Whanganui
Wastewater treatment plant“The people out there have put up with hell for nine years,” said Anderson.Whanganui council hoping two projects will end wastewater plant odour issues2025Whitford, East Auckland
Lack of sewage treatment plant
In September, the Herald spoke to residents who said the smell of raw sewage was making them gag. “It’s revolting,” said Robyn Newman-Hall, who along with her partner Jim Brown were members of a vocal group of residents angry at a lack of progress building a new wastewater treatment plant.Receivers appointed at Auckland’s Whitford Manor Estate housing development after sewage row, low sales2025ŌpōtikiWastewater treatment plantShe described the odour as “a sickening smell like dead carcasses”.
Ōpōtiki’s mystery smell solved, but ‘sickening’ odour remains
2025Marton, Rangitīkei
Landfill
The judge referred to victim impact statements in which neighbours said they were embarrassed to invite friends to outdoor activities at their homes, that they were sometimes woken by the smell at night or had to live with doors and windows closed, and laundry hung out to dry sometimes had to be re-washed.Smelly dump attracts $202,500 in fines2024Seaview, Lower Hutt
Wastewater Treatment Plant
“The stench”, as locals call it, can be so odious, people have to dash between their car and house holding their breath, have stopped eating outside and are considering selling their homes to escape.
Living with ‘the stench’: the smelly New Zealand city with an air of despair
2024Porirua
Landfill
Most described the smells as a “rubbish bin”, followed by “rotten eggs”.
Could these new fans spell the end of Spicer Landfill’s smelly woes?
2024Cardinal West, Red Hills, Auckland
Temporary sewage storage
“It’s like Rotorua but a little bit more potent. It smells like poo,” said one woman, who rents a house with her partner and three children across the road from one of the tank farms.
Stink over trucking sewage from West Auckland housing development goes to court
2024Bromley, Christchurch
Compost plant
Rancid meat or the worst boiled cabbage imaginable! That’s how residents in the Christchurch suburb of Bromley are describing the rotting smell they’ve been putting up with for years, coming from a Christchurch City Council-owned Living Earth compost plant.
Christchurch compost plant stench makes residents sick
2024
Washdyke and northern Timaru
Unidentified source”We always talk about it. When there’s the smell, it’s just not nice. We have to leave our doors closed because it’s almost like a dead animal smell,” she said. Her main concern was for the customers, who were getting a free side of the sickening stench if they opted for al fresco seating.‘That place smells’: Investigation launched into ‘nasty, meaty’ stench in Timaru2024Hastings
Tannery
“It was so bad in summer that I would have to close the doors and windows because the smell would get into your house. You’d have to get your washing in” Wallis said.Odour from Hastings tannery increasing every year, nearby residents say2023Awatoto, just south of Napier
Animal waste products rendering plant
The odours identified included rotting meat, animal effluent and waste, as well as a bark-filter smell.
Hawke’s Bay Protein fined $13,000 for stinky discharge after spending $1m trying to fix problem
2023Taylorville, Greymouth
Landfill
A Taylorville resident who contacted the Greymouth Star on Thursday said the smell had been extreme in the past 10 days. The smell would “bring up your morning tea” and it had been a talking point in the neighbourhood.
West Coast Regional Council investigates ‘sickening’ smell
2022Bromley, Christchurch
Wastewater treatment plant
Resident Vickie Walker broke down when she spoke of how the smell has affected her. “I can’t work effectively or efficiently in my business and neither can my husband. We don’t get our sleep and we don’t relax. There are thousands like me suffering here,” she sobbed. On top of that smell, Bromley residents have also had to deal with the disgusting smell of decaying food waste from the city’s compost plant, for the past 13 years.Bromley locals call on council to remedy stench: ‘Do your job – make our health paramount’2022Thornbury, Southland
Fish waste processing plant
“It’s putrid — it makes you want to vomit sometimes. A rotten, stinking fish smell.”
Stench has residents demanding action
2022Ellerslie
Pet food manufacturing company
“Residents across the suburb of Ellerslie first started reporting the smell of rotten fish and meat back in November 2020, and they say they’re still being plagued by more than a year on.”
Something fishy going on in Auckland as factory odour plagues Ellerslie locals
2021Tauranga
Pet food manufacturing company
“The complainants describe having to move indoors to avoid the odour, closing windows and doors and wanting to move house.”
Tauranga pet food company Alpine Export NZ ordered to pay $70,000 fine
2021Mt Maunganui
Pet food manufacturing plant
“Ziwi Ltd was prosecuted by Bay of Plenty Regional Council for both odour and wastewater discharges in 2018 that were described by complainants as “putrid”, “rank” and “overpowering””
Pet food firm gets $66,000 fine for ‘offensive and objectionable odours’
2021Uruti, Taranaki
Compost and worm farming business
“The stench in the air was just so bad. It made us all cough, it burnt our eyes, it made our lungs feel very heavy and my children, who were in the car at the time, all suffered the same symptoms and one of them in particular got into coughing splutters, so we had to call an ambulance,” Bendall said.
