McCallum Bros Limited® is a fourth generational Aotearoa New Zealand family-owned and run company that has been operating since 1904. We plan to remain this way, and the legacy will continue with the next generation.

McCallum Bros Limited® specialises in supplying the construction market with essential sand and quarried rock products, as well providing maritime and road bulk cargo transport services.

McCallum Bros Limited® has been extracting high-quality sand from the Mangawhai-Pākiri embayment for more than 75 years, which it primarily supplies to concrete manufacturers in the greater Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland. The sand has been used for many of Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland’s largest construction projects, including most recently in the Waterview Tunnel, City Rail Link, the Central Wastewater Interceptor and the Newmarket Viaduct. In addition to commercial infrastructure, the sand is also used in residential construction and recreational applications including playing fields and beach renourishment.

McCallum Bros Limited® have identified Te Ākau Bream Bay as the proposed location to extract sand for a number of reasons, including:

The sand analysed at Te Ākau Bream Bay indicates mineralogical and physical properties that are suitable for use in high strength and specialist concrete mixes of the type used in infrastructure development and commercial buildings. 

Te Ākau Bream Bay is already a highly utilised commercial shipping area. The embayment is already highly commercialised given it is the entrance to one of Aotearoa New Zealand’s busiest ports, an anchorage for bulk ships and super tankers.

Te Ākau Bream Bay is an active commercial fisheries area, including longlining and bottom trawling, it has historically been intensively dredged for scallops.

It’s a long way offshore, the proposed extraction site at Te Ākau Bream Bay was chosen as the inner boundary is at least 4.7km offshore and 6-7kms from Waipū Cove and Langs Beach.

The inner boundary of the extraction area is well outside the Depth of Closure for Te Ākau Bream Bay. This means that there are no anticipated effects on beach processes.

The proposed sand extraction area is not in close proximity to protected marine conservation areas.

The coastal process investigations have found large volumes of sand available in the proposed extraction area. Sand extracted at the proposed volumes is sustainable.

McCallum Bros Limited® is applying for a resource to extract sand from an offshore area of Te Ākau Bream Bay. The sand extraction application area is located centrally in Te Ākau Bream Bay and is west of the Northport anchorage area.

The extraction area is 15.4 km2 (7 km alongshore and 2.2 km across shore) and is located at a minimum distance of 4.7 km from the shoreline.

The proposed extraction volumes are:
• McCallum Bros Limited® intend to extract 150,000 m3 per annum for the first 3 years, and;
• Maximum of 250,000 m3 per annum with a monthly maximum of 25,000 m3 for the remaining 32 years.

Sand is a critical building material and is essential to produce concrete. The proposed volume of sand extracted from the Te Ākau Bream Bay will supply the construction sand requirements for Northland, Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland, Waikato, and the wider upper North Island.

The sand extracted by McCallum Bros Limited® is essential for both infrastructure and housing development. The sand extracted from Te Ākau Bream Bay has physical and chemical properties that allow it to be used in high strength and specialist concrete mixes to build large infrastructure and commercial projects. McCallum Bros Limited® have supplied Mangawhai-Pākiri sand into many of Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland’s largest construction projects, most recently in the Waterview Tunnel, City Rail Link, the Central Wastewater Interceptor and the Newmarket Viaduct. The sand from Te Ākau Bream Bay has similar properties and can be used in the same applications.

Trailing suction extraction is where the extraction vessel extracts while moving and skims the surface of the sea floor with the extraction head (the “drag head”). The drag head pumps water into the sand surface stirring it up so that it can be extracted through the drag head. Our vessel, the William Fraser, has a drag head that is 1.6m wide and extracts sand to about 8-10cm deep. The vessel moves at a slow 1.5 – 2.5 knots while extracting.

Not all of the material extracted from the sea floor is contained. There are screens on the vessel that prevent any material greater in size than 2.5mm from passing through into the hopper. This oversize material is returned to the sea through an enclosed moon pool in the vessel’s hull. Returning excess material to sea this way, as opposed to a chute over the side of the vessel prevents the particles from becoming aerated. In turn, this results in the excess material settling back to the sea floor much faster and minimises the plume generated from the extraction.

McCallum Bros Limited® are proposing to operate in the afternoon only.

This time of the day is busiest for most recreational boats and commercial shipping activity, so the presence of the William Fraser be negligible relative to the other activity within the embayment.

Limiting extraction during afternoon daylight hours means that sand extraction will occur in conjunction with elevated levels of commercial activity, human activity, and biological sound occurring underwater.  This reduces our effects to disturbance and acoustic disruption to marine mammals (particularly Bottlenose Dolphins and Bryde’s Whales).

