Britain’s Bounty Is Running Dry

The fact is UK oil and gas, which has given a big boost to the economy for the past two and a half decades, is running out fast. At current rates of extraction, the last drop of oil could be sucked out of the North Sea fields in about 10 years’ time.

Guardian
The fact is UK oil and gas, which has given a big boost to the economy for the past two and a half decades, is running out fast. At current rates of extraction, the last drop of oil could be sucked out of the North Sea fields in about 10 years’ time.

Oil output is already down by a quarter since peaking in 1999 at about 2.8m barrels per day (bpd), although the current production of 2.1m bpd is in line with the average of the past 20 years. At the present rate of decline, according to the UK Offshore Operators’ Association, the country will cease to be self-sufficient in 2007, production will drop to 1m bpd by 2010 and dry up little more than five years later.

Britain is also running out of gas from the North Sea. Given that a large chunk of the country’s electricity generation depends on gas, the shortfall will have to be made up by imports.

“You can see that production levels of oil and gas have dropped sharply over the last two years and that is set to continue, with fundamental consequences for the economy,” says David Page, an economist at Investec bank in the City.