An independent review of air quality at a controversial composting and worm farming business in Taranaki has found there is most likely a relationship between illness in the community and odours emitting from the Uruti site.
In April three people required ambulance treatment after encountering a strong smell near the Uruti site where 20,000 tonnes of oil and gas waste are stockpiled. Photo: screenshot
The review, which was prepared for the District Health Board, said neighbours could have been exposed to hydrogen sulphide, ammonia, benzene and other aromatic hydrocarbons.
In April three people required ambulance treatment after encountering a strong smell near the Uruti site where 20,000 tonnes of oil and gas waste are stockpiled.
Dawn Bendall, who lives nearby, was one of them.
"The stench in the air was just so bad. It made us all cough, it burnt our eyes, it made our lungs feel very heavy and my children, who were in the car at the time, all suffered the same symptoms and one of them in particular got into coughing splutters, so we had to call an ambulance," Bendall said.
That prompted the Taranaki District Health Board to seek advice from the air quality company Emission Impossible.
Its desktop review concluded it was likely that discharges to air from the site were causing significant adverse effects on neighbouring residents.
Bendall said it was relief that someone was finally listening.
"With the skin rashes that come up after the stench, the headaches, the burning eyes and all of that.
"You know it's starting to all come clear now and in particular that Wednesday when we went past we all reacted the same way to that particular stench and it was horrific."
Urenui Community Health Group spokesperson Rodney Baker said it was good to have some evidence to back up residents' suspicions.
"Well it just put proof to the custard actually because we actually knew from all the locals raising it with us that there was an issue out there," Baker said.
"The governance of it all just needs to sort it out. It needs to be addressed. It needs to be shut down or really stringent boundaries put around it. You can just let people keep getting sick around you."
The latest review did not reflect well the on the monitoring of Remediation New Zealand, which owned the composting site, Baker said.
Taranaki Medical Officer of Health Dr Jonathan Jarman said the DHB did its own assessment of the April cases before calling for outside help.
"It's almost impossible to prove that it's odours that are causing illness so we use something called probability modelling or something called the Test of Poisoning and that is what has lead us to the conclusion that it's possible or probable that the odours are making people sick," Jarman said.
According to the Test for Poisoning, the symptoms of two of the April cases were probably caused by the odour while the third was possibly caused by it.
Jarman believed there was a correlation between the symptoms people were experiencing - skin irritations, coughing, shortness off breath - and the stench.
But he was less clear about the long-term health affects.
"We're not absolutely certain and that's why we've called upon an air quality expert to give us some advice.
"In fact what we want to do is to work with the regional council, we want to work with the community, we want work with Remediation Limited to solve this problem as quickly as possible."
Bendall was celebrating just yet.
"I feel very sad that it's come to this where now something has to be done, you know, it should've been done years ago.
"And it does really make me feel concerned for all of our health because we've been subjected to this the whole way through really."
Remediation NZ managing director Kerry O'Neil noted that Emission Impossible had not done any on-site testing of its own, before saying the company did not want to comment further.
The company was about to hear whether its application to renew resource consents to discharge contaminants into land, air and water at its Uruti site had been successful.
The Taranaki Regional Council said because the consents decision was imminent, it was not appropriate for it to comment.