The Western Bay of Plenty District Council is being warned about environmental concerns over the current method of disposing of Katikati wastewater.

Consents for the Te Puke and Katikati wastewater treatment plants have to be re-applied for next year, but iwi and hapu in both towns are opposing the current method of disposing into water ways and the ocean.

An overview of the Katikati sewerage ponds.

'The re-consenting, due to be completed by October 2016, may not be an easy journey with the outcomes likely to inform the review of the Wastewater Strategy,” senior policy analyst Marc Fauvel says in a report to the council's Policy and Strategy Committee this week.

Council is in the process of re-consenting the Te Puke and Katikati Wastewater Treatment Plants for as long a consent period as possible. But opposition to the continued dumping wastewater into the immediate environment is not solely a Maori concern.

There have been significant law changes since the original consents were granted.

Marc warns councillors that the requirements to improve public health and environmental outcomes inevitably also increases with knowledge of public health and the environment and corresponding increasing community expectations.

'This is likely to trigger the requirement for upgrades to treatment plants to improve the quality of waste water discharge and to increase pressure to provide community wastewater schemes, if land owners are unable to meet the required standards on site,” says Marc.

Depending on consent duration granted, the council may be forced to consider the long term option of land disposal that will involve considerable future costs in terms of land purchase and increased operational overheads.

'This would require a significant change in the financing and revenue policy for wastewater if a sufficient reserve for funding a change to land disposal is to be contemplated in the future,” says Marc's report.

The waste water treatment hardware is still relatively new, with the renewal of the wastewater piped network not expected to begin until 2045. The Katikati ocean outfall is expected to reach the end of its life in 2037.

The re-consenting process is underway with consultants appointed and high level pre-consultation with Maori already underway.

Both projects have a deadline of May 2016 for lodgement of the consent applications, with the Regional Council with the outcome due by November 2016.

The recommendation is the review of the Wastewater Strategy is rescheduled from 2015/16 to 2017/18 to align with there-consenting of the Te Puke and Katikati Wastewater Treatment Plants and the implementation of wastewater treatment solutions for Ongare Point and Te Puna West.