Is North Sea Oil Still Needed In 2050? Artwork

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Is North Sea Oil Still Needed In 2050?

November 19, 2023 • Philip Russell / Paul Russell • Season 5 • Episode 1

in this episode, we explore the complex and often contentious topic of North Sea oil and its role in the current energy landscape. As the world gradually shifts towards renewable energy sources, the need for traditional carbon-based energy, particularly oil and gas, remains a topic of heated debate. This video delves into the reasons why new oil and gas licenses are still being sought and granted, even amidst global efforts to reduce carbon emissions and combat climate change.

the crucial role of North Sea oil in the evolving energy landscape, even as the world shifts towards renewable energy. Despite the global push for carbon neutrality, the video highlights why new oil and gas licenses are still relevant and necessary.

12:00:31

Welcome to the Going Green podcast.In this episode, we're going to have alook at these new licenses that havebeen granted for North Sea oil and gasprojects, and we're going to have alittle discussion aboutwhether they're a good idea or not.So let me throw thisone over to you, Paul.Do you think that these North Sea oillicenses and gas licensesare actually a good idea?Well, before we get say too involved inknowing sort of what the hell'shappening, let's just go through a bit ofcontext in relation to it all.So since 2016 or 2015, the governmentstopped all new licensingfor North Sea oil and gas.Okay.So they stopped in allthe projects to go through.Now at the time they said lots of newprojects basically were coming to aclose and they were trying to decidewhether or not they should actually gofor new ones or attempt to rely onessentially as in bit of kind ofeverybody else doing them will just buyit in and essentially not beingrasped.And do you mean buyingfrom other countries here?Yes.Uh, well, yes.And also reliance on the transition to ofcourse, uh, net zero to provide clean.And so that, that was the idea.If we sort of stop the licensing, thenall the North Sea oil just sort of thatwere happening at the time, you canremember 2016, 15, then they would expireby 2020 and then obviously we will thenpursue the continuance of converting toa, I say net zero or sort of, uh, carbonneutral processing, you know, basicallytransitioning across.So that was the idea of the clean andthat we don't need any oil and gasproduced in this country to support theUK economy because we can import it inand we can slowly wean ourselves off.So that, that's the context of relationto all those sorts of things.So, but here comes the butters, isn't it?This is the, this is the important bit.Yeah.So anyway, so recently this year, 2023,uh, the government has juststarted the process of re issuing newNorth Sea oil, uh, gas and oil, uh,licenses as in to go out there and drillfor oil and gas, and they are expectingto allow a procedure where every yearthey want to then vote and have a giveout licenses to do or new off, uh, NorthSea oil and gas drilling essentially.And the major points that they want to dothat is unfortunately due to the Ukrainewar, as in the Russian Ukraine warconflict or crisis orwhatever you want tocall it, oil and gas prices are shot up.And unfortunately the market's been soturbulent that basically we need not, um,new oil and gas, but importing it hasskyrocketed the actualcost has skyrocketed.So they're hoping that with the idea ofthese new oil and gasthings, uh, licensesthat they able to produce the oil and gasrequired for the UK economy locally,you know, quote locallybeing, you know, not far away.You know, you're talkingNorth Sea, not far away.Yeah.And, um, that will bring in sort of, theysaid, are lots of new jobs and things.But we will, cause it will pay for allthe people to run in the North sea oilstaff, as well as pay for them, grow theeconomy because it quite a lot.The UK economyrequires still oil and gas.And we're not talking directly being, uh,burning things like petrol and for,you know, power station, we are talkingfor things like lubricant,you know, oils, lubricant oils, as wellas doing other not gases directly forburning, cause most of the gas is forburning, but doing other bits like theywant to do some part of this hydrogen,um, business, but of course they need.Fuel as in, um, methane or at least, uh,natural gas to actually produce thehydrogen in which casethey make them lean out.It's a long problem.Okay.So we've got a need going on, not till weget to 2050 when we're going to becarbon neutral, but we're in fact, wellbeyond that where we're going to stillneed carbon fossil fuels for things likesome