Minister invites funding applications for contaminated site clean ups

New funding applications for contaminated site remediation and clean up works across the country will be invited from Friday, August 20, Environment Minister Marian Hobbs said today.

"Regional councils will be invited to submit applications for investigations and clean up programmes for priority contaminated sites," Marian Hobbs said.

"Councils will receive forms and guidelines on how to make an application. Applications will close on October 20, allowing regional councils plenty of time to prepare their applications.

"The ministry is already working closely with local communities and landowners on remediation partnerships with seven regional councils on 13 separate projects." Marian Hobbs said the Contaminated Sites Remediation Fund launched in October 2003 has been very effective in stimulating action on the ground.

"One case in point is the Auckland Regional Council which received funding of more than $180,000 for site assessment of the former fertiliser plant in Onehunga; investigation of seabed contamination around Devonport naval base and investigation of contamination in the Western Reclamation," Marian Hobbs said.

Many of the projects funded over the last two financial years support site investigations to guide future clean-up activity.

© Scoop Media

Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>