North Sea jobs go

Jobs are being cut in the North Sea oil industry. Although, of course, I hope those losing their jobs soon find new work, we need to invest far more in renewables and less in the past. Oil and gas do not need subsidies. We should be looking to the future.

Also, whilst I can fully understand the short-term benefits of fracking, I see this as a backward step: far better we were investing more in better insulation and renewables.

See http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-32065506 .

Oil prices

Funny (strange) how oil prices have fallen again in the last week or so, yet prices at the pumps have increased. Of course, the big oil companies will have many reasons for the lag. Let us hope prices for oil and diesel do actually fall again.

Oil prices

The price of a barrel of oil seems to be rising again and stood at around $58 today. Maybe the oil companies will be increasing their prices very soon!  Most prices for domestic fuel have dropped  far less than the drop  in wholesale prices.

Collapsing North Sea Oil?

See http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-30525539 .

If the continuing fall in oil prices results in a shift to carbon-neutral fuels, then this may be a blessing in disguise: for far too long we have subsidised fossil fuels whereas our focus needs to be on renewables.  I hope any who lose jobs in oil in the North Sea oil industry find alternative jobs fast in the renewables sector instead.

Falling oil prices

Oil prices continue to fall worldwide for many reasons.  See http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-30247276. I think North Sea Oil is a minor part of our trade figures these days. Had Scotland become independent, the falling oil revenues might have been very serious.

"Welcome to the new world of oil," said Michael Wittner, Societe Generale's senior oil analyst. "Saudi Arabia and Opec will no longer be the mechanism to balance the market, they have relinquished that role. Instead, the market itself - prices, in other words - will be the mechanism to rebalance the market. We cannot overstate what a dramatic and fundamental change this is for the oil market."

I think this is good news. The Middle East is no longer holding the world to ransom. Also, we are (too) slowly weaning ourselves off oil.

Norway

Unlike the UK, Norway decided to keep its oil wealth so it could invest it for the future.  By contrast, here in the UK we continue to live beyond our means and we have huge debts. See http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-28882312 . Norway seems to be an example of how we should have behaved. Now it is too late.

See also http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/dec/25/vitenberg-norways-mythical-oil-wealth/  for a touch of sour grapes.

Carbon Capture

See http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-27063796 .

We seem to be sleep-walking into the future with no real attempts to move away from a carbon based energy economy. Oil and gas are very heavily subsidised I believe in many western nations, so there is no imperative to make a switch to more sustainable energy sources. This being so we need to either change (fast) or move to measures that will mitigate the effects of high carbon use.

The UK looks to have been granted EU money (300M euros) to support a pilot project (see BBC report linked). This takes CO2 from coal power station emissions and buries it under the North Sea. If successful, CCS could be a useful technique as we make the switch to a lower carbon energy economy.

 We tend to forget the positive side of EU membership.