Energy and Resources Minister Gerry Brownlee says the Maari Oil Field is proving a success story of the petroleum sector in New Zealand, having produced 6.5 million barrels of oil for export in its first year of production.

"The Maari Oil Field is making an important contribution to the New Zealand economy and development of the Taranaki region,” says Mr Brownlee.

Mr Brownlee will be attending an event at Okurukuru Function Centre in New Plymouth tonight to mark the commissioning of the Maari Oil Field a year ago. The Maari Oil Field is located about 80km off the South Taranaki coast.

“New Zealand is a fortunate country. We have significant petroleum reserves that, through the efforts of explorers and development of oil and gas fields, will make a significant contribution to the future prosperity of New Zealanders," he says.

“Congratulations to the joint venture partners and all those involved in seeing this project reach full commercial production.”

Covering approximately 34 square kilometres of the offshore Taranaki Basin, the Maari Oil Field is a joint venture operation involving international and local interests. These include OMV New Zealand Ltd, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Austrian-based OMV Group (69 per cent), Todd Maari Limited (16 per cent), Horizon Oil International Limited (10 per cent), and Cue Taranaki Pty Ltd (5 per cent).

Drilling of the Maari-1 exploration well commenced on 30 October 1998, which confirmed hydrocarbons in three geological areas. Subsequent development towards commercial production then began in the last quarter of 2008 and production of a light crude oil began in February 2009.

In 2008, oil was New Zealand's third-largest export earner. Last year, the Crown received nearly $1 billion from petroleum production, with $543 million being from royalty payments alone.

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