6 Infrastructure
Ports
Port Nelson
Port Nelson lies at the head of Tasman Bay, in the shelter of Nelson Haven, a broad tidal expanse bounded by the Boulder Bank. The port is dredged to a guaranteed minimum depth of 9.8 metres, and the port facilities are situated on flat reclaimed land to the south of the harbour berths. The port is jointly owned by Nelson City Council and Tasman District Council, with each local authority holding 50 percent of the shares.
Forestry remains Port Nelson's major cargo, with the export of 599 000 tonnes of logs and 444 000 tonnes of MDF, timber and LVL. This equates to 40 percent of the throughput volume in the year ending June 2005. Log export volumes are expected to be flat over the next 10 years, while the volumes of processed forest products are projected by the port company to increase by 31 percent to 583 000 tonnes. In 2005, 59 percent of log exports went to Korea, 27 percent to Japan, and the bulk of the remainder to China.
Port Marlborough
Port Marlborough New Zealand Ltd manages shipping activities within Picton Harbour and Shakespeare Bay, and the barge unloading facility at Havelock.
The deep-water export port at Shakespeare Bay has a 200-metre wharf with a depth alongside of 15.3 metres at low tide. The Shakespeare Bay facility is currently New Zealand's deepest export berth. The quayside storage of 10 hectares of flat, open land adjacent to the berth can be accessed by road, rail and cargo shipping.
At present only logs are exported from this facility, with all sawn timber exports going through Port Nelson, approximately 1.5 hours by road from Blenheim. Sawn timber exports and possibly chip export facilities are potential developments for the port in the future.
In 2005, 71 percent of log exports went to Korea, and 29 percent to India through the newly established log export business, Zindia Ltd. This company has created a valuable outlet for larger industrial-grade logs.
Tug and barge services transport logs from forests in the Marlborough Sounds to Picton and Havelock ports for further transport to local mills for processing or for export as logs. On a few occasions logs have been barged to the North Island from the outer Marlborough Sounds.
Road transport
Marlborough and Nelson forests are well serviced by state highway and local authority roads. The forestry industry has also established a very extensive forest roading infrastructure.
The funding of local road upgrades at time of harvest is an issue that the industry and the local roading authorities are continuing to work through. The Blenheim office of Transit New Zealand (called Marlborough Roads) is contracted to manage state highways and local roads within Marlborough. They have been successful in obtaining "Alternatives to Road"(ATR) funding from central government for some of the log barging operations in the Marlborough Sounds. This has helped reduce the impact on the Port Underwood road.
Rail transport
The main trunk line passes through the eastern part of the region, linking Picton with the West Coast through Christchurch, and with the North Island by the interisland ferry service. There is no rail link in Nelson.
Spring Creek, 22 kilometres south of Picton, is the loading (and pricing) point for forest produce leaving the region by rail. Forest produce carried by rail is mostly sawn timber, with smaller quantities of MDF mostly for North Island markets. There is potential to rail logs between Marlborough and Canterbury.
Energy
At present wood residues generate about 4.5 per cent of New Zealand's total primary energy supply. Combustion (burning) is the most common method used in New Zealand to generate energy from wood, with an estimated 340 gigawatt hours (GWh) of electricity and 8,700 GWh of heat produced from wood residues each year.
Wood residues provide 50 to 55 percent of the New Zealand forest industry's energy consumption. Electricity provides about 25 percent, and the balance comes from gas, coal and oil.
Any new processing development in Marlborough, or any significant expansion of existing processing plants, will need to consider the availability of electricity and other energy sources, as well as the transmission line capacity from the national grid. A large wood processing complex could use about 20 megawatts (MW).
In 2004 the the maximum demand for electricity from all users in the Nelson/Marlborough region was 190 MW. This is projected to increase to 256 MW by 2015. Installed generation capacity in the region is low (46 MW) compared with demand. No new generation capacity has been committed in this period, although several possibilities have been discussed.
Contact for Enquiries
Policy Adviser
Pastoral House
MAF Policy
PO Box 2526
Wellington 6140
NEW ZEALAND
Fax: +64 4 894 0741
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