Introduction

The National Policy Statement (NPS) for Freshwater Management was gazetted on 12 May 2011 and takes effect from 1 July this year. From that date, consent authorities must have regard to the NPS when granting resource consents.

The aim of the NPS is to drive national consistency in managing and allocating fresh water. It requires regional councils to set limits on fresh water quality and the quantity of water taken from rivers, aquifers and lakes.

Key provisions include:

Water quality

  • Objectives to protect the quality of outstanding freshwater bodies,protect the significant values of wetlands and improve the quality of fresh water where degradation has occurred through over allocation.
  • A policy requiring regional plans to include objectives and quality limits having regard to the connection between water bodies and the reasonably foreseeable impact of climate change.
  • A policy requiring the establishment of rules to avoid over allocation of water.
  • A policy requiring the imposition of conditions on discharge permits to ensure that water quality policies can be met, including requiring the adoption of the best practicable option to prevent/minimise any effect on the environment of any discharge.

Water quantity

  • An objective to avoid any further over allocation of fresh water and phase out existing over allocation.
  • A policy requiring the imposition of criteria by which applications for approval of transfers of water take permits are to be decided, including those to improve and maximise the efficient allocation of water.
  • A policy requiring the identification of methods to encourage the efficient use of water. 
  • A policy requiring regional councils to ensure that no decision they make will likely result in future over allocation of water and requiring a defined timeframe to be set in which over allocation of water must be phased out.

Transitional policies

The NPS inserts two transitional policies directly into regional plans. These require Councils to consider specific criteria when making decisions on resource consent applications lodged on or after 1 July 2011.

The transitional policies apply to new activities and to changes to existing activities where discharges to water will be increased or the intensity/scale of existing activities is likely to result in more than minor adverse changes in the natural variability of water flows or levels. The purpose of the transitional arrangements is to ensure that such effects are considered and managed pending the inclusion of new water quality and quantity limits in regional plans.

There is also a programme for progressive implementation of the NPS. Regional Councils are required to implement the new policies as promptly as is 'reasonable in the circumstances', with full completion required by 31 December 2030. This will mean that Regional Councils must amend their regional policy statements, proposed plans and variations to give effect to the NPS. Where Councils cannot implement the NPS by the end of 2014, they must identify a staged programme to meet the 2030 end date against which they must report annually on their progress.

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