Yumbah Nyamat Works Approval Application October 2018 Appendix I Sustainable Project Management (2018) Marine Impact Assessment Table of contents 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................................................... 1 1.1 Purpose of this report .......................................................................................................... 1 2. Methodology ............................................................................................................................................. 2 2.1 Marine habitat assessment ................................................................................................. 2 3. The Marine Environment .......................................................................................................................... 3 3.1 General Characteristics ........................................................................................................ 3 3.2 EPBC Act Protected Matters ................................................................................................ 3 3.4 Victorian Biodiversity Atlas .................................................................................................. 5 3.5 Marine Benthic Survey ........................................................................................................ 5 4. Marine Impact Assessment ...................................................................................................................... 8 4.1 Inflow risks ........................................................................................................................... 8 4.2 Seawater discharge risks ..................................................................................................... 8 4.3 Mixing zone assessment .................................................................................................... 11 4.4 Risks to sensitive receptors: Ecosystem ............................................................................ 14 4.5 Risks to sensitive receptors: MNES .................................................................................... 15 5. Conclusion .............................................................................................................................................. 17 6. References ............................................................................................................................................. 18 Table index Table 1 Transect Details ................................................................................................................... 2 Table 2 Protected Matters (marine species excluding bird species) ................................................ 3 Table 3 Transect habitat summaries ................................................................................................ 6 Table 4 ANZECC & ARMCANZ (2000) guidelines for marine water quality ............................................ 9 Table 5 Summary statistics of water quality collected at Yumbah Narrawong November 2001-August 2018 .............................................................................................................. 10 Table 6 Seawater discharge configuration ..................................................................................... 11 Table 7 Summary of CTV, CAMB, COUT and DMZ values derived from the existing Yumbah Narrawong abalone farm’s water quality data (GHD, 2018) ............................... 12 Table 8 Extent of mixing zone......................................................................................................... 1 2 Table 9 Potential impacts summary: MNES ................................................................................... 15 Figure index Figure 1 Proposed footprint of Yumbah Nyamat................................................................................ 1 Figure 2 Habitat transect locations .................................................................................................... 2 Figure 3 Marine survey photos (A-H) ................................................................................................. 7 Figure 4 Statistical contours for 5-fold dilution in summer (GHD, 2018) ......................................... 13 Figure 5 Statistical contours for 5-fold dilution in autumn (GHD, 2018) .......................................... 13 Appendices Appendix A – Marine Habitat Assessment Results Appendix B – EPBC Act Protected Matters Report Disclaimer This report has been prepared by Sustainable Project Management Pty Ltd and may only be used and relied on by Yumbah Aquaculture Ltd for the Yumbah Nyamat Marine Impact Assessment. Sustainable Project Management Pty Ltd disclaims responsibility for any third party reliance of this report other than Yumbah Aquaculture Ltd. The report may not contain sufficient information for the purposes of other parties or for other uses. This report shall be presented in full and shall not be used to support any other objectives than those set out in Section 1.1 of this report, without written approval from Sustainable Project Management Pty Ltd. All intellectual property rights, including copyright, in designs development and documents created by, or for, Yumbah Aquaculture Ltd remain the property of the company. Any use of such design or document without the prior written approval of Yumbah Aquaculture Ltd will constitute an infringement of the rights of the company which reserves all legal rights and remedies in respect of any such infringement. The information, including any intellectual property, contained in this proposal is confidential and proprietary to the Company. It may only be used by the person to whom it is provided for the stated purpose for which it is provided and must not be imparted to any third person without the written approval of the Company. The Company reserves all legal rights and remedies in relation to any infringement of its rights in respect of its confidential information. 1. Introduction Yumbah Aquaculture are proposing to develop a land-based abalone aquaculture abalone farm (the Project) at Dutton Way, just east of Portland in south-western Victoria. The Project will have a 1000 tonnes/year capacity. The abalone farm will operate four large grow-out modules, utilising a seawater circulation system drawing and discharging water into the adjacent Portland Bay. The footprint of the proposed abalone farm is presented in Figure 1. Sustainable Project Management Pty Ltd was engaged by Yumbah Aquaculture to complete planning and works approval applications for the proposed Yumbah Nyamat abalone farm. As part of the environment and planning approvals application, a marine environmental impact assessment is required to determine the potential impacts of the Project on the receiving marine environment. This assessment utilises the results of both desktop and field surveys of the marine receiving environment as well as a near shore modelling assessment completed for the Project. 1.1 Purpose of this report This report has been completed with the objective to consolidate a range of sources available to present on the potential impact to the marine environment by the proposed Yumbah Nyamat abalone farm. Of particular interest is the potential impact associated with the discharge of water from the farm. Figure 1 Proposed footprint of Yumbah Nyamat 1 | Page Yumbah Nyamat Marine Impact Assessment 2. Methodology An assessment of the potential impacts of Yumbah Nyamat on the marine receiving environment was undertaken utilising the following resources: Search of the Commonwealth EPBC Act Protected Matters Search Tool (PMST) (maintained by the Department of the Environment and Energy (DOEE)), using a 10 km buffer around the Project site. Search of the Victorian Biodiversity Atlas Mixing Zone Assessment of the Project’s marine outfalls Results from a baseline marine survey undertaken by Matt Koopman of Kina Diving. 2.1 Marine habitat assessment To characterise the marine receiving environment, Kina Diving were engaged by Yumbah Aquaculture to undertake a marine habitat assessment of the area adjacent to the Project site. A series of seven video transects were undertaken at distances of 50, 100, 150, 200, 250, 300 and 350 m from shore (Figure 2). Transects were parallel to the shoreline, and depths ranged from 1.1–6.3 m. While the target length of transects was 1000 m, actual transect lengths ranged 1001–1017 m. A summary of transect location and depth is provided in Table 1. Figure 2 Habitat transect locations Table 1 Transect Details Transect Starting Starting Start End End End Latitude Longitude Depth Latitude Longitude Depth (m) T50 38˚ 18.028 141˚ 37.338 1.1 38˚ 18.289 141˚ 36.724 1.1 T100 38˚ 18.052 141˚ 37.364 2 38˚ 18.311 141˚ 36.753 3.6 T150 38˚ 18.078 141˚ 37.381 2.4 38˚ 18.339 141˚ 36.769 4.5 T200 38˚ 18.102 141˚ 37.398 3.3 38˚ 18.360 141˚ 36.787 4.9 T250 38˚ 18.126 141˚ 37.416 3.6 38˚ 18.385 141˚ 36.805 5.3 T300 38˚ 18.152 141˚ 37.431 3.9 38˚ 18.408 141˚ 36.826 5.8 2 | Page Yumbah Nyamat Marine Impact Assessment 3. The Marine Environment 3.1 General Characteristics The marine receiving environment the proposed Yumbah Nyamat abalone farm is part of the Otway Marine Bioregion (Barton et al, 2012), which commences at Cape Jaffa in South Australia and extends to Apollo Bay in Victoria. Portland Bay is a semi-enclosed embayment directly connected to the highly dynamic and energy intensive