Fossil Fuels: Licensing
The question
To ask the Secretary of State for Energy Security and Net Zero, what analysis his Department has undertaken of the effect of restrictions on new oil and gas licences on future domestic energy production.
Answered by Michael Shanks
The North Sea Transition Authority maintains projections of future UK oil and gas production, and these are published on its website.
Whilst North Sea oil and gas will remain a vital resource for decades to come, the basin is in natural decline, with a 75% reduction in production between 1999 and 2024. In the North Sea Future Plan, we explained that awarding new licences for oil and gas would only make a marginal difference to overall production. New licences would typically take up to 10 years to develop and would not make us energy secure.
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