PORT MARLBOROUGH WINS KUPE CONTRACT

Origin Energy has announced a major milestone in the Kupe Gas Project in signing a formal agreement with Port Marlborough to locate the project’s spool base at Shakespeare Bay.

The spool base will enable the assembly of 30km of underwater piping - the first time a sub-sea gas pipeline has been laid in this way in New Zealand.

Mr Des Ashton, CEO Port Marlborough, described the contract as substantial. “This collaboration will bring employment and economic benefits to the Marlborough region and is a welcome boost to our investment programme in Shakespeare Bay,” he said.

The first piping is expected to arrive by sea within two weeks and the project is expected to take some six months, employing approximately 40 fabrication workers.
The large steel pipes, about 30cm in diameter, will be welded together into lengths about 400m long, then assembled into three individual 10km lengths. The lengths of pipe are then reeled onto the Apache pipe-laying vessel and transported to South Taranaki for laying on the seabed floor, linking the gas pipeline from the platform 30km offshore to the production station onshore, near Hawera.

As part of Port Marlborough’s increasing involvement in the oil and gas fields, 3000 tonnes of chain and anchor destined for the Tui Field was shipped through Shakespeare Bay earlier this year and other opportunities are currently being pursued.