Tamarind Taranaki: From legal loophole to cleanup black hole

Already in a battle for survival, Tamarind Taranaki's production was shut down this week after oil was spotted in the sea near the Umuroa. Photo / Supplied

COMMENT:

By any measure, Tamarind Taranaki's situation is grim.

Having bought what was for a time New Zealand's biggest-producing oil field, Tui in 2017, an unsuccessful drilling campaign earlier this year has left major debts, creating headaches in the industry and within the machine of government.

Although there has been no official confirmation of the exact sum, its debts run into the hundreds of millions of dollars, and there is little cash at hand.

According to notes written at a creditors meeting held in New Plymouth this month, the mobile phones of its staff have been cut off because of unpaid bills. The company's directors and local operations are not responding to questions.

Dozens of companies are owed money, and effectively, so are taxpayers.

If Tamarind cannot fulfil its obligations to clean up the Tui oil fields - its only real asset - then the costs of closing down and cleaning up the wells will fall on the Crown.

Those costs would exceed $100 million.

Although Tamarind's parent company, Kuala Lumpur-headquartered Tamarind Resources, has provided a guarantee to the Crown, at least one major international creditor has said publicly it does not expect to be paid.

BW Offshore, which owns the floating production vessel, Umuroa, which has been gathering oil from the Tui fields since 2007, said it was already preparing to leave in early 2020, as it warned investors it faced a hit of up to US$23m to its earnings.

If the company did not already have enough trouble, a sheen spotted in the sea near its oil production vessel last week prompted an investigation which revealed a gash into the outer layer of one of the pipes which carries oil from the sea floor to the floating oil production vessel above.

As Singaporean-based administrators battle to convince key creditors to continue to support and supply it at least in the short term, the Environmental Protection Authority ordered it to immediately halt production.

While it is possible the regulator could be convinced to allow oil to start flowing again within days once check are completed, Energy Minister Megan Woods has made it clear she has sought specific assurances that health and safety standards are maintained when the company is in distress.

With accountants appointed by a lender in charge of an oil company with unpaid bills and limited production, regulators will be paying close attention to ensure corners are not being cut on safety.

Nevertheless, the battle to avoid immediate liquidation continues.

Borrelli Walsh, the international restructuring firm, hopes to restart production to squeeze whatever oil they can for a few more weeks or months.

One industry source predicted this week that allowing it to do this for even a few months would be expected to generate only a few million dollars cash, in the absence of a strong rise in crude oil prices.

The Tui oil production facility, the FPSO Umuroa. Photo / Rob Tucker

The greater hope is to attract a backer to invest in more drilling to allow it to produce the few million barrels of extra oil the company believes is still in the three fields in the Tui oil fields, which may allow it to trade its way out of trouble.

The odds appear to be stacked heavily against this.

Not only does it rely on Tamarind seeing something in Tui that others in the industry - including the former owners of the fields - did not, it assumes that New Zealand's oil industry will agree to even more exposure to a company with a short history and an uncertain future.

Unless it can pull off an unlikely recovery, exactly how Tamarind got in so much trouble so quickly is likely to be the subject of considerable scrutiny as events unfold.

Tamarind arrived in New Zealand in 2017, buying the local assets of AWE, an Australian producer which was then fighting to stave off a takeover as its share price sunk.

AWE's former partners, Pan Pacific and New Zealand Oil & Gas, quickly sold out. The nature of the sale should have left Tamarind in a position to fulfil its obligations, with the purchase price for the interests far exceeded by the US$30m cash left by the former owners to help cover the cost of the clean up.

By acquiring AWE, Tamarind exposed a legal loophole in the Crown Minerals Act.

The purchase meant it immediately became operator of the Tui fields, without having to go through the regulatory checks which are meant to establish they have the technical and financial nous to produce oil.

While it is true that officials at the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) quickly pushed to change the law to prevent it happening again, it is less clear whether the concern was theoretical or whether they were concerned with Tamarind's capabilities in particular.

Energy Minister Megan Woods recently sought assurances about the Crown's exposure to a troubled Malaysian oil company which she said exposed a "giant loophole" in the Crown Minerals Act when it arrived in New Zealand. Photo / File

Officials flew to Malaysia to conduct due diligence on the company.

If they were concerned when Tamarind arrived - which they were powerless to prevent - they missed a chance later which may have lessened the impact Tamarind could have now.

Tamarind later used a different subsidiary, Tamarind NZ Onshore, to buy onshore assets of TAG Oil, a Canadian oil company which was exiting New Zealand.

That deal was approved by government officials midway through 2019. Here the Government had the chance to stymie the company when it applied to assume control of a string of onshore oil permits, but apparently was confident enough in Tamarind's operations that it could let the sale go through.

People in the industry are speculating that Tamarind may have been using cash which was meant to be designated for cleanup liabilities to drill new wells and buy new permits.

MBIE is refusing to discuss the situation while it is unfolding, beyond confirming it has made a claim as a creditor.

The Government has not yet commented on its confidence in whether the guarantee from the Malaysian parent company has any value.

But the company in such deep trouble only a few months after it was allowed to expand suggests the risks of the company and the strength of its balance sheet were overlooked by the regulators.