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So Sunak’s embrace of drilling appears to be just a move to appease worried Brits about energy security. It won’t actually lead to any more security in reality.

When the fit hits the shan and public sentiment changes so too will we see increasingly politicians seek to take advantage of the shift in public opinion. After all, being the parasitic leeches most of them are, this would be only natural.

In a “surprise” turn, Sunak has given the green light to drilling in the North Sea. But will this result in any material increase in oil production, and if so, when? Furthermore, if oil is found, will this result in the UK actually having greater energy security?

From the article:

Will the move unleash a torrent of new production?

Decades can pass from the award of a licence to first production of oil and gas, and in many cases it never even happens. For example, the licence for the controversial Rosebank field that could potentially get the go-ahead for development this year was awarded in 2001.

North Sea oil and gas resources are mostly tapped out and production has steadily declined since its peak more than 20 years ago. The iconic Brent facility, which once produced as much as half a million barrels a day, has been mostly dismantled. The only oil field to come online last year, called Evelyn, pumps no more than 6,000 barrels a day.

Even if a new licence yields a discovery, many questions will have to be answered before it can be declared economically viable: How many barrels are in place? Is the field close to existing infrastructure? Does it lie in shallow or deep water?

As Wood Mackenzie analyst Greg Roddick points out, “no commercial discoveries have been made on new acreage awarded through licensing rounds since 2014.”

Is this good for UK energy security?

The UK imports about 40% of the oil and gas it consumes, yet about three quarters of the crude pumped within the country was exported last year. That’s because so much of the nation’s refining capacity has been shut down — about half over the past two decades — that the country is heavily dependent on imported fuels.

Britain also has very little natural gas storage, so it often exports the fuel to Europe during the summer and imports it back again during periods of peak demand in winter.

So there is no guarantee that additional oil and gas produced in the UK would remain there, and the country is very much exposed to swings in international price benchmarks over which its tiny share of global production — about 1% last year — has little influence.

So Sunak’s embrace of drilling appears to be just a move to appease worried Brits about energy security. It won’t actually lead to any more security in reality.

But perhaps more importantly — this is evidence that the net zero hogwash is a side effect of cheap energy and cheap money. You see, it’s only under the complacency of abundant relatively cheap energy (thank you, Russia) that folks managed to achieve the hubristic view that “net zero emissions” is in fact both good and necessary. It is neither.

See the rest here

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