Week 1 - RMA

National Policy Statements

National policy statements (NPS) include 

• New Zealand Coastal Policy Statement - 2010 (includes the 1st 20m of coastline, a resource consent was required for discharge from Rena) 
• National Policy Statement on Electrical Transmission - 2008
• National Policy statement on Freshwater Management - 2014 (includes objectives for management of rivers and streams, e.g. water quality limits are set as are abstraction volumes).
• National Policy statement on Renewable Electricity Generation - 2013
• National Policy Statement on Urban Design - 2020.

The only mandatory NPS is the coastal policy statement which was authorized by Doc, all reports and district plans must give effect this coastal policy statement. The other NPS were authorized by MfE and are optional at this stage.

More NPS are in development including NPS Biodiversity, which includes the protection of indigenous vegetation.

Regional Policy Statements

Regional Policy Statements (RPS) (Chapter 2 of the Unitary plan) shouldn't need to be used too often but could be useful e.g  to support an application for an activity for example a 3rd Harbour Crossing. 

RPS include:

• the significant resource management issues for the region including those of significance to iwi
• objectives and policies to address issues and an explanation of those policies.
• methods (excluding rules) used, or to be used, to implement the policies
• principal reasons for adopting the objectives, policies and methods of implementation
• environmental results anticipated from implementation of those policies and methods.

Regional Policy statement may contain information (which maybe based on models) which may affect your activity, for example detailed information about where floodplains are located.  The RPS is a key planning instrument because all Regional and District plans must give effect to the RPS.  Key sections of the RPS include: water quality and quantity, air quality, natural hazards, climate change, contaminated land, hazardous substances, waste, earthworks and land development and transport.

National Environmental Standards

National Environmental standards are set by central government and developed by the ministry for the environment for example:

• Air quality
• Sources of human drinking water
• Assessing and managing contaminants in soil to protect human health (e.g if digging more than 25m³ soil, you must prove that it is not contaminated via a preliminary site investigation)

Plus others including the development of a number of new standards e.g ecological flows and water levels.