On Tuesday morning, Pohokura operator Shell Exploration New Zealand announced the “major milestone” of having achieved first gas, and associated condensate, through the onshore production station at Motunui, north of New Plymouth.
The gas and condensate started flowing through the production station for the first time late Monday afternoon.
SENZ said commissioning of the production station would continue over the coming few weeks.
Early this month, contractors formally handed over the finished production station and SENZ started plant commissioning using Maui gas from the nearby Oaonui-Huntly Maui pipeline.
The installation of the 415-tonne jacket and 155t topsides module about 8km off the Motunui coast was continuing, with the jack-up Ensco Rig 56 scheduled to soon start drilling the more northern six planned offshore wells, said SENZ.
Those wells were expected to come onstream over the coming year.
Pohokura gas is being fed into the North Island high-pressure gas reticulation network to customers including major downstream players Contact Energy and Genesis Energy for use in their Auckland, Huntly and Taranaki gas-fired power stations.
Pohokura condensate is being piped to storage tanks at Omata near Port Taranaki, New Plymouth, for shipping to domestic and overseas refineries.
Although SENZ has not recently released official expected flow rates, it has told the Commerce Commission it anticipates full production from the 750-petajoule field to be about 60-80PJ per year.
The Pohokura partners are Shell NZ (48%), Todd Energy (26%) and Austrian firm OMV (26%).
After completing work at Pohokura, Ensign Rig 41 - the biggest land-based rig yet to operate in New Zealand - left the country for Thailand in June.
The rig, which has a 60m derrick, set several records for the length of wells drilled in New Zealand during its Pohokura campaign.
The Pohokura-1 and 2 wells both exceeded 6500m in total length, surpassing the old record of 5661m set by a development well drilled in the Shell Exploration NZ-Todd Energy owned onshore Kapuni gas field in south Taranaki several years ago.
