Porirua City Council says Spicer Landfill can’t be sustained in the long term and is considering the future options for disposal of waste in Porirua and Northern Wellington.

The Council is working through consents for the next decade and has considered alternatives as part of that process. On Thursday officers briefed the Council on those alternatives.

Officers consider that the landfill could close as early as 2035, and that a regional solution needs to be sought to manage residual waste after that time.

David Down, Council’s Manager Waste, told elected members that Spicer Landfill has a limited life and that now is the time to consider alternatives to meet the city’s growing needs, as well as its environmental aspirations.

An alternatives assessment has considered three broad options: new technology (such as mechanical biological treatment), a new landfill in Porirua, and export of waste to another landfill within New Zealand.

All of these options are expensive and none of them makes waste disappear, the Chair of Council’s Landfill Joint Committee Councillor Geoff Hayward said.

"No-one wants waste and none of us likes landfills. But the awful truth is that kiwis produce as much waste per capita as most OECD countries, and any changes we make to do something different will cost us in the pocket, but the cost to the whenua is just as high.

"Until that changes, we are stuck with putting our waste in a hole in the ground. A high tech and expensive hole in the ground for sure, but still a hole in the ground."

The Council now plans to look at the feasibility of pursuing alternatives, and to work with other Councils to determine what a regional solution could look like, how local waste would be catered for and what the impacts would be, said Cr Hayward.

"A change of this significance would be consulted on with the community and other key parties and would be formally included in a future Long-Term-Plan for review."

He says that in an ideal world, efforts to reduce, reuse and recycle would diminish the need for a landfill but currently volumes to landfill continue to grow. He was disappointed that there is not a national plan, as the scale of waste projects is typically too great for councils.

More information on the alternatives assessment including a summary and a full report are available on our website https://poriruacity.govt.nz/spicer-development/.

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