New Zealand now gets almost all of its petrol, diesel and jet fuel as already refined product imported from overseas refineries, mainly in Asia, especially Korea and Singapore.

Quick Scoop: Where NZ Fuel Comes From

  • New Zealand used to import crude oil and refine some of it at Marsden Point in Northland.
  • Marsden Point stopped refining in 2022 and was converted to an import terminal, so NZ moved to a nearly 100% refined fuel import model.
  • NZ does produce some crude oil from fields in Taranaki, but it is high‑quality “sweet, light” crude that is mostly exported because the old refinery was not designed for it.

Main countries NZ now buys fuel from

Recent trade data and analysis show a clear shift to large Asian refineries.

[7] [1][7] [1][7] [1]
Source country/region Role in NZ fuel supply
South Korea Largest supplier of refined fuel to NZ by value (around half of fuel import value over the year to March 2025).
Singapore Second‑largest source of refined fuel; major regional trading and refining hub.
Other Asian refineries Smaller shares from other large refineries in Asia as needed, taking advantage of scale and lower costs.
Taranaki (NZ crude) Produces 10–20 million barrels of sweet light crude per year, mostly exported to Australia and Singapore rather than used domestically.

Big picture: energy vs fuel

  • Around 60–70% of NZ’s total energy use still comes from fossil fuels (oil products, gas and coal), with the rest from renewables like hydro, geothermal and wind.
  • But when people ask “where does NZ get fuel from?” they usually mean transport fuels (petrol, diesel, jet), and those are now overwhelmingly imported refined products from overseas refineries rather than made in NZ.

In short: NZ’s cars, trucks and planes now mostly run on fuel refined in big Asian plants (especially in Korea and Singapore), shipped in as finished product, while NZ’s own crude oil largely gets exported.

TL;DR: New Zealand imports almost all its petrol, diesel and jet fuel as refined product, mainly from South Korea and Singapore, while exporting most of its own Taranaki crude oil.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.