This week UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced that he would ‘max out’ oil and gas production in the North Sea. He promised hundreds of new oil and gas licences, with the government claiming that this will “secure our domestic energy supply and reduce reliance on hostile states.”
“We have all witnessed how Putin has manipulated and weaponised energy,” Sunak said. Now, “more than ever,” we need domestically produced fossil fuels. Unfortunately, he insists, “there are those who would rather that it come from hostile states than from the supplies we have here at home.”
Who are these hostile states that are providing our gas?
Here are the government’s own figures for our gas imports:
77% of Britain’s gas imports are from Norway.
These figures are from 2021, which is the most up to date official data from the Office of National Statistics. That year Russia provided 4% of our gas, so even two years ago it would be an odd thing to base energy policy around.
It’s changed since then. By the spring of 2023, Russian energy imports had fallen to zero. This information is from a government briefing congratulating itself on reducing its dependence on Russian energy, so Sunak ought to be aware of this. Once it got to zero, the government banned any energy imports from the country.
If energy imports from Russia were successfully eliminated and then banned by Rishi Sunak’s government, why is he justifying the growth of UK oil and gas by citing Russia energy?
It can only be because it’s not Russia that he’s referring to as a hostile state. It must be Norway.
I mean, it’s possible that Sunak is telling us a load of nonsense, like David Cameron did about fracking almost exactly ten years ago. But that would suggest that the Conservative Party have learned nothing about energy and climate change in a decade. And it can’t be lies, because Sunak promised us “integrity, professionalism and accountability at every level”.
So I guess he must just really hate Norway.
The Earthbound Report 