NSW Greens MEDIA RELEASE

Tuesday, 19 August 2008

Botany Bay dredging begins - environmental damage looms

Greens MP Lee Rhiannon says Ports Minister Joe Tripodi’s announcement that dredging is about to begin to accommodate the Port Botany expansion is bad news for the environment risking tidal changes, disturbance to fish and bird breeding grounds and the unleashing of the toxic plume at the Orica site across Botany Bay.

“Dredging more than 7.5 million cubic metres from the site at Botany Bay carries significant environmental dangers that could have been avoided if the government has said ‘no’ to this ill-advised project,” Ms Rhiannon said.

“Dredging Botany Bay to make way for increased trade will disturb fish breeding grounds, threaten internationally recognised waterbird habitat and provide the opportunity for invasive pests like molluscs, worms and algae to become established.

“The extensive works risk disturbing the toxic plume from the Orica site which could spell disaster for the entire reach of Botany Bay.

“The Orica plume, steadily creeping towards Botany Bay, contains PCBs

* a group of toxic chemicals which accumulate in the food chain and can adversely affect the environment and people’s health.

“The works are so extensive that they will change tidal patterns, threatening nesting grounds for birds by creating new wave patterns and eroding Botany Bay beaches.

“Human impacts will also be felt with the start of these works.

Dredgers and bulldozers are permitted to work around the clock.

“The dredging of Botany Bay is just the start of a sore that will fester with the Port Botany expansion * with increased construction causing dust and noise, road traffic and rail freight.

“The expansion of Port Botany has been opposed by local residents, key stevedoring firms like Patricks and P&O and the government’s own commission of inquiry.

“Port Kembla and Port Newcastle is where this expansion should have occurred, delivering much needed economic benefits to these regional areas,” Ms Rhiannon said.

For more information: 9230 3551, 0427 861 568

Port Botany Expansion

Unfortunately, construction of Port Botany expansion will commence at the end of August 2008 with various preparations being undertaking including fences being placed along Foreshore Road, and other preliminary works, including silt curtains being placed around the site prior to dredging 7.5 million cubic metres of seabed to create a 60 ha footprint that should be completed by 2011. Local residents have been warned that the construction will include work being undertaken 24 hours a day. (Please see the content below from the recent notice by Baulderstone Hornibrook Jan De Nul Port Botany Consortium (BH-JDN) that is carrying out the works.)

The Sydney Ports Corporation (SPC) is spending $20 million on community facilities that includes a new boat ramp, two pedestrian bridges, viewing platforms around Botany Bay (to look at shipping containers) and a gymnasium at JJ Cahill Memorial High School at Mascot. As the port expansion is costing more than $1 billion that will have an ongoing detrimental impact on the community and local residents, the paltry $20 million for community facilities is completely unbalanced. Save Botany Beach wrote to NSW Premier Morris Iemma in May 2008 raising these concerns and seeking appropriate compensation to be offered to local residents including double glazing, insulation and air-conditioning as well as financial compensation for the expected loss of property values. Unfortunately SBB is yet to receive a response but is pursuing the matter.

Also, after the port expansion development application (DA) was approved, which is twice the size of that recommended by an independent Commission of Inquiry, the SPC applied for and received the approval for a Section 96 application (for changes to the original DA) from NSW Planning Minister, Frank Sartor, and will now construct a rock seawall along Botany Beach between the port and the new boat ramp on Foreshore Road. It is outrageous that this DA approval was given without any requirement for public consultation nor an environmental impact statement.

The Port Botany expansion is another ill-conceived plan by the NSW Government that has chosen to concentrate all of NSW’s container trade in Port Botany which currently has inadequate appropriate road and rail infrastructure to support the current 1.4 million containers per annum, let alone the forecasted tripling of container trade of over 4 million containers per annum.

The NSW Government’s decision to expand Port Botany follows in the footsteps of other NSW Government planning disasters including the inadequate M5 (at capacity and outdated the day it opened), the Cross City Tunnel, the Lane Cove Bypass, the Sydney Airport to Central Rail Link, the T-Card etc.

Also, the NSW Government decided to close Sydney Harbour as a working port and have all imported vehicles delivered by ship to Port Kembla, resulting in over 100,000 car transporters per annum transporting the vehicles back to Sydney to the major car dealers and spewing carcinogenic fine diesel particles.