plastics and they don't have to bethe evil plastics that don't decompose.They could be the biodegradable ones.We also going to needoil for lubrication.We're going to need some basically someoil to actually burn for certainapplications where it's not going to workdoing anything else.So we're still going to need some oil forsome reasons and various people justsaying, yeah, get rid of oil completely.Uh, well that is literally then going toget the, the country to seize up.Uh, yeah, with no lubricants at all.Yeah, it's quite, quite one.I think.And it's just, just the way of sort ofthe armament or saying, you know, whatthey're trying to do, this is whatthey're actually lookingat doing is to try and getrid of that reliance of Isay foreign oil natural gas.And since we've got the North sea oil,why don't we just use it?Yeah.For us.Yeah.That's any say it's one of those thingswhere that's what the idea is.But, you know,everybody's sort of not moaning.That's the runway to put it, but it is a,you know, how can we talk, say before,uh, going green in case of for these oilfields to be drilled and things.Well, it's one of, you know, to trans,you know, the idea istransitioning is thatyou still need to transition.You can't sort of go cold Turkey.Because of course we're not prepared to,I said, go cold Turkey, but as I said,we still need things like lubricants.You still need to say the engine oils.I know we're going for electric.Yeah.But they still have things like, uh, notgearboxes, but some, some of the carshave things like, uh, these sort of.Various drive shaftsand other bits and pieces.Yeah.You can stick a motor on each wheel, oryou might still want to have somethinglike a passive axle and then it stillneeds oiling, greasing, lubricating.So yeah.So, so that, that's, as Isaid, so those ideas is how.Lot of the British economy still got needfor oil and gas in relation to all thesethings.And so the idea of simply put is insteadof paying expensive imports, make itourselves, which doesn't seem ludicrous.It doesn't seem a bad idea.Well, they've even talkedabout coal mines as well.And again, when they're talking aboutopening a coal mine, it's not necessarilyjust to burn the coal, but it is becausewe can actually extract certain otherchemicals from the coal to supply othersort of industries,what we call feedstocks.Yeah.They were hoping to use that.They said this new car, I can't rememberit's something in Cornwall, isn't it?I can't remember.I can't remember.Anyhow, this, thisnew coal mine on quiet.Yeah.The idea is to not shutter anything, butto say, look, this, this.Coal is actually not for burning, but fordoing everything's I'm makingcarbon fiber from it because where is theuseful way of making carbon fiber?Darfley is not the graphite in pencils,but sort of scraping coal, you know,basically sort of not sanding it down,but scraping at it andproducing it that way.And we need carbon fiber.You know, it's one of those things wherehow much carbon fiber we use, we'reactually slowly using more and more andmore and more of it.So that's trying to find that use for it.You see, I'm producing thatlocally means we, you know, thathelps apparently the economy.So that's, that's supposed, but peoplesee coal mine and they go, Oh, yougonna use it for burning, you know, sortof, but forgetting that of course, in theUK, we don't have any coal power gasplants, but we actually do.We don't, we have to know we have to,because occasionally they have toturn them on to do things, but.Yeah.Largely they're not using them and theyhave converted tracks to, um,basically use, um, biofuels.Haven't they, they, they sort of recyclebits of tree that, uh, nobody else wants.We apologize for the airplane flyingoverhead at the moment.Or helicopter.Don't know which sounds more helicopterlike in regards to it'sflying around the circles of play.We'll be just over anyway, but inrelation to all that, it's one of thosethings where of course aviation fuel, youknow, where are we going to make, howare you to getaviation fuel at the moment?And we don't make it necessary ourselves.But the idea thatNorth sea oil is all bad.The answer is North sea oil isn't exactlygreat at producing petrol.Um, well we've known this because it'sone of those things where we don'timporting petrol happens is stillimporting from the sailing Arabs and thesound ease and those that sort ofdirection, as opposed to what we weregetting from Russia was actually notcrude oil in relation to being sort ofthe black tar, but it was sort of this.Mess of just, you know, more for the notthe lubrications, but it was just notpetrol clean fuel.It was all sort of.Yeah.Let's say what the question really whatPaul's saying is what is crude oil