Yes. Barging sand directly to the Ports of Auckland or to any other port is a more efficient method of transport in terms of carbon emissions per cubic metre of sand compared to using trucks. Not only does barging produce less emissions, but it also reduces road congestion and the associated damage to the roading infrastructure caused from heavy vehicle movements as well as reducing other social costs. According to the International Transport Forum, ‘road freight can emit more than 100 times more CO2 as ships to carry the same amount of freight the same distance’*.

* International Transport Forum. ITF Transport Outlook 2021. (2021).

No. Globally, sand is the second most used material behind water.  Sand is an optimum binding material for concrete production as it fills in the gaps when mixed with aggregates. A typical mix of concrete is approximately 80-90 percent sand and aggregates.  You can’t make concrete without sand.

The availability of good quality sand is absolutely vital to Aotearoa New Zealand’s infrastructure and construction industries. Without sand, commercial buildings, and large-scale transport projects will not be able to meet target strength and lifespan build requirements for concrete.

There are several resources in the upper North Island that can supply various grades of sand to the market. However, not all of these are of similar quality, or they have constraints (including but not limited to) their availability, distance, economic cost, or environmental cost.

Manufactured sands are made by crushing up quarry rock to a finer sized particle. There are two types of manufactured sands currently being produced. These are Premium All Passing (PAP) type products with a particle size ranging from 6-7 mm down to 0.075 mm. The other being, manufactured sand of a similar particle size to natural sand from 2 mm to 0.075 mm.

Currently, manufactured sand of a similar particle size to natural marine sand is available. Manufactured sand can complement the use of natural marine sand in a concrete mix to a greater or lesser degree depending upon the performance requirements of the concrete.

In some countries, manufactured sand is being used in the manufacture of concrete, the volumes used depend on the availability and quality of natural sand resources.

There are several companies at various stages of developing a manufactured sand product of a similar particle size to natural sand.

We consider that the Te Ākau Bream Bay embayment is the most environmentally sustainable source for sand due to the large volume of sand available, its quality and the proximity to Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland and Northland.

Sand from the embayment can be easily barged to central Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland where it can be distributed to local concrete manufacturers sustainably.

Sand of similar quality and volume can be found in the Kaipara Harbour, but this cannot be easily shipped to Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland without going around Cape Reinga at enormous cost and time, ultimately making the sand unviable for purchase in the market.

Instead, if the sand was extracted from the Kaipara, it would need to be trucked to Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland from Helensville. Given Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland’s sand demands and construction needs, this would see  return truck and trailer movements every year on the North-western motorway, resulting in increased congestion and an extra  243,000 tonnes of CO2 emissions in the atmosphere over 35 years (proposed consent duration). This is based on an additional 4,319 tonnes of carbon dioxide generated annually over the short term (3 years), before increasing to 7,198 tonnes from year 4 onwards.

Because sand is a high-mass, low-value product, it is expensive to transport long distances via the road network. This means construction costs would need to increase as concrete prices rose to adjust for the increased transportation costs. Economic research has found that using the Kaipara to meet Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland’s sand requirements would cost an extra $132 million in transport costs over 20 years.

Most sands south of Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland are unsuitable for major civil engineering projects because they contain large volumes of volcanic material from the central plateau. This can impact the quality of the concrete produced.

Sourcing the sand south of Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland would also add substantial truck and trailer movements to the already congested motorway network, resulting in a substantial increase in carbon dioxide emissions.

The extraction area is 15.4 km2 (7 km alongshore and 2.2 km across shore) and is located at a minimum distance of 4.7 km from the shoreline and 6-7kms from Waipū Cove and Langs Beach. The inner boundary of the extraction area is well outside the Depth of Closure for Te Ākau Bream Bay. This means that there are no anticipated effects on beach processes. Vibracore sampling estimates that the depth of sand across the entire extraction area (15.4 km2) averages 2.55 m deep. This means that there is at least 39,270,000 m3 of sand available in the extraction area. The total maximum volume that is proposed to be extracted over 35 years is 8,450,000 m3. This is less than ¼ of the total volume of sand available.

McCallum Bros Limited® remain committed to reducing the environmental impact of sand extraction at Te Ākau Bream Bay. We have invested heavily to understand where we can mitigate adverse effects and have outsourced subject matter experts from leading organisations. We have commissioned 15 Assessment of Effects reports to extensively research and understand our impacts to the marine and terrestrial environment, including:

Water Quality

Airborne Noise

Avian (Seabirds and Shorebirds)

Benthic Ecology

Coastal Processes

Concrete suitability

Cultural impact assessments

Economics

Fishing

Landscape

Marine Mammals

Marine Ecology

Navigational Safety

Surf

Underwater Noise

McCallum Bros Limited® has also invested heavily in new technology, including a purpose-built and state-of-the-art vessel, the William Fraser. Built in 2019 to McCallum Bros Limited’s® design specifications, the William Fraser has a number of features which reduces the impact of extraction on the environment and other users in the embayment.

