PETROL POSITION

Otago Daily Times, Issue 27018, 1 March 1949, Page 4

PETROL POSITION

RATIONING COULD BE ENDED OPINION OF INDUSTRY PA WELLINGTON, Feb. 28. The opinion that petrol rationing in New Zealand could come off so far as fne supply and tanker positions were concerned was expressed by the chairman and managing director of the Vacuum Oil Pty., Ltd., Melbourne, Mr H. Rabling, in an interview to-day. Overseas exchange was the only reason for rationing as far as he knew. The supply and tanker shortages of a year ago, he said, had been taken care of by the oil companies expanding their facilities. The shortage had not been in well production, but in refining capacity. The tremendous expansion in demand all over the world that had followed the war could not for the time be met. That demand was was still increasing, but through the enterprise of private industry it had been overtaken. Additional refining capacity and more tankers had been brought into service. His own company, said Mr Rabling, was building a refinery in Melbourne which would be operating in April. Two or three other refineries existed already in Australia. No local oil had been found yet, but geological parties were out prospecting on the Australian mainland and in Papua. A really intensive search for oil was planned for the next two years. The possibility of world oil supplies running out was not a question giving any concern to oil companies, he continued. There was enough oil already known of to last at least 25 years at the present rate of consumption, and probably four or five times as much as that actually existed. Mr Rabling was last in New Zealand as a guest of the Government in 1943. His present visit is a combination of business and holiday.