The first of two new oil tankers begins service this month in the North Island, to deliver refined petroleum around the country and its maiden visit to Dunedin is pencilled in for early next month.
Matuku replaces the tanker Torea, while in South Korea a second unnamed vessel is being designed and will eventually replace Kakariki, which has been plying its route to Dunedin's upper harbour oil jetty berth for the past 18 years.
Kakariki's replacement is scheduled to arrive in New Zealand about December next year.
Silver Fern Shipping, a member of the ASP Ship Management Group, will "time charter'' Matuku long term to Coastal Oil Logistics, which delivers petroleum products from Refining NZ, at Marsden Point, to New Zealand's ports.
Refining NZ's shareholders are BP Oil New Zealand, Mobil Oil New Zealand and Z Energy Group.
Coastal Oil Logistics chief executive Jon Kelly said Matuku and Kakariki's replacement would become the most modern and efficient fleet operating on New Zealand's coast.
"Matuku will be substantially more fuel-efficient than Torea, and there will be a large reduction in emissions as a result of that efficiency,'' he said.
He said Kakariki's replacement was in the final design phase and steel was due to be cut at the South Korean yard later this year.
The vessels had been designed to increase efficiency, decrease emissions and meet New Zealand's trading conditions.
Kakariki's replacement, a second 50,000 deadweight combined products/bitumen eco tanker, will be constructed for ASP Group by Hyundai Mipo shipyard in Ulsan, South Korea.
•Matuku is the Maori name of a native New Zealand bird, also known as the Australasian bittern, an endangered bird inhabiting wetlands in New Zealand and Australia.
