Hopefully all of you with mixed waste issues have now heard that an Order in Council to allow the burning of prohibited material like plastic and tanalised/treated timber come into force on 5 July 2023. This means that big, intertwined and really hard to separate mixed waste piles can now be burned. There are some conditions that need to be complied with –
- The fire must be located on rurally zoned land, outside of the Hastings and Napier Air Sheds (you can check whether your property is within one of the airsheds here: Burning | Hawke’s Bay Regional Council (hbrc.govt.nz)); and
- A fire management plan must be completed at least 2 days before you burn – you can do that here: HBRC Fire Management Plan: Plan Contents – Hawke’s Bay Regional Council (datacomsphere.co.nz); and
- You must have made an effort to remove prohibited items before the fire is lit; and
- You need to give the owner or occupier of any adjoining land at least 2 days notice of the burn; and
- The burn can only occur when wind conditions are not less than 10 km per hour and not greater than 25 km per hour; and
- You need to supervise the fire at all times; and
- After the fire, you need to have the ash and soil under the burn pile sampled, and if necessary remediate or remove any contaminated ash or soil. We are just in the process of finalising further information about how you can get this done.
The full text of the Order in Council is available here: Severe-Weather-Emergency-Recovery-Resource-ManagementBurning-of-Waste-Order-2023.pdf (hbrc.govt.nz)
Any questions about burning mixed waste, or other frustrations with planning or council processes, please get in touch– 027 3225595 or Charlotte.Drury@hortnz.co.nz
Dr Charlotte Drury
View Research and Resource Management
