A convoy of citizens, fighting the closure of Marsden Point Oil Refinery, has arrived at Marsden Point this afternoon.
Vehicles from around the North Island left Silverdale at about 2pm heading for Whangarei Heads.
The protest and a planned occupation aim to stop the destruction of the refinery, regain the refinery and evolve the refinery as a national asset for the future, with a constitution in place to protect energy independence.
The government has been warned that closing the country’s only refinery will make New Zealand dependent on imported, expensive and inferior oil products.
The $250m shutdown has been on the cards for some time.
SPIIND Industrial Engineering managing director Paul Hebberd said today he could not give any information about the stage of decommissioning the plant or the timescale of the project. He referred the NZ News Alliance to the refinery, that was unavailable for comment.
Oil refining operations stopped at the end of last month, and the site became an import-only fuel terminal on April 1.
Several hundred jobs are expected to be lost over the next two years.
‘Secure Marsden’ movement organiser Brad Flutey says it is madness to close the refinery, particulary at this time of geo-political instability.
He says the closure process started between 2010 to 2013 when maintenance was neglected with the long term aim of closing the refinery:
“Now there’s a rush to pull equipment down that isn’t in disrepair, ripping it out in such a way that it will be too expensive to restart.”
He warned that conflict in Ukraine and instability in the Asia-Pacific, that could affect transport channels, will make New Zealand wish that we had our own refinery.
“If we don’t stop the destruction crews this week, we risk our energy independence”, he said.”
The refinery stopped making bitumen 18 months ago.
“Imported bitumen is of very poor quality and I’m told that operators have been trying to further refine the bitumen. It ends up costing three times as much and explains why our roads are in such bad shape”, Flutey says.
The move to close the refinery has been justified by a volatility in refining margins over recent years, with benefits seen for shareholders and the country’s investment in a low carbon future.
A petition with 18,200 signatures has been presented to parliament. The petition requests that the House of Representatives declare the Marsden Point Oil Refinery a nationally strategic asset and require the government to purchase the shares from private owners.
But Flutey says the petition is “just a piece of paper”:
“We got good numbers of signatories but awareness is not as widespread as it should be. We need to increase public awareness.”
The refinery, built in the 1960s, is owned by Refining NZ, rebranded to Channel Infrastructure.
It refines crude oil that is imported on behalf of its customers - BP, Z Energy, Mobil. Those oil companies dominate the shareholding – 46 percent.
About 15 percent of the oil refined at Marsden Point comes from Taranaki. The rest of the crude is from the Middle East.
Whangārei police are at the site.
Flutey says he supports police being present and taking responsible for ensuring nobody does anything unlawful.