Shotover Wastewater Treatment Plant in Queenstown. Photo: Supplied / Queenstown Lakes District Council
Queenstown Lakes District Council spent more than $1.8 million on repairs to its troubled Shotover Wastewater Treatment Plant before racking up almost $600,000 in legal bills over compliance failures.
Figures released under the Local Government Official Information and Meetings Act (LGOIMA), which have also been made public, show the council had carried out years of costly repair work between January 2021 and March 2025 before the Environment Court ordered an urgent fix this year.
The legal proceedings cost a total of $596,519.94, including $235,000 in court-awarded costs.
The council told RNZ that sum also included more than $144,000 spent on legal representation, more than $180,000 spent on planning and technical consultants and more than $36,000 on environmental monitoring.
The Otago Regional Council brought the case after issuing two abatement notices and 10 infringement notices since early 2024, many relating to treated wastewater ponding on the Shotover delta.
Court documents show part of the plant's "disposal field" had failed and wastewater was ponding, to the alarm of nearby Queenstown Airport, which was concerned that it would attract birds and increase the risk of bird strike.
After two days of court-facilitated mediation, the Environment Court issued a decision in June ordering the QLDC to take immediate action to fix the Shotover Wastewater Treatment Plant and develop a permanent, legal plan for wastewater disposal.
It ruled the council must finish installing a new treatment system and have it running by 31 December 2025.
A QLDC spokesperson said about half of the $1.8m repair spend came from the council's long term disposal field capital project, with the rest drawn from the long term plan and annual plan budgets.
It included expenses for reports, consultants and contractors, they said.
"The wastewater treatment plant is a vital asset and, as a council, we are continuously setting funds aside to maintain and upgrade the facility," the spokesperson said.
They said the plant was a "significant, complex operation".
"Given the current challenges we want to ensure we are ready for future wastewater needs through efficient spending and upgrades. It is with this in mind that QLDC has allocated $77.5 million through the current long term plan to implement a new disposal strategy which also sits alongside the stage 3 plant upgrades - which will provide for future growth in the area through to the year 2048," the spokesperson said.
The council has since applied for consent to discharge treated wastewater into the Shotover River as an interim solution, which it began doing in March using emergency powers.
Public consultation on the applications opened on 23 September for a period of six weeks.
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