Tarawera River

The Tarawera Falls

The Tarawera River is a river in the Bay of Plenty region in the North Island of New Zealand.

He springs from Lake Tarawera first running in a northeasterly direction across the northern flank of the volcano Mount Tarawera, past the town of Kawerau. Then he turns to the north and ends six kilometers west of Edgecumbe in the Bay of Plenty.

The river has a length of 65 km, a discharge of 26 m³ / s and a catchment area of 906 km ² (measured to Awakaponga ).

In the area of ​​effluent from the Lake Tarawera in New Zealand, the known waterfalls are Tarawera Falls. These emerge from a rock wall, as the river runs a bit far underground before.

Since the 1990s, locals signs reading "Black Drain" ( " black drain " ) on time.

The river due to water pollution from farms, sewage and surface water initiated a dark color. However, the main influence comes from the effluents from paper and pulp mills. This initiated in 1997 more than 160 million liters of industrial wastewater per day. Since 1998, the sight of the river and the color in the lower reaches have improved, mainly due to lower pollution by Tasman factory. 2006, the oxygen content had again reached a level that could survive in the fish, but the water was still dark.