KEY POINTS:
An Environment Court conviction and $5000 fine imposed on a company for discharging excessive lead into the air is a clear message to business that breaches won't be tolerated, Greater Wellington Regional Council says.
The court yesterday fined Exide Technologies $5000 after the company pleaded guilty to discharging lead into the air from its battery recycling plant in Petone during March, April and May this year.
The council brought the prosecution against Exide after detecting the company had breached its resource consent conditions.
The emissions, recorded at one of the plant's boundary monitors, exceeded the permitted limit of 1.5 micrograms with an average of 2.08mcg of lead per cubic metre of air.
The court found there was no evidence of any environmental or public health ramifications resulting from the discharge.
Council environmental regulation manager Al Cross said he was satisfied with the court's decision.
"For us the critical thing will be Exide ensuring that they don't breach their resource consent in the future," he said.
"We understand they are going to be putting in place some additional measures at their plant to help ensure that they don't have similar problems in the future - so that is very good news."
The court's decision reflected the one-off nature of the breach, but it was clear that it viewed it as significant and would be less tolerant of further breaches, Mr Cross said.
"The breach that occurred was unfortunate but has been a valuable lesson for the company in requiring it to make further changes to its operations to ensure it complies with the stringent limits of its resource consent.
"We expect that Exide will continue to be highly vigilant."
Mr Cross hoped the conviction would have a deterrent effect on others. "While that's certainly not the primary motive ... clearly there is an important message behind that to others.
"From our perspective, significant breaches of resource consent simply won't be tolerated."
Health experts agreed risks to the community's health arose from long term rather than short term exposure to lead, but the reason that specific limits were imposed on Exide was to ensure that no cumulative effects could arise, Mr Cross said.
"It is absolutely vital that we continue to enforce this ... to give the community a level of comfort that their health is being safeguarded."
The council was responsible for monitoring Exide's discharge and would continue to do so in the future, he said.
Exide Technologies recycling general manager recycling John Hawkins said the company accepted the conviction.
"While Exide regrets this breach, we have performed the necessary operational maintenance procedures to correct the problem from recurring.
"Exide remains committed to operating as a good neighbour to the residents of Petone."
At the time, the company described the breach as a spike during maintenance in March that pushed average lead emissions at one plant boundary over a three-month limit.
It promised to "fully comply with all associated rulings".
- NZPA
