End of an era: Northland's Marsden Pt Oil Refinery gets last crude ship visit

The Tom Ingeborg docked at Marsden Pt Oil Refinery with the final delivery of crude oil ever on Tuesday - 60 years after the refinery first opened. Photo / Tania Whyte

It's the end of an era. After 60 years of operation the last ship has docked delivering crude oil to the Marsden Pt Oil Refinery.

The Tom Ingeborg docked at Marsden Pt yesterday with the final delivery of crude oil. No other ships are scheduled before the refinery closes on April 1.

A new company - Channel Infrastructure - will take over the site, which will import refined fuel.

The refinery's shareholders voted overwhelmingly in August for the change - with the new entity known as Channel Infrastructure - to go ahead because of what it said was a glut of fuel supplies globally, combined with the impact of Covid-19 on refinery output, pipeline fees and plummeting demand for fuel.

The number of workers at the site is expected to drop from 300 to 60, with hundreds of contracting jobs and services from associated businesses in wider Northland also likely to be cut.

Refining NZ CEO Naomi James said: "The final crude ship marks an important milestone in the closure of the refinery. After 60 years as Refining NZ, we are now only a few weeks away from transition to Channel Infrastructure, and our focus is on the safe shutdown of the refinery, and on supporting our team through this period while we look to manage the additional impacts of Covid-19.

''We look back on our past with pride in the role we've played in supplying New Zealand with the fuel it needs. And we look to the future with confidence that our new business will continue to have a critical role to play in keeping New Zealand moving for generations to come."

The refinery closure has led to fears that fuel prices will rise further and that the country will be at the mercy of overseas distributors to get its refined fuels.