Mood:  accident prone

Notice the reference to water volumes allowed: Basically they have DA approval for 25 ML/YR which is likely used up by now or soon will be, and have had a temporary license up until Dec 2007 for 66ML/YR under their DA approval.

In other words until the decision one way or the other from the Land & Environment Court in a quite complex and tricky case, hotly contested by neighbouring agricultural land users, community group and the green movement, Coca Cola are faced with running out of their license allocation for their Peats Ridge water bottling plant.

And as their barrister Peter Tomasetti stated/implied in the court on Sept 4, as a public company they have obligations to declare to the market place what their trading situation is. At that time they suggested they had some 3 weeks supply available under their license which bring us to about now 25 late Sept 2008 if not already passed.

One local writes to SAM micro news today that he believes CCA have only themselves to blame as the local staff at Peats Ridge were having their water resource bulk exported by tanker to the CCA Smithfield plant which could have been kept back for the licensed water bottling at Peats Ridge:

Sent: Monday, September 29, 2008 10:20 AM

Subject: Re: Fw: LEC No. 10429/05 David Kettle Consulting v. Gosford City Council

> Dear Tom.
>
> Thanks for CCA letter to L&EC This confirms my understanding of the licensed allocations to be 2 seperate amounts 1@25ml & 1@41ml.PRS has reached their 25ml limit for this year. The 41ml subject to the trial conditions is not available to them due to the refusal by GCC to convert the status from temp to perm.The temp / trial period expired Dec 2007.The DWE docs Fraser [counsel for GCC] produced at court don't alter the fact that PRS [Peats Ridge Springs Ltd subsidiary of CCA]  is currently restricted to 25ml. Access to all or part of the 41ml is subject to the courts decision.
>
> CCA have been aware of this restriction of 25ml since GCC refused their application in Feb 2008 however they chose to use up part of their limited allocation for bulk removal to their Smithfield processing plant therefore putting at risk having enough water left to keep the PRS plant operating as a bottling plant.
>
> In the last paragraph of the letter they are using economic blackmail on Comm Moore to try to gain access to the 41ml . This should be pointed out to Council so that Council make it clear that CCA put their PRS plant in this position THEMSELVES and it is not acceptable to try to now blackmail the Court.
>
.....

 

Nor is the Court's judgement quite the official end of the controversy in this current phase going on for many years now. There are a whole lot of thorny questions being asked in NSW Parliament about how CCA managed to get a state govt license increase in water from 25 to 66 ML/YR (subject to a DA approval for the same amount via the court) compared with neighbouring landholders routinely rejected for any increase. As well as a cognate Water Bill also before the parliament.

One begins to suspect why former minister Nathan Rees preferred to jump up the ladder rather than stick around in this problemmatic portfolio:

Posted by editor at 4:58 PM NZT

Updated: Monday, 29 September 2008 5:43 PM NZT

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