North Sea oil production falls at fastest pace in a decade as Labour fears deter investment
By Paul Homewood
h/t Robert Christopher
That worked out well then!
North Sea oil production has plunged at its fastest pace in a decade as fears grow over a potential Labour government and Rishi Sunak’s windfall tax deters investment.
Crude oil output slumped by 13pc in the first six months of this year compared with the same period in 2022, a report by Offshore Energies UK (OEUK) found.
The decline meant oil production fell to a record low of 16.2m tonnes, roughly a quarter of what the UK produced at its peak in 1999.
OEUK, which represents 400 oil, gas and wind operators and contractors, said it is the biggest decline since the same period in 2013, when output fell by 13.7pc.
Ross Dornan, an author of the OEUK’s annual economic report, said the Government’s windfall tax and the threat of a Labour victory at the next election had seriously destabilised the industry.
Sir Keir Starmer has pledged to ban all new oil and gas licences under a Labour government as part of his plans to make Britain a “clean energy superpower”.
David Whitehouse, chief executive of OEUK, said: “People want to see consistency of policy, but it’s clear there is political uncertainty with a general election next year. That is causing uncertainty with investors and that is part of the reason why we are not seeing much investment being unlocked.”
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NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
Incompetence in the main political parties has no upper limit.
Incompetence?
Malevolence more like.
Though somewhat radical, how else to get the message across? I’ve being saying this for some time ever since T**Co came to town and threatened to ruin the local community: – all the Affected businesses should straight away SHUT DOWN and with the Council LOSING an income, would maybe change their minds. Likewise In the OIL industry, lack of revenues and High unemployment would push a point through. In Farming we could do the same.
Instead, in this woke world, we are at war with Russia, yet on the other hand, continue to do some business. “Some” because we are dependent upon “SOME” things. So there is still Bilateral trade, as with China, as with The Rainforest and Palm oil areas …. despite what we “shouldn’t” be doing, according to some.
Ayn Rands book ‘Atlas Shrugged’ was perhaps prophetic
Yes, I have taken a copy, but Jings, it’s hard going when you are tired after a long day!
“…it’s hard going…”
Are you inclined to shrug, then?
Spike Milligan had a funny sketch in a children’s program (!), depicting the famous Greek mythological tale of Atlas being outsmarted by Heracles into bearing the burden of the heavens
for a second time. As Heracles runs away laughing Atlas simply calls out “You will be hearing from my solicitor first thing in the morning!”
U been cheeky! !!! ( :0) ) If only you knew what I know and all I have to do and for whom, … currently working ona project and having to “Re-learn stuff” I used to do automatically. Think of it as the Wee Kir Coo Bree Centipede. .. all because of some Know-it-alls making a cockerel of the job. Last thing I want at night is to read a Book ( that kind ) I have shelves of Service & operator manuals – if only people would take the time to read their own, and not go clubbing & getting daft ideas therefrom…. Speedreading ? Try this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YIUvX7hebBA&t=38s Maybe help with the reading.
Indeed. The plan at the moment seems to be to Just Stop Oil and buy it from some other place. This won’t reduce our consumption much, except maybe in Aberdeen where the newly unemployed won’t be able to afford home heating or a car.
Thanks to the likely government in waiting aka the *Labour* party. Exporting jobs and paying extra for imports is called success by those jokers.
Why is Parliament, (HoC, HoL, Civil Service Quangos etc) trying to destroy this Country, I ask myself?
The only conclusion I can envisage is to reduce us to a region as the EU desires.
We appear to be the sole country in the whole World pursuing the pipe dream of NetZero (<1%) whilst the rest of the World ploughs on taking our trade and laughing at the stupidity of our ruling class as they lead us into Armageddon.
As Frazier was wont to say, 'We are doomed, doomed I tell ye' and who can argue with that?