 Notice about the commencement of the Port Botany expansion

Baulderstone Hornibrook Jan De Nul Port Botany Consortium (BH-JDN) that is carrying out the works for the expansion under contract to Sydney Ports Corporation.

Civil works commenced in July 2008. Dredging activity is due to commence end of August 2008, when all silt curtains have been installed. Dredging works will continue until 2010 with the terminal expansion works scheduled for completion in early 2011. Dredging and reclamation works will occur in the area between the third runway and the existingBrotherson Dock and will also involve some areas in the shipping channel. Establishment of Environmental Controls
Initial work to install the silt curtains at Foreshore Beach, and between Brotherson Dock and adjacent to the third runway, will start on the week commencing Monday 11 August 2008. This work will continue for up to three weeks. Silt curtains are being installed to ensure that impacts to theenvironment are minimised. Some of this work near the end of the third runway is required to occur at night when the runway is not operational. Residents may hear some noise associated with these works. Dredging and Reclamation Activities
Dredging and reclamation activities will involve the use of dredgers and bulldozers that have beenapproved to operate 24 hours a day. Modelling of noise impacts indicates that residents closest to the works should not be impacted. Monitoring of noise levels will be conducted on a monthly basis during the day and at night throughout the construction period. Measures to minimise noise include selecting equipment appropriate to night time works, reducing the number of machines operating at night and minimising of the use of traditional reversing alarms. To further ensure that noise impacts for nearby residences are minimised during construction, two temporary sand mounds approximately two metres in height will be created, one  within the reclamation area, and another located near Foreshore Road adjacent to the location of the new boat ramp. 

To find out more about these activities or the Project, or to register a complaint about any activities related to this Project, please contact the Project Information Line (free call) on 1800 177 722, or alternatively visit the website at www.sydneyports.com.au or send an email to portbotany@bh.com.au

Note: Save Botany Beach would encourage people being affected by the port expansion construction noise and activities to make complaints.

The Federal Department of Environment and Water Resources has released a new factsheet on particulate matter. Small particles as mentioned in this factsheet are found in industrial pollution and diesel exhaust.

The Federal Department of Environment and Water Resources has released a new factsheet on Polychlorinated biphenyls.

These are the chemicals currently awaiting destruction at Orica.

Below is a letter written by Greg Killeen that was recently published in Lloyd’s List.

Sir

I write in regard to your story (”NSW Opposition slams uncoordinated NSW spending”, Sam Collyer, Lloyd’s List DCN , September 27, 2007) and would agree the Iemma Government has no integrated freight plan and this equates to gross economic mismanagement of NSW and its taxpayers’ money.

With Sydney’s lack of appropriate road and rail infrastructure to support current container trade, the Iemma Government should scrap the proposed 60-ha Port Botany expansion and use the $700m-plus construction budget, along with the AusLink funding, to address this issue immediately.

There is no urgency for a 60-ha third terminal as DP World’s proposed $43m upgrade and the recent completion of Patrick’s $220m upgrade will increase Port Botany’s capacity to around 2.7m teu per annum - doubling current capacity - and without NSW taxpayers’ money.

The Port Botany expansion is planned without any sound business principles.

The Iemma Government will soon announce the successful tenderer for the “design and construction” of the 60-ha footprint (twice the size recommended by the COI), prior to securing a contract with a stevedore to develop and operate on it, resulting in no surety of a return on the expenditure.

With the Iemma Government unable to manage a long-term lease with DP World at Port Botany, what will be the economic and commercial impact if Patricks does not exercise its 18-ha (30%) option on the proposed 60-ha expansion, that it was offered to get out of Darling Harbour before 2000?

Port Botany was approved to process a maximum of 3.2m teu per annum with the proposed expansion. However, it will have a capacity greater than 4.2m teu per annum combined with current stevedores’ upgrades.

If and when the port were to operate at this capacity, even with the 40% freight rail target for containers, it would equate to a 200%-300% increase in containers transported by road, creating an ongoing detrimental impact on Sydney’s traffic congestion.

Mr Tripodi’s comments are true - that there was extensive community consultation for the Port Botany expansion; however, the community submissions were, and continue to be, ignored as was the recommendations of the COI.

The Iemma Government has given itself powers beyond legal reproach by establishing “state significant” legislation to approve any development, regardless of the detrimental economic, environmental and social impact and has turned NSW from a democracy into a dictatorship.

The Iemma Government must reconsider the proposed Port Botany expansion and address the current container freight and infrastructure issues with a whole of state approach and implement the NSW Ports Growth Plan now.