andcrude oil is simply a mixture.And in some countries like the middleEast, they've got a lot of the smallercarbons, which makes itsort of smaller carbon chains.This makes it good for things like.Well, petrol.And, uh, in North sea, they had veryshort carbon chains,which made it excellentfor North sea gas, but they also had alot of much longer chains.Now these much longer chains, we canactually use and we use a process calledcracking and what we do is we sort ofbasically heat them up with a catalystfor their air and this produces lots ofvery useful compounds, um, which arecalled the alkenes and these alkenes goon to be feed stocksor things like plastics.So the Arabs in their, their, their fuelis basically alkanes, which are very goodfor fuel or cars, et cetera, aircraft.And ours was sort of different really.Yeah.And you want both.Exactly.This is the whole proponent of the wholeidea is that it is, you know, just, weneed our bits, but we need a little bitmixture of all thedifferent types of oil.You see?So we've changed our sort of goalposts oncars and, uh, we're not going to have tosort of go all electric,uh, just quite so soon.And that's just giving the industryperhaps a little bit more time.Now, is that necessarily a good idea?Well, talking still to friends who havegot electric cars, they still have a lotof problems getting from A to B,especially if B is a long way from A andthey've got a sort of recharge on the waybecause there are more and morerecharging points coming, but we're notthere yet and we still need more andmore to do that.And so the idea is we've got to try andgrant more licenses to try and sort of,well, slow down the system.So we've actually got time to adapt.Yes.So, so one of the things they weretalking about is inside these licenses,you know, there are two types.There's of course exploratory licensesand then there is just normal producinglicense and actually what the gum isactually proposing isnot out of say thesehundreds of gas licenses they're going toissue is they said 90% are going forproducing licenses with only 10% going toexploratory licenses.Except they said that only that 10% ofthe exploratorylicenses will actually go fornot brand new exploratory processing, butthey might be going to old wells to notto see if they're tapped out, see ifthere's any more inside those ones.So actually it's one of those things whenthey're not actually looking at new,new exploratory oil fields, because weknow quite a lot of the oil fields outthere already, you know, they all beendiscovered and found and explored.It's now effectively that we're talkingabout some extensions to these, aren'twe, these extensions to these fieldswhere there might be this little extralittle tiny little bit somewhere.And when I say tiny little bit, Iactually mean quite alarge tiny little bit so theycan actually find it'sgoing to be worthwhile.Uh, it just really staggers the mindtrying to think abouthow much gas and oilare in these sort of gas and, uh, oilfields that the, the amounts are reallyquite staggering and that's why we've gotthe problem we've got today with allthis amount of carbon dioxide.If you consider how much you use when youdrive yourself to work, how much CO2 youproduce, and then you multiply that byeverybody else, just in this country,we're producing a huge amount of carbondioxide and that's got to go.But it's not the onlything that does that.We won't be able to get down to sort ofcarbon neutral just by doing that.There are many industries, especially thechemical industries that produce carbondioxide, not just things for heating, butin chemical manufacture.So we've got to worry about that and theystill need their feed stocks.And so we still got to supply them withmore sort of raw materials to keep themgoing because, you know, this idea ofjust stopping oil sounds like a reallygood idea until you sit down and thinkabout it and you work out, well, if wejust do stop all our oil, we haven't gotvery much left to work with.Yeah.It's one of those challenging, awfulthings of how much is, you know, you cando the same thing of how much is madeusing, um, oil and you just say, well,most chemicals are made of derivatives ofoil and then you sort of, you know,we don't have any clothes or any nice,um, pieces of stuff.So we're lacking and that's the majorcrux of the whole thing.It is the idea of thatpeople hear oil is bad.And the answer is it is, it is bad.Now I'm not saying it's great.I'm not saying it is sort of wonderfulthing as unlike someof the, uh, I say oilproducing companies and yet all thesesort of the BP's and shells and all thosethings who slap on things such as we'redeveloping clean technologies.And what we're doing is technically tomake us