The Auckland Gas Company was formed in 1862 as the first
joint stock company in New Zealand. It was also the first private services provider in Auckland. In the 1870s, the company bought and developed a large site in
Freemans Bay to build a
gasworks (roughly on and east of the site of the current
New World supermarket), with further buildings (mainly workshops) and offices on Beaumont Street. In the late 1960s the
Kapuni gas fields were opened, providing
natural gas which was cleaner and cheaper than the locally produced
coal gas variant, and the company stopped producing gas and became a supplier only. This led to most of the buildings in the Freemans Bay are being demolished. == References ==