood up for water storage – building dams. No Councillor has declared their priority mission is to achieve XX in water savings. Now that would be an accomplishment for grandchildren to celebrate.
Similarly at the staff level. The Action Plan proposes a dedicated ‘project manager’. That sounds like a mid-level bureaucrat to attend to report writing, not someone empowered to knock heads and drive an ambitious programme internally, let alone someone, however well-intentioned, with the mana to engage, persuade, enlist all the external players who need to be committed participants in any serious regional water savings initiative. We’ve seen how well this hasn’t worked with HBRC’s approach to climate ‘action’.
Yeah, we have an ‘Action Plan’, at least offering a bare-bones benchmark to wave at the next triennium’s cadre of HB Councillors. Hopefully a genuine champion will emerge.
yeah more noise engine on the tax front…….. more more more more more tax! Come on Jock how about making a stand for the other 99% of your constituents bro!
Oh for bit of air con in the Hospital.
There is no incentive to conserve water use under permits.The HBRC over allocated in the past, but if you do not use your allocation you can lose part of it. So this encourages permit holder to use a high percentage of their allocation, or risk losing it.You cannot use it when you need it most due to restrictions. Perhaps HBRC could reduce monitoring costs as an incentive to use less. Compare that to rates. The more you spend on your house improvements the higher the capital value and the more rates you pay! Stormwater charges are based on capital value, presumably there are correlation of CV and roof size?
A bit more information about water. We know we have water shortages / droughts looming so it’s irresponsible if we don’t do something about it. Being more efficient is important but it’s not enough on its own. We also need to do better with recycling, especially for industrial water and we need water storage. If we do these three things, there is plenty to go round.
There is another aspect to this. NZ incomes are low and in Hawke’s Bay they are even lower. This is mainly because we are not that productive. If you want to change that, you need to focus on what you are good at and in HB we are good at growing things. But that can’t happen in the current set-up because we are placing severe restrictions on water use. So the people that grow things have the brakes put on and this is the opposite of what we need. The good thing about water storage is that it takes winter water, when we have plenty and releases it in summer, when we don’t. This is a win for the economy but importantly, the environment too because the water is released back into the river in summer when river flows are low