” Why is Parliament, (HoC, HoL, Civil Service Quangos etc) trying to destroy this Country, I ask myself? ”
The Westminster “Bubble”.
WHY ! ? One must ask the other question: WHY do the people continue to vote for and support those gonks with a RAAC’d brain. RAAC Concrete was just such another daft idea ( only 30year life for those applications ). Much as PERHAPS being anti-fracking. …. and Anti-Nuclear power. ( There must be something under the Bed )
Oh there are other ‘Western’ countries also trying to return to the dark ages. Bidens USA, Aus, Germany shutting its Nuclear plants …
But only the ‘first world’ is trying to become the fifth world of hell. The third world seems to be intent on becoming the new first world.
Not the only one at all – France, Germany and the Netherlands are all following suit, and the US under Biden is rushing headlong into destruction. The bizarre desire of the Tories to lead the world means we are simply getting to poverty sooner than everyone else.
So what’s the common denominator? DON’T say …… **os, or that few multi Billionaires. …
The problem on the European mainland is the EU Commission and spineless governments in EU countries that don’t fight back against the insanity.
The UK is different. It is self-inflicted lunacy. The infamous Brexit should have put a stop to that but yet it continues
>>Not the only one at all – France, Germany and the Netherlands are all following suit
Yes, quite right…. but the MSM won’t pick up on this. .. rather give / feed you consumer affairs garbage. But but but, or not only but also: we are now BACK in the EU with that Horizon thingy? was all much better years ago with the “World about us” stuff, etc.. now anything like these progs gets missed in the relentless “watch it on I player” adverts if you’ve missed it on the more obscure other FTA Channels. wherever they are on the Prog List. ( and WHEN.)
Once initiated the process will be irreversible decline in the North Sea. The original investment was only possible on the back of the discovery of large fields as a frontier exploration area. As a mature area, the opportunities arise as incremental value on top of existing capital investment in infrastructure. As maturity is reached, the marginal cost makes smaller fields financially viable. Kill off rounds of licensing and that disappears. Once gone, the infrastructure will go into decline and its all over. Oil industry capital and investment will flow to new areas around the world including many hostile to the West. The UK offshore was always regarded by insiders as a financially unstable and risky regime for oil company investment, now the final nail is being placed in the coffin.
Producing our own oil and gas provides the benefits of a relaible tax revenue stream for the exchequer and energy security. The idiot politicians, having sucked the golden goose dry with windfall taxes, will now kill it. Sacrificed on the altar of climate change.
The stupidity, the short-sightedness, the sheer vandalism of all this destruction of capital beggars belief. Same as the destruction of investment and capital by blowing up reliable coal fired power stations since 2010. I despair of when this madness will end and whether the UK will ever recover from it – unlikely in my remaining lifetime but I worry for my children and grandchildren.
Milliband, Gummer, Starmer, and all the other useless politicians who are gaslighting the UK population ( apologies for that tautological event) will never suffer the consequences of their mendacity – they will inhabit some equally useless quango once their “political time” is up and continue to infect the rest of us “useless eaters” and it will either be in the EU or the US. I agree about the wilful destruction of this country’s infrastructure – ranks with Brown’s sale of the UK gold reserves – towards the bottom of a slide in gold prices – to buy fiat currencies. For someone supposedly with a brain for economics and finance, that was the dummest example of political stupidity and especially so from a Left winger – how could he not know of the effect of inflation on his hoard of paper money….no surprise that these Labourites continue to make disastrous decisions when they have that example to fall back on.
