Incentives urged to boost exploration for gas fields

New Zealand should have enough gas to meet demand until 2016, a geologist and exploration expert told the NZ energy summit yesterday.

Mac Beggs, who has worked for BP North America, told the conference in Wellington that beyond that, demand could only be met by new discoveries or other energy sources such as imported liquid natural gas (LNG).

Previously it was thought that the rapid depletion of the Maui gasfield meant New Zealand would be running out of natural gas by 2012. The addition comes from a revision of Maui's resources and the Turangi fields.

Beggs, now managing director of Wellington company Geosphere, said the best hope after 2016 was undiscovered finds such as onshore at Taranaki and off the west of the North Island.

But these would depend on offering more incentives to explore.

The country was now at a "critical juncture," and market and policy signals were not yet sufficient to entice exploration investment to do the work.

The discovery that Maui was running out had shaken the energy sector and the Government, resulting in increased investment and several finds, but it was not enough, he said.

In the past, companies had shown little interest in exploration outside Taranaki. But new frontiers were opening off Canterbury and the North Island's east coast and there had been limited drilling off Wairarapa and western Southland.

Disincentives included increased costs for exploration and a drop in prospective profit if it took a company too long to get into the energy system.

However, Beggs said, importing LNG would lessen the incentive for finding indigenous gas.

- NZPA