Search for black gold is sweeping the country

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