clean and greener is of course,we hire, uh, contractors to actually goout and do the North sea oil.Uh, and so us BP, we are cleaning greenand are bad oil producing slash, um, notthe green side of the company.They're actually individual contractorswho unfortunately they can't be green.Cause of course they haven't got themoney of BP to do so,you know, whoever to do so.So it's one of those odd things wherethere's a little bit of green washinghappening out there in relation to that.The showcase sort of right.Who is, you know, what's happening outthere being green, not being green,which is unfortunate because of course,you know, if you look at, if they take,include those parts of their pines, yousee, they're not so green.The answer is no, they want to show beinggreen because being green apparently iscool.Yeah.Well, let's, let's,let's move ahead to 2050.2050 has arrived.We are now net zero, but basically aquarter of our energy will still comefrom oil and gas, there will have to bestill some domestic gas production.So some people canstill have their heating.Um, so this country is able to producesome of its oil and gas and about, Iknow, quarter a third ofthat is probably imported.But why do that?And this is the question that the primeminister has actually asked is why dothat when we've still got quite a lot ofgas that's and other materials thatare untapped at home.So that's, that's there sort of thegovernment's rationale behind this thateven when we reach carbon neutral 2050,if we do, then we're still going to beusing still quite a lot and we haven'tgone to the stage where we really, a lotof people are pretending they're talkingabout, which is going carbon negative ornot using carbon at all.And that quitehonestly is pie in the sky.Yeah.This is, this is what, as I said, this isall the cracks of the sort of thing wherepeople say, simplethings like stop using oil.The answer is we, wephysically just count.You know, there is a problemin relation to all the fees.I can get most, quite a lot of medicineis made from oil or releases derivatives.You see, as because of course, gas inrelation to that is quite a views asfeedstock. And so suddenly you can't cutback because it's required, you know, andthe answer is, oh, you needto find new sources of it.And the answer is.Where, where are these new source, unlessyou're willing to sort of maketurn the gravesites as in sort of, youknow, yeah, graveyards and sort of burythem really deep and sort of,you know, turn that into oil.And unfortunately it's the long-termprocess doing those sorts of things.And so I'm not saying we need to findgreener, cleaner ways of making thefeedstock, you know, things like biogasand sort of those sorts of things.And these technologies, which we werehoping to be using and achieving aretaking a much longer time to develop.You know, they, they sort oftalk about our carbon capture.We just suck air inand clean air comes out.And the answer is notquite how that works.You know, and it's just not coming on.You know, things like electric cars, theyhaven't, you know, guess we startedquickly and they've been slowly turningon, but still haven't got enough chargingstations, you know, the power grid hasn'tgot the capacity yet to actually dealwith the amount of electric cars.And we have to remember how do theseelectric cars get powered?Quite a lot still by electricity that'smade from fossil fuels.We haven't got enough wind turbines.We haven't got enough solar.Especially on days like today when we'replaying a game called spot sun.I could spot it.It's that white thing that's sort of abit sort of speckledreally like the moon.Yeah. Yeah.No, it's not, not quite that bad.But yeah, it is those sorts of thingswhere people thought,ah, we'll be building upthese wind turbines and getting enoughand sort of every house in the UK willhave solar panels.And the answer is if we were reallycertain to get rid ofoil and gas, then wereally would be putting solar panels onevery single roof, you know, doesn'tmatter, you put it on literally all thesigns of the houses and all you just,just slap, slap them all over the place.Yeah.Except of course you do realize that wedo need some fossil fuels toactually make our solar panels.Gosh darn it.I wish I had known that.Yes.You can see the, the cracks.You see, this is where we're talkingabout the problem of, you know, gettingrid of the oil, not quite there.Yeah.We still need the feedstock and the ideaof doing it things of locally is muchbetter idea than important because howmuch, you know, problems of importingall that oil across, you know, I saywherever, as opposed to just, you know,I say pumping it in, you know, shippingit in sort of from the local backyard.It's so much