Operator Origin Energy yesterday said the Apache, operated by lead contractor Technip, had completed the final stages of laying the umbilical and pipeline and was heading back to Britain to other projects in the North Sea.

The Aberdeen-based vessel, one of the most advanced of its kind in the world, is a reel-lay barge – a type not previously seen in New Zealand.

It laid the 30km of Kupe pipeline and umbilical more easily and quickly, with much less downtime because of bad weather, than an ordinary barge would have done, Origin said.

The vessel first laid the umbilical – which it picked up from Corpus Christi in the United States en route to New Zealand – from near the south Taranaki coast to the Kupe platform.

It then headed to Picton, near the top of the South Island, where it loaded previously welded sections of the 12-inch diameter products pipeline, transported them north, and laid them in the same trench as the umbilical.

“The laying of the pipeline marks another major achievement for the Kupe gas project,” Origin Kupe project director Peter Ashford said.

“The three 10-kilometre sections of pipeline have been laid quickly, without any serious delays.”

The jack-up Ensco Rig 107, which is batch-drilling three development wells in the Kupe central field area, has drilled the Kupe South-8 well to its target depth of 3429m and is over halfway with the Kupe South-6 and 7 wells.

The Kupe partners are operator Origin (50%), integrated energy company Genesis Energy (31%), New Zealand Oil & Gas (15%), and Mitsui E&P NZ (4%).