Green groups pleased with new authority

A new, independent environment agency has been hailed by green groups as a big step towards improving environmental management.

Environment Minister Nick Smith announced details of the Environmental Protection Authority yesterday, pleasing lobbyists who hope the agency will play a leading role in the Government's new-look environment regime.

Environmental Defence Society chairman Gary Taylor and Sustainability Council executive director Simon Terry applauded the decision to make the agency a Crown entity with its own board, at arm's length from political influence.

"The Ministry for the Environment never had the necessary teeth," said Mr Terry.

Also pleased was Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment Jan Wright.

She said last month that environmental monitoring was so haphazard that it was impossible to tell whether the country was getting cleaner or dirtier.

Regional councils collect data for their regions, but a report by Dr Wright concluded it was difficult to build up a clear picture nationwide.

Dr Smith has said he would like to bring in a law requiring an independent national environment report every five years.

Dr Wright said it was too soon to know whether that proposal would fix the problems she outlined.

As a BP oil well continued to leak in the Gulf of Mexico yesterday, Dr Smith revealed the Government had asked the Environment and Economic Development ministries to look at toughening proposed environmental rules that will cover New Zealand's four million square kilometre exclusive economic zone.

The vast area of sea, which will be managed by the new authority, is not covered by the Resource Management Act and the Government is considering environmental laws to protect it.

"We just don't want to proceed with that legislation unless we are absolutely confident that it is going to provide world best practices in dealing with the sort of risk we are seeing in the Gulf of Mexico," Dr Smith told reporters after the Environmental Defence Society annual conference in Auckland.

He said when an economic power as large as the United States was struggling to manage a "global-scale environmental tragedy" such as the BP disaster, it rightly raised questions.

Dr Smith said an independent report on health, safety and environmental provisions around minerals activities such as deep sea drilling should be ready next month.

His comments come days after the granting of a petroleum exploration permit over the Raukumara Basin off the North Island's East Cape to international Brazilian-based company Petrobras.

Annual operating costs for the Environmental Protection Authority have been estimated to be about $1 million more as a result of separating from the Environment Ministry, which will focus on giving policy advice from next year.

OVERVIEW

Environmental Protection Authority
* Begins full operation on July 1, 2011.
* Will process resource consent applications for nationally significant projects such as oil rigs and power stations.
* Absorbs the Environmental Risk Management Authority.
* Will monitor compliance with national standards for such things as air quality and soil contamination.
* Will administer greenhouse emissions units under the Emissions Trading Scheme.
* Will advise the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade on Antarctica's environment.

- ADDITIONAL REPORTING: NZPA