more, yeah.Now I'm not talking about sort of goingfor the fracking idea of things, butyou know, it's sort of taking a placewhere no one's going to notice NorthSea oil, the seabed being sort of not thestove, but being lower because of this,all these pockets of being, but they dotry to fill them up.So it's not that bad.And there was a potential plan was toactually take the North Sea oil that'sbeing used up andactually pump CO2 back into that.It's one of those hilarious dumb thingsand actually make the oiland put the CO2 back in.So then make oil so that the latergenerations will actually still have someNorth Sea oil to actually, orNorth Sea gas in that regard.Uh, so it does take quite a while toconvert CO2 to methane.However, it isn't a quick process, but,uh, it can be done because, you know,basically, you know, we were seeing thatprocess being done anyway, but it's.It is a possibility there, but that's nota short-term solution, is it?Paul, it's going to take sort of, um,maybe millions of years.Yeah.It's not the most, as I said, not themost ludicrous to do for long term.So, but we've got to look at this, youknow, and it's unfortunate.I say unfortunate, but say people likethe, um, you in climatechange, um, agency, he's the man.I think it's the UNsecretary, whatever his name is.He makes lots of good quotes.Um, you know, he's saying that the doingthis idea is delusional.You're working against the system.And the answer is.Well, not really.Cause it's sort of like, you know, it'sall right saying move to net zero withoutsaying, how are you good?How am I meant to do that?You know, which is whywe call these transitions.You know, it's why, um, they wanted tocall, I think the EU wants to call,um, gas transitions fuel or something.Yeah.Yeah.It's sort of the, the, the argument ongas is it does burn cleaner thanother things like, like coal.Coal puts an awful lot of other noxiouschemicals into the environment, butburning gas, although a greener than thatis still chucking out an awfullot of carbon dioxide and our way roundthis problem is to move to greenersystems to move to wind power, to move towave power, to move to solar power.But it's still won't getrid of this oil problem.We still must have some oil to do things.And I think this is thebit that some people forget.So if I grab my little banner and justsay, just stop oil and sit in the middleof the road, yeah, it really should be.Yeah.I was going to say it brings it not onlybrings the country to a halt.It's actually going to throw us probablyback to the stone age, except it's notbecause if we went back to the stone age,we wouldn't have any electric.And so we'd have to startburning more wood again.Yeah.It's a bit tough, but no, what theyreally should have inthose posters instead ofjust stop oil is stop burning oil.You know, there's a course, you know,using oil or beingclever with the oil andactually creating things like I sayplastics and youknow, I know they're bad,but you think biodegradable plastics inregards to those sort of things.You know, doing that with the oil isactually morebeneficial than just burningit because of course you'renot removing CO2 in that way.You're just changing how it is.You know, even instead of being a liquid,you made it a solid, you know, that's allyou're still got it still captured or notreleasing the CO2 by that way.And so the idea of, yeah, the postershould be, you know, just stop oilshould be stopped burning oil.The simple words, butit makes the difference.But it wouldn't bring their message over.Yes, probably quite as well.That's that.That's the problem.So we've been looking at whether thesenew licenses in theNorth Sea oil, the oiland gas sea, North Sea oil and gasprojects, see whether they're good idea.And unfortunately, and it isunfortunately, they stillare a good idea to keep thecountry going.Yeah. That's not the sad thing, but it is theidea of we still need them.They're still required and needed.Yeah.And we're still going to probably needthem after 2050 when we've got to thismagic net zero.Yeah.And then we can start moving to carbonnegative, but is it all going to be toolate?Well, that's probably a question thatwe're going to have to look at and returnto in another episode of going green.You've been listening to the going greenpodcast, looking at here, new licensesthe North Sea,whether they're good or bad.Our feeling is they're probably.They're needed.Yeah.Not necessarily good or bad.They're not, they're notgood, but they are needed.And so we, we think we're going to haveto sort of go alongwith this until we cancome up with a much better solution.And so until we can find a bettersolution, it's goodbye from me.And a goodbye from me.You take care.Bye bye.