The company behind an oil-drilling operation on Stewart Island which has horrified some residents says the proposal was developed following an "extensive process of consultation" with the local community.
Auckland-based Greymouth Petroleum Ltd has been granted consent to carry out petroleum exploration, and to drill a well site on private land on Horseshoe Bay Rd.
In a statement yesterday, the company said consultation included public meetings in Oban attended by residents and authorities, and it had received "great support" from the community.
Greymouth Gas supplied natural gas to industrial and commercial consumers and it had gas-fired power generation units available to use gas from its fields.
That might be of particular benefit to the Stewart Island community, the company said.
Rigging-up was under way yesterday with the Orange Tough rig which recently completed the drilling of a well in Greymouth's Turangi petroleum mining permit in Taranaki.
It was taken by barge from Bluff to Stewart Island.
It would be the first well drilled in the Great South Basin for 30 years and represented an "important next step" in the evaluation of the basin, Greymouth chairman Mark Dunphy said.
There was uncertainty about whether economic volumes of petroleum were to be found in traps in the Great South Basin.
Drilling of the Horseshoe-1 well within Greymouth's PEP 50122 permit area would provide valuable evidence in a test of the petroleum system along the northwestern flank of the basin.
Proof of petroleum generation and/or accumulation along that flank would increase the attractiveness of future exploration activity in PEP 50122 and throughout the basin, the company said.
Established in 2000, Greymouth Petroleum is a New Zealand owned and operated integrated petroleum production, exploration and development company.
It holds 10 oil and gas fields in Taranaki and, in addition, exploration interests in the Taranaki and Great South Basins.
In Chile, the company, through its 100% owned PetroMagallanes unit, holds oil and gas field interests through the Straits of Magellan.
