Capacity boost for oil pipeline

By PAULA OLIVER



The 170km pipeline carrying fuel from the country's only oil refinery, at Marsden Pt, to Auckland is to be upgraded to meet growing demand from the country's largest city.

The New Zealand Refining Company, a publicly listed company owned mostly by the four big oil firms, said yesterday that it would spend $8 million installing extra pumping capacity at Wellsford.

A new pumping station would also be built near Huapai, north-west of Auckland City, for which resource consent had already been granted.

The Auckland pipeline, first used in 1986 after it cost $55 million to set up, was initially able to pump 1.5 million tonnes of oil products each year from Marsden Pt to Wiri.

It was upgraded in 1999 when $13 million was spent installing a pumping station at Wellsford. That increased the pumping capacity to 2 million tonnes a year - or 43 per cent of the total refining production.

The upcoming changes will increase the volume of fuel being transported by 20 per cent to 2.4 million tonnes.

Refining company general manager Thomas Zengerly said the increase meant Auckland's growing demand could be met by the pipeline rather than by road and sea.

That would mean road congestion was not increased. Already the fuel being transported is equal to more than 50,000 truck movements, or an average of 140 trucks a day.