One of the most concerning issues we are currently facing as a nation is the existential threat to fuel security and fuel supply.

We have seen the immediate effects of being isolated and totally dependent on international supply lines of oil and gas, and the dramatic and costly effects it has on New Zealand’s sustainability, planning, and future certainty.

We are totally susceptible to the geopolitical choices made by other nations in the cost, supply, and certainty we need as a country to survive, today and into the future.

This needs to change.

Other parties want to ‘tinker around the edges’ with solar panel plans – which does next to nothing to address fuel and gas insecurity; we say New Zealand has one of the greatest potentials in the world to have ownership of our own supply of oil and natural gas.New Zealand potentially holds Norway-scale energy prospects in our offshore basins and that potential has never been accurately surveyed or characterised with modern tools.

If we identify those reserves in our basins, we will have the ability to utilise the natural resources we have to make our country secure, prosperous, and to build real resilience.

Analysis shows that the odds of New Zealand having a major commercial discovery in our basins is well above ninety percent. And most likely, we hold something that would be transformational for our country, and potentially the equivalent of Norway in scale.

We can no longer ignore this potential we have in our deep sea basins.

This is about future-proofing New Zealand in a world of uncertainty.

This is about making the investment now to build fuel security and fuel resilience for New Zealand’s future. We cannot afford to wait any longer.

New Zealand First will be campaigning on an initial investment of $1 billion over the term of government, into a ‘National Subsurface Development Survey’ - to identify and create one national dataset across energy, geothermal and CO₂ storage sites, and create the framework for New Zealand to develop those sites, extract those resources, and build our country’s resilience and prosperous economic future.

New Zealand has ten prospective basins with world-class potential, the Great South Basin has had eight wells drilled in its entire history and the deeper horizons are untested. The existing seismic data is two technology generations old, covering only a fraction of our subsurface inheritance.

Namibia has made the discoveries that can now transform its country and economy after a focused data acquisition campaign which began in 2022.
In under a decade, Guyana went from first discovery to South America’s third-largest producer.

We have that potential here in New Zealand.

Since the conflict in the Strait of Hormuz, capital is now moving into politically stable basins elsewhere in the world, and for it to move it needs modern data. The reality is, survey costs right now sit at structural lows.

The policy is a game changer.

Under this plan we would expect to see first results within twelve months and convert that potential into knowledge that global capital can bid against. This is at a time when we are in the midst of the largest basin-capital movement in a generation.

Within the first twenty-four months the highest-ranked basins will have surveying completed with wells identified, and the first physical proof that reserves exist.

Potentially within just six years, we will have a pathway forward for our country to own and control our own supply of energy that we can use domestically and export around the world.

New Zealand First would utilise these resources to transform our economy and our future.

We would set fair terms while explorers carry the risk of proving the fields — and over time place a royalty well above 50% on all extractions as production matures.

We would use these finds to end the gas shortfalls that have sent power prices through the roof, and to drive fuel costs down locally, export oil and gas, and establish a Norwegian-model sovereign fund.

We will transform any discovery into permanent national wealth and invest in regional industry.

New Zealand has natural resources that are there, ready to be utilised to transform our country.

This is about New Zealand’s economic sovereignty and security, we cannot wait and continue to be beholden to international interests and decision making.

We will find those energy reserves, we will extract them, and what we find, we will use to make our country prosperous again.