Dairy giant Fonterra's Edendale factory complex is to be prosecuted by the Southland regional council regarding air pollution over the nearby township.
The dairy factory - one of the largest in New Zealand - is expected to produce 230,000 tonnes of product during the present 2003-04 season.
The Environment Southland environmental managementdirector, Warren Tuckey, this week confirmed that the plant's air-consent breaches met the criteria for it to be prosecuted.
On October 24 the council slapped an abatement notice on the plant, demanding that it stop discharging "particulates" not allowed under its resource consent.
At the time, Environment Southland compliance manager James Holloway said that although Fonterra breached that notice, shutting down the plant would mean millions of litres of milk might have to be dumped into waterways.
Fonterra has made particular efforts to portray its production systems as "clean and green", and has even drawn up agreements with councils and the Government to get its farmers to toe the line on avoiding waterway pollution caused by dairy cows.
Fonterra gave Environment Southland assurances that the problem would be fixed by November 12, but soot complaints were lodged by Edendale residents as late as November 18.
A faulty filter system in a coal-fired stack was finally "fixed".
But in a report to the council environmental management committee this week, Mr Holloway said the stack had to again be closed down on November 19.
Mr Tuckey said the matter would now go through the court system. No dates had been set.