Other features of the vessel that reduce environmental impact are an electric driven pump to reduce underwater noise and eliminate the risk of oil spills. The moon pools direct all discharges at keel level below the vessel, and a wide drag head reduces the depth of extraction. The engine room is contained within a soundproofed superstructure to reduce terrestrial noise as much as possible. All of these features ultimately reduce sediment plumes, discharge of contaminants, the distance that underwater and terrestrial noise can be heard, and increases the survivability of biota passing through the pump.

An independent study of sand extracted using our vessel has shown that the turbidity in the water column and resulting plume is described as localised, and temporary (short-lived). Based on extraction at Mangawhai-Pākiri turbidity levels return to normal within ~26 minutes (i.e. when the dredge vessel was 2000m from the sampling vessel), there was minimal to negligible effects of plume (as turbidity).

The Te Ākau Bream Bay proposal is for offshore sand extraction, an area of 15.4 km2 that is located 4.7 km offshore from the shoreline at the closest point.

Te Ākau Bream Bay is an open coastal environment that is exposed to heavy storm and sea activity. Due to this, the seafloor is highly mobile. Animals living in this environment are used to significant changes and are generally very robust and accustomed to disturbance.
Independent research commissioned by McCallum Bros Limited® found that the extraction area consists of nationally and locally common species, with no “At Risk” species being found to be present or affected by the proposal. The proposed extraction activity has been considered to have a low effect on seafloor and finfish communities.
The most significant possible impact is caused by the drag head, which extracts a track approximately 1.6m wide and between 80 and 100mm deep. Many burrowing species were, however, were found to not be picked up at that dredge depth. Those species that were picked up were typically very robust and survived passing through the dredge equipment before being returned to the seafloor with minimal harm.

McCallum Bros Limited® have and continue to engage with Northland Regional Council, local iwi, hapū and wider whānau.

Since the inception of the project, engagement has focused on two groups with links to Te Ākau Bream Bay that includes Te Parawhau (via Te Pouwhenua o Tiakiriri Trust) and Patuharakeke (Patuharakeke Te Iwi Trust Board).  Discussions continue weekly with representatives of both groups. We consider we have taken meaningful steps to address their concerns, including our attendance to an induction day with Patuharakeke whānau by our experts and company/family members so that the proposal could be tailored to address their issues and understand their values.

We have extended invitations to meet with other interested parties such as community groups with genuine interests and representation in the Te Ākau Bream Bay area. If you represent an interested group in the Te Ākau Bream Bay area, please contact us with your name, contact details and who you represent, and we will respond accordingly to discuss our proposal and any concerns your group may have.

It is predicted that the Northport construction upgrade at Marsden Point will result in increased numbers of cruise and container ships within the harbour. In the medium to long term, the Northland Regional Council estimates that the frequency of shipping movements will increase by 10-15% on average over the next two decades. This estimate does not include recreational vessel movements and ship anchorages, which are, on average, continuous throughout the year. This highlights there is considerable commercial shipping activity at Marsden Point, and the cumulative impact of the extraction vessel William Fraser’s presence in the embayment would be extremely minor, relative to the 1,150 ships that currently transit annually in the embayment.

No. The William Fraser and all other vessels under McCallum Bros Limited’s® fleet have never run-aground at Mangawhai-Pākiri or in other areas whilst undertaking sand extraction.

No. The William Fraser and all other vessels under McCallum Bros Limited’s® fleet have never had an oil spill in 120 years.

Half of McCallum Bros Limited’s® marine employees are from the Northland region. Our vessels are slipped and maintained biannually on commercial slipways in Whangārei Harbour and are part of the transport chain for cement out of Northland. The production of which is one of the biggest employers/industries in Northland. We are also involved in shipping bulk oversized cargo to and from Whangārei based fabrication companies around the wider Northland region.

McCallum Bros Limited® is using many highly qualified experts who work for many of New Zealand’s most prominent environmental or commercial consultancy firms. The experts are required to undertake their Assessments of Effects in the form of technical reports. The reports and their findings can be used as evidence in legal settings such as in hearings, and in court. Therefore, the reports must follow an agreed “expert code of conduct”. This code of conduct requires an expert to:

• Be impartial: Expert witnesses must not act as advocates for the party who hired them. 
• Be independent: Expert witnesses must exercise their own professional judgment and not follow instructions from others. 
• Be clear: Expert witnesses must state any qualifications, limitations, or uncertainties in their evidence. 
• Be prepared: Expert witnesses must be well-prepared and provide details of any tests or investigations they relied on. 
• Comply with orders: Expert witnesses must follow any directions from the court or tribunal. 

McCallum Bros Limited® is preparing to lodge an application to the Fast Track Panel based on science and using independent, highly qualified experts. By doing this, we feel we are demonstrating commitment to best practice and genuinely want to mitigate and reduce effects of the proposal in Te Ākau Bream Bay.