New Zealand's petroleum basins
New Zealand has 18 sedimentary basins with known or potential hydrocarbons located both onshore and offshore including deep water beneath the country's extensive continental shelf.
There is evidence that petroleum generation and migration has, and is taking place in many of these basins. This is reflected in both commercial and sub-commercial discoveries, and hydrocarbon shows in exploration wells. The petroleum systems present in these basins share many common characteristics, due to the stratigraphic distribution of potential source, reservoir, and seal rocks.
However, the diversity of tectonic environments in New Zealand has produced differences in the timing of maturation, migration history and trapping styles.
For more comprehensive information read our New Zealand petroleum basins booklets:
NZ Petroleum Basins - Part One [PDF 7MB]
NZ Petroleum Basins - Part Two [PDF 5.5MB]
Petroleum Exploration Data Pack
The Petroleum Exploration Data Pack contains a broad representation of publicly available data on a portable hard drive. It features a large selection of data, interpretation projects, reports and studies and is updated annually.
Read more about the Petroleum Exploration Data Pack.