After 24 days of no fuel deliveries, Nelson finally had a shipment delivered at 01:28 ear;y this morning, 17th.
While, Wellington is now on 11 days since the last fuel was discharged, Port Taranaki is on day 18, Port Lyttelton, Christchurch, is on day 12 and Timaru is now on day 23.
We are now seeing Nelson, Lyttelton and Timaru on the list of ports that are having many days between deliveries of fuels, Bluff historically has been in the same situation already earlier this year.
Expected Fuels and delivery date's.
Please take a look at what is to come to the South Island.
An introduction to the events that are taking place with our Fuel Shipments today 11th April 2024
Before I get onto the main body of text, here is a brief introduction into what is going on with our shipping here in New Zealand, and no surprises here, this has been coming.
The BW Falcon. This vessel moored at Marsden Point on the 2nd, the furthest most northerly port in New Zealand after arriving from Singapore, the vessel departed on the 4th and it's destination was listed as Bluff, the furthest port in the South Island. Now the first thing I did ask myself, why, and at what cost? The ETA was listed as the 8th of April four days later.
In the mean time, the fuel shipping forecast was looking quite normal at the start of the month as we did have enough fuel delivered towards the end of March, and the records do show we met our target of 17/30 days, just above the 15 we would be looking for, the one tanker every two days, so everything was looking normal.
The forecast was starting to fill up, and we did already know that we do go through a period where each month there are not many vessels to list at the start of the month, it does go quiet.
However, the forecast list was not growing and the fuel being delivered at each of the other 9 ports around the north and south island was becoming sparse. (Marsden Point is the largest port at No 10 )
On the 4th of April, shipping was looking quite normal, even although some ports had no fuel shipments, and this again is expected, however by the 9th we had almost every port without any shipments of fuels, now again this is not the first time that I have recorded this event, and I did let everyone know about this, and so it was a matter of wait and see. By the 7th, Wellington had a vessel departing and that left every port in New Zealand empty except Bluff where the CSC Auspicious had just moored the day before on the 6th, and the BW Falcon in transit with an ETA of the 8th, and nearing port.
However, a few events and changes went on during the evening and night, on the 9th I recorded that the CSC Suspicious had Moored at Dunedin and the BE Falcon had moored at Bluff the evening before, the 8th, every other port was still empty with no shipment of fuels logged that day.
This brings us to today 11th of April
Marsden Point, the deepest port in New Zealand did have one tanker that did moor on the 10th and four yet to arrive later in the month, again, however every other port in New Zealand is now empty and has no fuel shipments to report, and here is what could become a problem.
Except Marsden Point, every other port around New Zealand is empty to the 11th, some just having vessels that have departed recently, however, some may be at a loss in the near future.
From the top down, Nelson will be 23 days between deliveries, Timaru will be 25 days between deliveries, Christchurch will be 13 days between deliveries, Bluff who just had a shipment will still have to wait 12 days before the next delivery and Dunedin at 9 day's. Again, some ports have already seen a long delay in fuel shipments, but there are three who stand out.
Nelson and Timaru, it should be noted that these ports have been recorded as going over the 20 days, and even reaching 22 day's without any fuel delivery, but 23 or 25, we are about to find out.
Christchurch at 13 days', this I am not sure about as this city does have a high population in NZ terms and I am not sure about this, I certainly have never seen this before, and so for the first time, we wait and see.
Why would you have a vessel travel the distance from the most northerly port in New Zealand, Marsden Point, all the way to the most southerly port, Bluff, when a vessel had already left the day before? One particular fuel may have been needed, but that is a guess.
Asphalt.
The Asphalt / Bitumen carrier, the Atlantic Asphalt has just arrived
from Portland Oregon USA and is now at anchor outside of port Tauranga.
The journey has taken 24 days to complete. From Tauranga. the vessels
will go forward to Port Lyttelton, and from there is will leave and head
to St Johns CA Canada. You have to ask, at what cost?
After 31 days with no fuel deliveries, Port Taranaki New Plymouth finally has a fuel tanker, the Forever Splendor at anchor outside of port, so much for safe and reliable fuel deliveries.
So, over the past few months we have had, Napier, Nelson, Timaru and Bluff go over a 21 day period without any fuel tanker deliveries, and in case you don't know, I record every fuel tanker that comes in to the country, and all of the ports where these tanker go, and I keep accurate records.
I was informed that Southland had to have fuel delivered from Nelson and Port Lyttelton Christchurch to meet the demands, that was the result of Bluff having no fuels delivered for 3 weeks.
And, Auckland, Northland Region where the fuels that this area need is stored at Marsden Point, did get near a deadline. The large tanker's that do come into Marsden Point only go there as they are oversize for any other port, now read further. Each VLC can discharge on average 120 million liters of fuels to Marsden point fuel storage, enough for 11 days to keep everything running, and well in the past 2 days it got to day 9 before the next fuel tanker came in, and you tell me that this is "fuel security".
Our fuel deliveries over the past 6 month did reach 95 vessels which is on average 15.8, which does meet the proposed 1 fuel tanker every 2 days average, , it's just the gaps that are causing concern, the storage amounts of what is in stock and the timing, is this enough? (if fact 95 x 2 equals 190 which is above the figures they gave, and in my records, could be a little short of what we need)