John Carnegie: Energy Resources Aotearoa CEO on oil and gas exploration applications reopening

Oil and gas exploration applications have reopened for the first time since the 2018 ban.

Companies can now apply for new prospecting and exploration permits anywhere in the country - not just onshore Taranaki.

An open market application pathway's also being introduced to allocate new permits, in addition to the current competitive tender process.

Energy Resources Aotearoa chief executive John Carnegie says there's concerns among investors about the ongoing certainty of this, given the backlash from the opposition.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Right from today, oil and gas being officially gone. There's
a new faster pathway that's been announced as well that
you can go and explore on. The first application was
actually put in less than two hours after the process
reopened at midnight, which is good news if you're in
the business. John Carnegie is with US Energy Resources. Are here?

Speaker 2 (00:15):
Hey?

Speaker 1 (00:16):
John?

Speaker 2 (00:17):
Yep? Good afternoon.

Speaker 1 (00:18):
Do you know who this applicant is? What do we
know about them?

Speaker 2 (00:22):
No? No, that's obviously confidential. Good a minister in the ministry.
But given the time that they put the application in,
hopefully it's from someone offshore.

Speaker 1 (00:33):
You'd hope. So how worried will they be about labor
and the Greens?

Speaker 2 (00:39):
Oh look, ongoing policy certainty is critical to investors, and
so that will certainly be a factor that investors will
weigh up the likelihood of another policy reversal. And you
know that's just not helpful.

Speaker 1 (01:00):
How long realistically, let's say this applicant is successful, they're
allowed to go and explore. Let's say they find something.
How long realistically between application searching and extracting?

Speaker 2 (01:11):
Oh look, it's interesting because the lengthy timelines proposed by
groups like Greenpeace actually aren't grounded in reality, In fact,
the arithmetic nonsense because even recent history shows that the
fields can be brought to market quickly. And this is
even offshore. Offshore. Pohakura took six years from discovery to production,

(01:34):
while some other offshore developments were as short as free
and onshore. Of course it's even faster. The Turingi field
was producing within a year. So look where there were
longer delays in the past, that was because of Maui,
a globally significant find which was meeting almost all of
New Zealand's needs at the time. So there was absolutely

(01:55):
no urgency to rushing the other developments to market. And
I think the counter point liners today's situation is very
very different. We face a significant gap between supplying demands.
We've got an energy shortage and that means that any
discoveries would be developed much more quickly to meet that demand.

Speaker 1 (02:16):
John, appreciate your time. John Carnegie's with US Energy Resources
out here all right. For more from Hither Duplessy Alan Drive,
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