Airport investor lays complaint

An investor has complained to the financial markets regulator and the New Zealand stock exchange over the time it took Refining NZ to signal problems with its pipeline to Auckland.

The Marsden Point refinery posted about an issue with the 170-kilometre pipe at Ruakaka, near Whangarei, on Facebook on Thursday but it was not until Sunday that the full extent of the issue was revealed.

Shares in the refining company fell 3.63 per cent yesterday, after it made a disclosure to the NZX.

Auckland Airport investor Peter Wakeman has reportedly complained to the NZX and Financial Markets Authority (FMA) about the delay in the announcement, concerned people were trading shares without full knowledge of what was going on.

An NZX spokeswoman said it was engaging with Refining NZ.

‘‘NZX is unable to comment on specific complaints, and is therefore unable to provide any further comment at this time.’’

FMA spokesman Andrew Park said continuous disclosure issues were primarily the NZX’s responsibility.

‘‘We understand that the NZX has engaged with NZ Refining in accordance with their standard procedures. We treat complaints in confidence so we can’t comment on that.’’

Refining NZ said it was expecting to be able to resume supplies of jet fuel from Marsden Point to Wiri some time between midday on Sunday and the following Tuesday.

‘‘From that point we estimate it will take another 30 hours for the jet fuel to settle, for recertification to be obtained, and to transport to the airport for final use,’’ the statement said.

‘‘Our repair team has made good progress on the dewatering of the first of two pits required to weld stopples – internal plugs – in place in the pipeline.

‘‘Construction of the second stopple pit has started. We are in the process of hazard assessing of the first stopple before it can be welded in place.’’

It said testing undertaken by Refining NZ and the Northland Regional Council indicated no contamination of the surrounding waterways.

Andrew McNaught, an industry spokesman representing the customers of the refinery, said the industry was working to minimise the effects of the pipeline outage.

‘‘Airlines at Auckland Airport continue to operate on their 30 per cent fuel allocations, though they have flexibility around how they use that allocation over the first five days to enable further route planning,’’ he said.

‘‘We are acutely aware that the refinery’s pipeline outage is impacting our airline customers and, while the issue is beyond our control, we apologise to those people who are inconvenienced.’’

Trucks were being used to deliver petrol and diesel into Auckland from alternative locations.

‘‘The refinery is continuing to produce fuel and two dedicated coastal shipping vessels have full delivery programmes of petrol, diesel, jet fuel and marine fuel oil into New Zealand ports,’’ McNaught said.

One of the two coastal vessels, the Matuku, is loaded with 36,000 tonnes of fuel and is heading to Mount Maunganui to discharge.

The other vessel, the Kakariki, is loading at the refinery and will be delivering jet fuel to Lyttelton and Dunedin.

An import vessel loaded with jet fuel and petrol is due to arrive in New Zealand early next week.

‘‘Tanks are full at the refinery and key ports and the coastal and import vessels are now routinely topping them up. This is important because access to fuel storages in Wellington and Christchurch airports provide airlines with some refuelling contingency.’’