The Greater Wellington Regional Council has laid charges against a company after thousands of plastic rings were discharged into a Wellington bay, causing the closure of beaches.
The small plastic rings, used in sewage treatment, were discharged from the Moa Point Wastewater Treatment Plant into Lyall Bay on December 8.
Greater Wellington
consents manager Paula Hammond said it believed Moa Point operator Anglian Water had breached the Resource Management Act.
"The discharge of contaminants into our coastal marine area is strictly controlled under the regional plan and the treatment plant's resource consent," she said in a statement.
Beaches at Lyall Bay and Island Bay were closed to the public for at least a day after as many as five cubic metres of the 10mm rings -- about a truckload -- had spewed into Cook Strait among treated wastewater from an outfall pipe from the plant.
The case was not the first time that the rings have washed up on Wellington's beaches. A major sewage spill at the Anglian Water International facility at the southern landfill in 1999 saw a large number of them flow into the Happy Valley Stream and on to Owhiro Bay Beach.
An initial hearing will be held on June 18.
- NZPA
