$150,000 fine for chemical dumping
A Christchurch businessman has been ordered to pay more than nearly $150,000 in fines and costs for illegally dumping electroplating chemicals in North Canterbury.
Stephen Graham Knight, a company director, pleaded guilty in Christchurch District Court to charges of discharging the chemicals onto land which may have entered water.
Environment Canterbury said it was told that several 200-litre drums of washed down copper sulphate and hydrogen peroxide had been left on a property near Parnassus, North Canterbury, in September 2008.
The previous owner of the property was Knight.
Officers found an area of dead or dying pine trees and dead surface vegetation as well as yellow and white substances on the land surface and trees bleeding blue coloured sap. The property is above an aquifer about 30 metres from the Waiau River.
Environment Court Judge Jon Jackson said Knight’s actions were deliberate and he had gone to some effort to dump the chemicals at hidden locations on his property which had not been disclosed to the new owner.
There was the potential for the contaminants to affect groundwater from the Waiau River catchment and any surface water that it intercepted.
Knight was ordered to remediate the contamination remaining on the site. The estimated cost of the work is $116,000 and it is expected to take six months to complete.
The request for reparation of $278,000 for the new property owner was denied.
Knight was also fined a total of $6000 on each charge and ordered to pay $16,000 towards Environment Canterbury’s investigation costs. He was also ordered to pay court costs of $130 and solicitors costs of $113 on each charge.
