Trans-Tasman Resources is abandoning its High Court appeal over ironsand and will instead make a new application to mine, chief executive Tim Crossley says.
The appeal was against the Environmental Protection Authority's decision denying it consent to mine ironsand from the South Taranaki seabed. It was due to be heard in the High Court in March.
It has been dropped because the company discovered the remedy it wanted would not be available to it.
What it wanted was a rehearing of its application, under High Court supervision. But that appeared to be near impossible within a reasonable time frame.
Since that would be equivalent to a fresh hearing, it has decided to submit a fresh application for marine consent instead.
The company has spent more than $65 million researching the mining project so far, Mr Crossley said.
It is still committed to achieving the development, which would entail mining up to 50 million tonnes of iron-rich sand per year, 22 to 36km offshore from Patea, in water 20 to 45m deep.
Opposition group Kiwis Against Seabed Mining (KASM) said the decision was a victory for common sense. It has spend years alerting people to the project, which chairman Phil McCabe said is awful, and destructive of the marine environment.
The proposal attracted about 4800 submission, with only eight in favour or partially in favour.
"The economics, at best, were dodgy," Mr McCabe said.