Central Plains Water - The Feasibility Study Stage

The Feasibility Study Stage

The constitution and terms of reference for the Central Plains Water Enhancement Steering Committee was approved on 14 February 2000. The terms of reference had these two objectives:

• to execute feasibility studies into the viability and practicality of water enhancement schemes in the Central Plains area,..
• is to undertake feasibility studies for the Central Plains area sufficiently detailed to allow decisions on the advisability of proceeding to resource consent applications and eventual scheme implementation.

The feasibility studies also had a required level of detail:

The level of detail of these studies shall be sufficient to allow decisions to be made by the Councils on the advisability of proceeding to resource consent applications and scheme implementation.

By February 2001, the steering committee had identified 27 tasks that would be necessary to complete the feasibility study. The list of tasks is comprehensive; it included the assessment of economic effects, benefits, environmental effects, social effects, cultural effects, risks, planning, land accessibility, and environmental and technical feasibility, and consentability. Item 23 was specifically entitled 'Land Accessibility'.

On 11 February 2002 the Central Plains Water Enhancement Steering Committee presented the URS feasibility report and their own report to a joint meeting of the two 'parent' Councils. On 18 February 2002 the reports were presented to the Strategy and Finance committee of the Christchurch City Council.

The conclusion of the URS feasibility study was stated fairly firmly;

"that a water enhancement scheme for the Central Plains can be built, is affordable, will have effects that can be mitigated, and is therefore feasible"

The Steering Committee's conclusion was much less firm.

"the affordability, bankability and consentability of the proposed scheme has been proved to a degree sufficient to give the Selwyn District Council and Christchurch City Councils confidence to proceed with the project to the next stage."

The Steering Committee had not provided a full conclusion on a number of issues from the list of 27 feasibility study tasks. They had instead simply moved the resolution of a number of the important issues from the feasibility study stage to a new stage to be called 'concept refinement'. The issues to be dealt with later were;

• more technical investigations
• the scheme's ownership structure
• how to acquire land for dams and races
• the mitigation of social, environmental and cultural effects.