Delays stall Nullaki lime pit production

Environmental conditions have delayed the availability of lime from the new lime pit on the Nullaki Peninsula.

Great Southern Lime last month issued an apology to farmers who had planned to secure lime from the pit, announcing required road upgrades had been held up.

The proposal for the new lime pit by Denmark man Graeme Robertson went to the State Administrative Tribunal last year, after the City of Albany rejected the plan.

The SAT approval required the lime pit to meet 45 conditions.

“Most of the the conditions related to the roadworks, which unfortunately meant that we had to reconstruct Lake Saide North Road, of which there was 5.5km of road to reconstruct,” Mr Robsertson said.

“We have had to upgrade it to accommodate road trains to get the product off our property to the Lower Denmark Road.

“That has been quite a challenge.”

He said when seeking approval from the heavy haulage department of Main Roads WA, it was discovered about 15 per cent of the design was not on the road reserve.

“The existing road had gone over onto a couple of recreational reserves, so we had to redesign quite a lot of the road to go back onto the road reserve, which required additional consultation for flora and fauna,” he said.

“The flora report could only be done in October because that is when the rare orchids are in flower to be identified, so that was a bit of a delay.

“We also had to make sure we weren’t interfering with the assassin spider.

“We have now covered all of that.”

The road upgrades will start on April 1.

Great Southern Lime expected to be able to take orders from June.

While the development was controversial in the planning stages, he said people, especially farmers in the area who would benefit from the product, had been supportive.