EPA struggles to find independent experts in 'small' New Zealand

The Environmental Protection Agency says it struggles to find enough independent experts in a small country where many people have professional links with industry or environmental groups and may have to consider the appointment of permanent 'commissioners'.

The comments are in the EPA's post-election briefing to environment minister Nick Smith. The EPA was established in 2011 with a brief that ranges from managing boards of inquiry under the Resource Management Act, to processing applications for hazardous substances and new organisms, administering the emissions trading scheme, overseeing restricted imports and exports, and processing marine consent applications in the nation's exclusive economic zone.

It is currently supporting a board of inquiry into Chatham Rock Phosphate's application to mine phosphate nodules from the sea bed on the Chatham Rise after Trans Tasman Resources was declined permission to mine ironsands. Among other recent high-profile applications was the Tukituki Catchment Proposal, which was granted 17 resource consents relating to the Ruataniwha Water Storage Scheme.

"Attracting and retaining independent, expert decision makers is a growing challenge across our decision making functions," the EPA said in its report. "New Zealand is a small country and many of those with the expertise to make a good quality decision have professional links with either industry or environmental groups. The EPA is finding it increasingly difficult to identify decision makers who are free from current or past relationships that could be challenged by parties for potential bias or conflict of interest."

It said the need for EPA board members themselves to be available as expert decision makers "further exacerbates the challenge of managing accusations of bias and conflict of interest." As environmental decisions become more contentious and complex, alternative decision maker options may need to be considered. It cited the Commerce Commission's appointment of full-time commissioners to decide on complex regulatory issues as a possibility.

The EPA chair is former Wellington mayor Kerry Prendergast and her deputy is Kevin Thompson, an engineer who was previously chief executive of Opus International Consultants and Works Civil Construction. Other members are former Meridian Energy CEO Tim Lusk; WorleyParsons consultant Nicki Crauford; Taria Tahana, who is on the board of Te Māngai Pāho and is a former executive of Fletcher Challenge and Ernst & Young; former Cawthron Institute CEO Gillian Wratt and Kura Denness, a company director and chair of Te Atiawa (Taranaki) Holdings.

The EPA's 2014-2015 costs are estimated at $36.4 million, of which $11.3 million is funded by fees and other revenue and about $25 million is Crown funded. The biggest cost in terms of the EPA's decision-making functions is for Exclusive Economic Zone decisions at $9.1 million, which is also the output class with the highest cost recovery at 72 percent.

Spending on resource management decisions is budgeted at $7 million, with 55 percent recovery, and decisions on hazardous substances, new organisms, hazardous waste and ozone-depleting substances have a budget of $6.5 million, of which 8.2 percent would be recovered. Spending on compliance outputs amounts to $7.4 million and spending for its climate change response function is budgeted at $6.4 million.

(BusinessDesk)