Or it will prove the Government has learnt nothing from its other infrastructure debacles, such as the Cross City Tunnel, Sydney Airport RailLink and the M5 that was at capacity the day it opened etc., because it will squeeze the last breath out of Sydney’s choking road network.

Greg Killeen,

Secretary, Save Botany Beach.

The Federal Department of Environment and Water Resources has released a new factsheet on Particulate Matter. Small particles as mentioned in this factsheet are found in industrial pollution and diesel exhaust.

Patrick has downplayed suggestions that heavy congestion at its Port Botany container terminal this week is the worst the port has seen in 10 years.Importers and road transporters told Lloyd’s List DCN that turnaround times at the terminal this week, and tracing back as far as August, are worse than ever.

Patrick terminal operations general manager Peter van Duyn said this morning (Wednesday, October 17) that the congestion had been caused by a technical glitch that affected the stevedore’s global positioning system (GPS).

“Yesterday was particularly bad, but that was just an IT issue,” Mr van Duyn said.

“We had network problems that distorted our GPS on the straddles.”

Patrick had been forced to operate its straddles manually, which had slowed the landside process, Mr van Duyn said.

The terminal also had to deal with extra boxes delivered by a vessel that had bypassed Brisbane and had instead unloaded all her Brisbane-bound boxes in Sydney.

But road transporters said the congestion had been evident since August, which some said was worse than anything seen in the last 10 years, including the 1998 waterfront dispute.

Some carriers are reportedly recommending to their clients that they use shipping lines that are serviced by rival DP World, which has faced congestion of its own but not to the same degree.

Statistics sent to Lloyd’s List DCN by the Australian Trucking Association New South Wales suggested that at least one carrier had waited almost three hours on average for daytime slots and almost four hours at night to enter Patrick’s terminal.

The information, reflecting slots used since last Tuesday, showed that one truck had waited seven hours.

Truck companies said the delays meant their drivers were exceeding their allowable shift times, representing a danger to themselves and the public.

Sydney Ports Corporation’s Cargo Facilitation Committee met yesterday, with much of the discussion focusing on the present delays at Patrick.

But Mr van Duyn said Patrick would be back operating smoothly by the weekend.

“We’re whittling it down and we’re very mindful of the pain we caused yesterday, we are really prioritising the road at the moment,” he said.

“We’re trying to honour [vehicle] slots that we missed out yesterday and shipping has levelled off a bit so we’re trying to recover.”

Patrick has extended free storage times until Monday morning and is not cracking down on no-shows by truck companies.

The Customs Brokers and Forwarders Council of Australia’s (CBFCA) freight and business operations manager Paul Zalai welcomed the concessions but said he looked forward to meeting New South Wales ports minister Joe Tripodi in two weeks.

Patrick’s congestion woes come as the Independent Pricing and Regulatory Tribunal (IPART) prepares to deliver a draft report on landside issues at the port.

Story from Lloyd’s List

(From Lloyd’s List )

A lack of urgency and the non-use of an integrated freight plan had left many key road, rail and port projects in New South Wales unsynchronised, the state’s opposition leader Barry O’Farrell said yesterday (Monday, September 24).

In an interview with Lloyd’s List DCN, Mr O’Farrell said the state Labor Government had not lived up to its 2007 election slogan “More to do, but heading in the right direction”.

“There’s no shortage of plans, no shortage of ideas, there’s no shortage of knowledge of what needs to be done - what has been lacking has been any sense of either timeliness or urgency in actually making the decision and getting on with the job,” Mr O’Farrell said.

“We’ve seen since the election a couple of decisions, but to quote Labor’s 2007 election strategy, those decisions are heading in the right direction but there is plenty more to be done.”

Read the rest of this entry »

The Save Botany Beach July Newsletter is now available.

Greens MP and ports spokesperson Lee Rhiannon says Premier Iemma’s commitment to an expanded Port Botany will unnecessarily strangle Sydney with an increasing number of trucks and freight trains impacting negatively on Sydney’s traffic, air pollution and health.

“The NSW government will never reach its 40 percent rail freight target without adopting a freight infrastructure charge which would create an incentive to move freight by rail. Its decision to duck this initiative shows it has again caved into the road lobby,” Ms Rhiannon said.

“For the government to claim there will be 300 fewer truck movements a day around the Airport, Port Botany and Marrickville and a reduction in CO2 is pure fantasy. ” Read the rest of this entry »