https://www.sott.net/article/266018-Revealed-Why-Gordon-Brown-sold-Britains-gold-at-a-knock-down-price
Thanks – if I recall, that was rumoured at the time during a period of “troubles” involving the lack of chinese walls with certain banks’ investment and retail operations. Brown may have been in a “terrible situation” but he failed to adequately regulate the banks as has been extensively covered and “the rest is history”. I doubt if there has been a more egregious example – other than the abandonment of the Gold Standard/ QE/CV19 for money debt – of a politician saddling the taxpayer with such a debt……
If he had forced the separation of investment:retail banking it might all have been a tad different – he ( and others) did not to his eternal repetitional shame (imho, of course)
“The UK offshore was always regarded by insiders as a financially unstable and risky regime for oil company investment, now the final nail is being placed in the coffin”
Better get another coffin ready:
https://www.edp24.co.uk/news/23769798.vattenfall-reportedly-talks-sell-norfolk-windfarm/
At least oil & gas provide a useful, reliable commodity…
Thinking Scientist: I think you may be saying that the North Sea production is falling due to depletion. That’s certainly what I think. How many of these “hundreds” of new licences have actually been applied for? A big ZERO I bet. The UK sector is exhausted but meanwhile HMG continue to dither about Rosebank, the last possibly viable prospect. Its a fantasy world.
33rd Offshore Licensing Round
The 33rd UK Offshore Licensing Round officially opened on 7th October 2022 and closed for applications for licences on 12 January 2023.
The round attracted a total of 115 bids across 258 blocks and part-blocks, from a total of 76 companies.
The round attracted similar interest to the 32nd Licensing Round in 2019 which received 104 applications from 245 blocks and part-blocks. In 2019 a total of 768 blocks and part-blocks were offered, compared with 931 this year 2023.
Results of round yet to be announced.
There is plenty of interest from small players who can make money, big players long gone. But once the rounds are stopped the infrastructure will decline and then its game over.
The OGA estimate for 3P possible resources is I believe within the range 10-20 billion boe, which I think is about 20-45% of what has been produced already (45 billion boe).
That is a huge future potential, 30% gas they say (70% oil), but historically that is 40% gas, so likely future 40% or more will be gas.
Key aspect is: “volumes closely linked to activity levels” i.e. the more wells you drill, the more you find (obviously!).
OK, I was unduly pessimistic about new application s but why have none of your knowledgeable respondents mentioned Rosebank?
They’ve benefited for years from the oil revenues, now the great and the good subscribe to the belief that the State subsidises oil, not the other way round, whilst taking still more money out of the industry, it’s cognitive dissonance all round. If the Green blob think the State has taken no pecuniary benefits from North Sea Oil perhaps we can have the oil back? Failure that perhaps cash in lieu? Say £100 billion?
Quite apart from corporation tax and all the other taxes paid by employees of the oil companies, how can there possibly be any “subsidy” when more than half of the actual price at the pump is TAX?
>>subscribe to the belief that the State subsidises oil
I did some research in February 2022 of total revenues from North Sea Oil, fuel duty and subsidies (negative) to renewables over the period 2001 – 2021. The numbers are:
North Sea Oil £98.8 billion
Fuel Duty £507.5 billion
Renewables -£56.1 billion
I think the numbers speak for themselves
“clean energy superpower” is an oxymoron.
It is indeed a strange concept. Has Starmer ever elucidated what his vision is? Is it any more than just elitist jargon?
Starmer and Miliband have shown that they have no idea of what they are talking about by announcing a policy of full electrification of energy production from unreliables by 2030
“Oxymoron” is defined as a term to make one laugh.
I’ve tried to think of a replacement for the word “superpower” and came up with terra nullius and black hole. Neither is quite right.
*Basket case* perhaps?
https://www.wordnik.com/words/basket%20case
North Sea oil production falls at fastest pace in a decade?
Obviously subsidies are the answer to this problem.
I passed a couple of nodding donkeys in a corner of a field the other day.
The public are probably unaware that their daily energy output dwarfs local solar and wind farms & contributes tens of thousands of pounds daily to the UK tax pile
If it’s GreenPR BBC will promote it
BTW plastic roads = plastic dust
plastic roads = plastic dust Oh so true. Metalrail dust, brake dust et al throught the tunnel VENTS – but that’s OK, along with the viral load included from all the Fare-paying passengers
I think the only real response to the creatures in government is a concerted asymmetric rebellion against them. The ULEZ camera destruction should be seen as a good and effective example of this.