Air quality review indicates link between compost site odour and illness
2021Hastings
Meat industry cartage
Staff from three businesses – The Warehouse, Wheel Plus and Hastings Honda – said people at their premises had been affronted by what was variously described as “a fetid sickening odour that smelt like rotten meat or fish”. It made staff feel nauseous, headachy and unable to eat their lunch. There had been numerous complaints about odour from the property between 2010 and 2018 and in February 2019 an abatement notice was issued directing the company to cease the discharge of offensive odour beyond the boundary of its property. Putrid stench of rotting meat hung over Hastings city centre putting many off their lunch2020Pukemiro
Landfill fire
“It was a toxic plastic smell that brought her “to the point of vomiting” and was so bad at night it had woken them up at times, she said.”Waikato dump fire burning since August: Locals report health problems2020Bromley, Christchurch
Unknown
For years residents have bemoaned the putrid pong, claiming the air is so bad they are trapped in their homes, forced to relentlessly wash their bodies and clothes to rid themselves of a smell they liken to a disgusting soup of rotten fish, bins and dead animals.
Tracking down the source of Bromley’s mysterious stench2020Tuakau, Waikato
Animal products processing plant
The court heard the stench was akin to rotten meat, stale water or raw sewage and had resulted in locals being physically sick and suffering throbbing headaches.
2019Waharoa, Waikato
Wastewater treatment plant
Residents near the factory have complained of a “putrid smell” that wafted as far away as Matamata, 6km up the road. They described a range of debilitating effects from having to keep doors and windows shut through to headaches and vomiting.
Dairy firm cops hefty fine for smell that caused sickness
2019Green Island, Dunedin
Landfill
“So offensive was the malodorous air yesterday morning that Green Island resident Tina Tunster was woken from her sleep by it.”
Crying foul over stink coming from landfill
2019Gibbston, Central Otago
Landfill
”The stench has been there for months, and it’s so bad that anybody – not just local travellers but international travellers – would be revolted by it because it’s so strong.”ORC ignores smell complaints – Laws2019Hororata
Animal rendering plant
“I’m used to country smells and have lived in the country for 30 years,” she said. “Bad smells don’t worry me but these ones are vomit-inducing.” The woman said she had to keep windows permanently shut, stopped going outside and avoided having friends over, and the smell seeped into her laundry.Stinking meat factory and body parts on the lawn cause years of hell for neighbour2018Havelock North
Mushroom farm
Krebs said just because there was a small number of complainants did not mean the other neighbouring residents were not affected by the stench, labelling the case “death by a thousand pongs”.
Te Mata Mushroom Company fined $26k for objectionable odours
2018Mosgiel
Animal rendering plant
“It’s not just a little bit of bad odour, it’s absolutely disgusting. The families living next to it, they go to get their washing in and it bloody stinks. The clothes smell worse than when they got them off the kids,” he said.Residents cry foul over ‘unbearable’ smell from plant2018Burnside, Dunedin
Animal rendering plant
Kenmure resident Ian Stewart said he was driving down Kaikorai Valley Rd recently and “dry retching” at the smell. “It’s because of the type of smell. It’s that real decaying smell.”
Gripes over ‘disgusting’ stench
2017Hokio, Horowhenua
Landfill
“It’s very invasive and noxious, the most appalling smell. It destroys people’s lifestyles and their pleasure of life,” he said.
2017Temuka
Wastewater treatment plant
“You have the shut the house up and turn off any air conditioning, otherwise the whole house reeks of… sewage. Clothes are starting to smell of this, and you can’t hang anything on the line to dry.”Pungent, revolting odour vexes some in Temuka2017Woolston, Christchurch
Gelatine factory
Complaints were from residents living in the wind pattern of the odour, who were catching whiffs of rotting meat.
Christchurch gelatine factory draws more complaints about odours
2017Waipukurau, Hawkes Bay
Several sources including a wastewater treatment plant
Jo Brabyn lives on Mt Herbert Rd, and said it had been happening almost every night and seemed to have worsened with winter approaching. “It’s a very strong, foul smell, it’s not sweet like silage, it’s a sewage smell.”
Foul odour gets up noses of Waipukurau residents
2017Southern suburbs, Wellington
Wastewater treatment plant
Owhiro Bay Residents’ Association spokeswoman Colleen Cox said the “sewage-gassy odour” varied, “from a six to a 10”.Stench of Wellington’s sewage wafts through suburbia2017Timaru
Meat processing plant
“I have been here for four years and this is the worst it has been. The other night, when it was a really sticky day, I tried to open the windows and the stench was out of this world. It turns your stomach.”Timaru residents’ noses put out of joint by smell2016Tahuna, South Dunedin
Wastewater treatment plant
“I came home on Thursday and it was that bad you could throw up.” Her message to council staff was: “You come and live here.”