Nelson City Council

Effective 1 October 2007

Council's existing Trade Waste Bylaw (1984) has been reviewed and updated. Council adopted the revised Bylaw at its meeting on 27 September. It becomes effective on 1 October 2007.

The bylaw was required to have a review under the Local Government Act. It needed bringing up to date with modern practises, is based on the national model for Trade Waste Bylaws and where possible, is the same as the Tasman District Council Trade Waste Bylaw 2005. Consultation on the Bylaw July through September 2007 produced no submissions.

What is Trade Waste

Trade waste is any liquid discharged by a business (retail, commercial or industrial) into a Nelson public sewer, for example a restaurant kitchen, petrol station or photo processing lab.

Businesses affected by the Bylaw

If you have a trade waste permit from Nelson City Council the changes to the Bylaw may affect you. Council will be sending an information pack to all the businesses that currently have a trade waste permit. You should apply for this free consent if you are in business and your waste water could contain grease, silt or oil, or your trade waste includes anything hazardous, such as (but not limited to) chemicals, paint or petrol, or your trade waste discharge needs to be monitored by Council.

The proposed changes

Although the new bylaw is more comprehensive than the existing bylaw, it does not introduce any major changes or new requirements.

The permitted discharge list has been updated to bring it into line with current hazardous substance and resource management legislation.

One of the main things businesses may notice is that Council will be asking for considerably more information about trade waste premises on trade waste permit applications. Council will be recording the extra information gathered in a trade waste database.

Why the changes are needed

Since the original Bylaw was introduced in 1984, the rules and regulations on what Council can discharge from the sewer system into the environment have changed a lot. Sewage treatment is now far more thorough and complex. To enable Council to meet it's obligations on sewage treatment it is helpful to know more about what type of waste is entering the system. Gathering more information on trade waste premises will help Council understand more about what is going into the system and how best to process it. The changes to the Bylaw aim to help achieve this without increasing the bureaucracy or the cost involved in the process.

Will the costs change?

It will still be free for businesses to get a trade waste permit and they will only be charged on the basis of how much waste they are discharging into the sewerage system, as per the existing system.