Violent confrontation with those in power is futile because, they have the power to crush it.
But for example, cutting off the power and water to individual homes; ie. the homes of those in Whitehall and Westminster who are promoting these wicked plans; might be relatively easy to do and be quite effective.
Hmm, ‘Violent confrontation with those in power is futile because, they have the power to crush it.’ Ever heard of the VELVET REVOLUTION ? Elizabethan Serenade & Green Velvet …. so missed last year. So why doesn’t our MILITARY do something for us. Good Heavens the Judiciary and their minions look t’other way or dance along with it, y’know what I mean?
Build Back Better. Destroy and rebuild in your WEF, CBDC (central bank digital currency), 15 minute cities, EVs and green energy powered world courtesy of the globalists.
And next year, the majority will vote for the uniparty LibLabCon and wonder why nothing changes.
“Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”
Could vote ‘None of the above’ Chris. I’ve been told, on this site, that it is better to turn up and vote, rather than not vote at all. Perhaps we could all campaign on behalf of the ‘None of the above’ party!
Political parties – of the pre 20th century model with the exception of the Verdigreens are dead in the water …..protest votes may bring some chaos in the CoP but can anyone say we don’t have “chaos” now? I want a very different kind of “chaos” please…
doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results, …. there’s at least one word for that, but then again ACTIONS speak louder than words: Power of the PEN ? only in the hands of Mr Bond. ( or wassit his Nemesis ? )
Love it ….. on the Lockdown Sceptics reddit (link below) which now also covers climate bollox, someone has just posted the following
“Friend sent an email question to our local climate change officer, after the pages of self promoting waffle and question avoiding, he summed up with possibly one of the greatest horseshit non-answers I’ve ever seen.”
Argunentum ad ignorantiam.
Today Canterbury City Council texted me (not aware I ever gave them my mobile phone number) to advise me their “Severe Weather Emergency Protocol” had been implemented. Severe weather? What mind bending drugs make you think the mid 20’s and pleasantly sunny is severe?
Easy to see why so many councils can go bust if this is the way they piss up our money.
It is scary that councils (and the government) can get lists even of which mobile numbers exist and possibly who they belong to without a court order.
Or are they just inventing mobile numbers just like scammers do for e-mail addresses? I have my own domain. Yet I get spam sent to addresses there that don’t even exist and have never existed on the domain.
Some phones have a setting to stop “alerts” but not all.
>>Canterbury City Council texted me (not aware I ever gave them my mobile phone number)
From Rystad Energy (who probably know abit more than some hack)
https://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/Whats-Behind-The-Surge-In-Investment-In-North-Sea-Oil-And-Gas.html
” ……
Oil and gas investments in the UK have not recovered in the same way as in Norway. It is expected that 2023 investments will be around 75% lower than 2013, when investment peaked at nearly £18 billion ($22.7 billion). With many developments in the pipeline, however, next year could see the highest number of projects sanctioned in a decade. While three to five projects are sanctioned, on average, in the UK each year, 2024 could see up to 14 new oil and gas fields given the green light……more”
It would be hard, but ALL businesses closing factories, stopping investment etc. could be the only way to get politicians (irrespective of claimed party) to stop and reverse their obsessions with “climate”, “green” and “net zero”.
Oh, it’s going to happen. Just not suddenly. It will over time. The elitist vision isn’t workable.
The prosperous hope the alligator eats them last.
I’m pretty confident that the majority in the UK do not want:
An end to North Sea exploration
A ban on ICE car sales
A ban on gas boilers
Higher electricity bills
Higher cost flights
Higher cost meat and dairy products
I’m sure we could add other things. Yet we have these things or are going to get them. How come?
” How come? ” Belief