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| Wed, 24th Mar 2021 17:28:00 |
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The journey from black gold to green |
- Two reports this week tackle the tough choices of how to reduce harmful emissions in a country with a big oil and gas industry.
- One seeks to make that transition a fair one: the other signals that further drilling will have to be justified.
- Local capture of the economic benefits of that shift is a priority in both cases: if not, support for this vast project cannot be taken for granted.
Claiming 150,000 jobs - direct and indirect - supporting high value exports, avoiding high cost imports, driving technology and productivity, and providing some energy security in an insecure world: the oil and gas industry in the UK is a big deal.
So it ought to be a big deal also when it transitions to something very much greener. That process is under way, and a significant milestone is reached with the North Sea Transition Deal (UKTD), agreed between the industry, its regulator and the UK government.
Published on Wednesday, it was preceded this week with a "Just Transition" report by a Scottish government-appointed commission:
- by planning ahead, trying to align another round of industrial change with fairness
- support to those affected, helping them gain the skills to share in the benefits and to avoid paying the price
- buy-in from communities, to control transition rather than having it done to them, with an emphasis on wellbeing more than economic benefit
- It calls for this to be a "national mission - a collective endeavour"
Both reports carefully tiptoe round the reality for the economy of north-east Scotland in particular, and for those tens of thousands employed in extracting oil and gas. Oil and Gas UK has claimed that one in 25 Scottish jobs is dependent on the industry.
These reports also try to walk the very narrow line between maximising the remaining value from oil and gas under the seabed, and being true to the rhetoric about climate change.
Read original full article
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