Posted on 05/17/2008 8:01:09 AM PDT by kingattax
More than 200 communities in the English countryside may be sitting on billions of pounds of undiscovered oil, according to prospectors.
Scores of greenfield sites across southern and eastern England are being mapped for viability as world oil prices soar.
The Government has received 60 applications from 54 companies to explore 182 plots, but is keeping the details confidential because they are commercially sensitive. Villages, hamlets or new estates will learn about a prospector’s interest only if permission is sought to drill or extract oil.
The Times has learnt that rural locations from the South Downs to the Lincolnshire Wolds have been designated potential oilfields. There is a 70-mile stretch of small oil deposits in limestone and sandstone from Poole in Dorset, through Hampshire to West Sussex, and pockets in Surrey, the East Midlands and South Wales.
In stirrings that could indicate the start of a nationwide resistance to Dallas-style entrepreneurs, conservationists and locals in West Sussex have expressed outrage at the county council’s giving approval for exploration Markwell Woods — an ancient woodland near Chichester, and part of an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.
They fear that the site may contain as much as 200 million barrels of oil, with a potential value of £12 billion, and the permanent disruption that would result.
Five years ago there were only eight applications for onshore oil exploration in Britain involving six companies and 22 plots. But prospectors’ interest has grown with the price of oil.
In August last year Brent crude was $70 (£36) a barrel By the first week of November — just before the deadline for the latest round of onshore licence applications — it was up to $93.49 a barrel and yesterday it was $124.
It may be some months before Northern Petroleum starts drilling in Markwell Woods, in its first onshore venture into oil in Britain, but locals are already on their guard.
David Parker lives close to the Forestside site and is concerned about the traffic and road closures. “There is bound to be damage to the road,” he said.
“How do you get a 3.5 metre-wide low-loaders up a small country road? Lots of horses use this road and what about the verges?”
The Woodland Trust denounced the scheme as “an act of vandalism”. It rates the destruction of a hectare of ancient woodland — the richest habitat for wildlife in Britain — as the national equivalent of the despoliation of rainforests.
Supporters of the plan are appealing for calm. Andrew Tyrie, Conservative MP for Chichester, said: “They will explore for three years and if there is oil then there will have to be further planning permission. Clearly, if there is going to be an oilfield it has to be done in a sensitive way and great thought will be needed for the local road structure.”
Northern Petroleum admits that there would be some disruption and noise for the three to six weeks of drilling, but says that if oil were found, people would not know extraction was taking place.
Oliver Harwood, energy adviser at the Country, Land and Business Association, said: “This rural enterprise has been going on quietly for some time. It’s about jobs and income in the countryside and energy security for the nation.
“If the site is well screened or away from roads most people would never know about it.”
"jobs and income and energy security for the nation" ?????? damn. isn't drilling for domestic oil evil ???? what about killing mother earth and dying polar bears and global warming and CO2 ? call algore ASAP !!!
“Wow...cost rise, creating incentives to increase production thus outraging the Moonbats. What a shock!!! “
No shock at all. This scenario played out in the US in the late ‘70s and early ‘80s after the two oil embargoes and gas lines of the 1970s. But then the Arab producers got over US support of Israel during the Yom Kippur war and crude production got back to normal and prices fell. Then, the widespread exploration in the US ended.
After, it was declared that the free market would answer all problems and needs. So, it has, and the answer is $125 crude and $3.50 to $4.00 gasoline.
People need to stop pretending that we have a free market in crude oil that will satisfactorily supply the USA’s energy needs. There is no free market and it will not satisfy US energy needs except at prices that will be crippling to the US economy and to many individuals.
It’s past time that we had an energy policy that greatly lessens our increasing dependency on foreign oil, and one that requires that the US build the capacity to produce most of our energy needs domestically.
Both political parties will have to change their ways, but with the still rising prices for energy and food, there is a good chance enough citizens will become outraged that the bought and paid for politicians in Washington will actually address our long term energy needs in a realistic manner.
No more idiotic environmental restrictions from the Dems. and Florida and other coastal states.
And no more idiotic pretense from Republicans that the market will solve all problems. It won’t, and it hasn’t in the past. It’s not a free market, and the government needs to mandate a capacity to produce a high percentage of our energy needs domestically. That can’t be left purely to corporate decisions.
Will, I hope that you’re right about Americans becoming outraged enough to demand change. Unfortunately, there is so much working against that: a leftist media, special interest money, elitist lawmakers, entrenched activist judges, and the environmental religion which has captivated most of America. It will be a HARD fight and it may not be one that is settled peacefully.
But even if some Englishman found Texas tea on his property and they set up wells would the European Union and the elite in Brussels take the lion share of the profit?
In the old days it was the robber barons who said “The public be damned!”. Today we have a new set of robbers who are sying that.
That would be scary.
Britain's gots greenie-weenies, too!
So much for that peak oil idiot that adversises his scare magazine on talk radio.
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