"New Oilfield In The North Sea Would Blow The Uk’S Carbon Budget"

"Campaigners say Rosebank, with a potential yield of 500m barrels, would seriously undermine legal commitment to net zero".

"A single new oil and gas field in the North Sea would be enough to exceed the UK’s carbon budgets from its operations alone, analysis has shown, as the government considers fossil fuel expansion despite the legally binding commitment to net zero.

Rosebank is the biggest undeveloped oilfield in the North Sea, with the potential to produce 500m barrels of oil, and has already cleared several regulatory hurdles, meaning a decision on its future could come soon.

But analysis by the campaigning group Uplift has shown that the likely emissions just from producing oil from the field would be enough to exceed the share of the UK’s carbon budgets that should come from oil and gas production, from 2028 onwards.

That would mean other sectors of the economy would have to cut their emissions further and faster to enable the UK to stay within its carbon budgets, if the Rosebank field went ahead."

Fiona Harvey reports for the Guardian April 1, 2023.

Source: Guardian, 04/03/2023