The Victorian Government’s wasted waste policy

The bureaucracy takes over

Since 2001 the government has entrusted the implementation of its hazardous waste policy to the EPA and Major Projects Victoria (MPV). The EPA is responsible for policy content including standards and regulations while MPV provides the required infrastructure such as soil recycling and long-term containment facilities. The EPA developed a series of classification standards, treatment specifications and facility performance requirements. It consulted with industry, environment groups, scientists and the community to ensure broad agreement in the slow but steady implementation of the policy.

In contrast, MPV engaged in a roller-coaster ride of ill-conceived, poorly timed and inappropriate attempts to find sites for the proposed facilities. Initially directed by an Advisory Committee, MPV asked industry to nominate sites for a soil recycling facility. Not surprisingly these proposals were overwhelmingly inappropriate - for example within 500m of a kindergarten or with 10,000 residents within the proposed buffer zone - and led to major community outrage. Increasingly critical of the MPV’s approach, the Advisory Committee commenced its own study using GIS computer mapping databases to locate more suitable sites.

In late 2002 the new Minister for Major Projects, Peter Batchelor, dismissed the Advisory Committee and took the whole process behind closed doors. In secret, MPV continued the GIS study commenced by the committee and in late 2003 provided the Minister with a list of three sites for the Long Term Containment Facility (LTCF) that were described as being “the most suitable in Victoria”.

In November, without warning, several farm owners in Baddaginnie, between Violet Town and Benalla; Pittong, past Ballarat; and Tiega, in north-west Victoria, awoke to a letter from MPV advising them that their farm may be compulsorily acquired as the site for the LTCF. Amid widespread community opposition and strong support for the hapless farmers, the magnitude of MPV’s errors was uncovered.

It was soon established that one of the sites was located on a significant flood plain while another was subject to substantial groundwater and water table issues. Both these problems were evident from even a superficial site inspection or preliminary discussions with locals. The third site, at Tiega, was free of such problems but was 450km from Melbourne in the middle of productive farmland.

The question must be asked, how can productive family farms in areas that breach the government’s siting criteria be presented as constituting Victoria’s “three best sites”? Despite all efforts an answer has not been forthcoming. Furthermore the secrecy of the whole process remains, thwarting the effective implementation of the government’s policy.

Incompetence or sabotage?

Some people have questioned the competence of MPV and urged the Premier to intervene. However a handful of cynics have suggested that it may be more than just a case of bureaucratic incompetence. They point out that when the Minister dismissed the Advisory Committee, MPV appointed the manager of the Lyndhurst landfill, Rod McLellan, as project manager for the hazardous waste project. By employing a project manager committed to landfill, and then using consultants servicing the landfill industry, it was predictable that a landfill would be the outcome.

The cynics point out that it is a no-risk strategy for the industry: having their people on “the inside” they will achieve either a new landfill for which companies like the French owners of Lyndhurst, Sita, can put in their management bids, or the whole policy collapses due to “mismanagement” and community outrage and Lyndhurst will simply continue its existing highly profitable hazardous waste landfill.

From the frying pan into the fire

In April 2004, as a result of community pressure, the government withdrew the three sites and nominated a fourth at Hattah/Nowingi, about 500km north-west of Melbourne. In typical fashion the decision was made without consultation or justification and with grossly inadequate preliminary work. After considerable agitation MPV finally admitted that the Hattah site was chosen because it was on public land and was “similar to the Tiega site” which had “no major problems”. No additional studies had been undertaken although the site was adjacent to two environmentally significant areas: the Hattah-Kulkyne and Murray Sunset National Parks.

MPV went so far as to claim that, “Initial flora and fauna surveys indicate that the study area is unlikely to contain critical habitat of rare or endangered flora or fauna”. Yet it was well established that the whole area was part of such “critical habitat” and that a number of endangered species were known to inhabit the area. Indeed, even the Federal Government acknowledged the risk to endangered flora and fauna by intervening in August-September 2004 to make the MPV proposal a “controlled action” under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act (EPBC). Such intervention only occurs where potential environmental significance is established.

The environmental significance of Hattah

To meet the environmental requirements of the EPBC Act, as well as state requirements for an Environmental Effects Statement (EES), MPV is required to prepare detailed studies of the potential environmental impact of the proposal. MPV employed environmental consultants, Biosis, to undertake the studies. Despite some significant methodological problems and timing issues in the Biosis study the initial results, released in December 2004, confirm what environmentalists have been saying all along. Biosis was forced to give the Hattah site the highest possible environmental value rating. Their report acknowledged that, “The diversity and abundance of fauna species and general absence of introduced species indicates that the study area supports an intact faunal assemblage as part of a functioning ecological community”.

The study documented the substantial number of indigenous species (135), including 5 species of state significance and 37 of regional significance, with introduced species (14). In addition there were 78 vertebrate species recorded, including 5 species of national significance listed under the EPBC Act: Mallee-fowl, Mallee emu-wren, greater long-eared bat, regent parrot and black-eared miner. Also documented were three additional species of national significance, four species of state significance and ten species listed as part of the threatened Mallee bird community under the Victorian Flora and Fauna Guarantee Act.