NZ First has pledged to put an initial $1 billion into a national survey fund for oil and gas exploration in deep-sea basins around New Zealand, presenting the policy as a fuel security measure (RNZ).

Leader Winston Peters announced the policy at the party's campaign launch, saying fuel security and supply was one of the most concerning issues facing New Zealand. Peters said the country potentially held Norway-scale energy prospects that had never been properly surveyed, and that within six years New Zealand could have a pathway to own and control its own energy supply (RNZ).

The party's proposed royalty regime — the share of revenue the government takes from companies that extract oil or gas — would place a royalty above 50 percent on all extractions once production matured (RNZ).

Greenpeace chief executive Russel Norman said the billion-dollar pledge should instead be spent on renewable electricity generation. Norman described the fund as a gamble that would not guarantee lower power prices (RNZ).

Norman said demand for oil and gas in New Zealand and worldwide was dropping, pointing to the electrification of transport in China (RNZ).

National energy spokesperson Simeon Brown noted that Peters and Shane Jones had supported a ban on oil and gas exploration when they were in government with Jacinda Ardern (RNZ).

According to Greenpeace, New Zealand spent around $7 billion importing petrol and diesel for land transport in 2025 (Greenpeace). The organisation says the country's electricity system is already mostly powered by renewable energy such as hydro, while around 60 percent of total energy use still comes from fossil fuels (Greenpeace).

The policy revives a fault line that has run through New Zealand politics since 2018, when the Labour-led government banned new oil and gas exploration everywhere except onshore Taranaki. Brown's response points to the coalition dynamics at play: Peters and Jones sat inside that government, and are now campaigning to reverse the ban. That record gives opponents a line of attack and would likely feature in coalition negotiations if NZ First holds the balance of power after the election.

Peters' framing draws on Norway's model, where the state takes a direct stake in petroleum resources and channels royalties into a sovereign wealth fund — a large state-owned investment portfolio built from oil revenue. The proposed royalty rate above 50 percent would sit at the high end of international comparisons. Whether the geological premise holds is a separate question. Peters' claim that New Zealand's deep-sea basins have never been properly surveyed would need testing against existing prospectivity work carried out by New Zealand Petroleum and Minerals and its predecessor agencies.

Norman's counter-argument rests on a different reading of where energy security lies. Greenpeace's position is that the $1 billion would deliver more for fuel security if directed into renewable generation, given the electricity system is already largely renewable and transport electrification is reducing demand for imported liquid fuels. The $7 billion annual import bill for petrol and diesel gives that argument political weight, though the scale of investment needed to materially shift the transport fleet's energy source extends well beyond a single billion-dollar fund.

The six-year timeline Peters cited for a pathway to energy sovereignty is notable for its brevity. Deep-sea exploration, appraisal, and development cycles typically run well beyond that horizon, even where commercial discoveries are made. The pledge conflates survey work with production outcomes — the policy would fund seismic and geological surveying, not extraction itself. Royalties would only flow once production matured, which under most industry timelines would fall outside the six-year window Peters referenced.

The broader context here is that the policy reads as a positioning statement rather than a near-term spending commitment. NZ First is signalling where it would push in negotiations, and the $1 billion figure sets a benchmark for what it would ask of a future government. The royalty regime is the element most likely to attract industry attention, since it would directly affect the economics of any future extraction.

Both sides are trading on the same underlying concern: New Zealand's reliance on imported liquid fuels. The disagreement is about the remedy. Peters points to domestic oil and gas resources as the answer. Norman points to renewables and electrification. The $7 billion import figure is the shared factual ground that makes both arguments politically resonant.