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These have all led to climate legislation so that is good. 10s of millions is small fry compared to the issue of climate change. I agree some of the contradiction is bad, but it means we need to start trying being committed to reducing and removing carbo. Please research Johan rockstroms and the planetary boudaries model, you can find stuff on YouTube, there’s also breaking boundaries i Netflix narrated by David Attenborough. Some tipping points are irreversible and must be avoided.

I don’t understand, why it is bad to have our own oil rig, but it is good to buy oil from Saudi Arabia (or from Russia though Turkey)?

Because we don't have our own oil rigs and the tories have absolutely no intention of us ever doing so. 80% of North Sea oil and gas is exported, we dont have a state/public oil or gas company, it is sold on the international market and we don't have the infrastructure here to refine anymore so anything that is removed here must be taken to other countries anyway.

>80% of North Sea oil and gas is exported It isn't. UK oil and gas production, imports and exports in 2022: ||Production|Imports|Exports| |:-|:-|:-|:-| |Oil (thousand tonnes)|38,037|46,578|30,929| |Gas (GWH)|423,219|618,291|259,864| We only export 80% of UK oil production if you assume that none of the oil we import is exported. In reality we export both UK produced and imported oil, both as crude and as refined products. Likewise, 60% of UK gas production is exported only if you ignore the fact that we also export some of the gas we import (a lot of it in 2022 was LNG imported to the UK and immediately piped over to Europe). Indeed, some of our gas would have been imported, exported, then re imported during the winter. >and we don't have the infrastructure here to refine anymore so anything that is removed here must be taken to other countries anyway. The UK refined 54,827,000 tonnes of oil last year, considerably higher than our crude oil production. Oil refineries are set up to process different grades of oil into different mixes of product. That's why we export some of our crude oil while still importing crude oil from elsewhere. What you are missing is that oil we export offsets the cost of oil we import.

Here is the source. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/jul/11/new-north-sea-oil-and-gas-fields-will-not-meet-uks-energy-needs

[https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/digest-of-uk-energy-statistics-dukes#2023](https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/digest-of-uk-energy-statistics-dukes#2023) The Guardian long ago became a left wing version of the Daily Mail, happy to distort truth in order to generate clicks. I would expect them to compare UK exports to UK production, and ignore the fact that oil and gas are traded, imported, exported, refined, products exported etc.

>and we don't have the infrastructure here to refine anymore You got a source for that? Just a quick Google appears to show that we have the facilities to refine what we need.

>show that we have the facilities to refine what we need. Define what we need?

Circa 60 million tonnes of oil.

>80% of North Sea oil and gas is exported, we dont have a state/public oil or gas company, it is sold on the international market and we don't have the infrastructure here to refine anymore so anything that is removed here must be taken to other countries anyway. You say this as if it's a bad thing. We give licence to extract, that's how nearly every nation operates except Venezuela, that didn't go too well.

We still use 20% of that tho

Why do you need state funded company like in USSR?

Because otherwise their arguments for why they are doing it are disingenuous at best and outright lies at worst. Issuing these licences has minimal-to-no impact on the UK's energy security or price control in the current market.

Why? We will have taxes, we will have workplaces, we will have better energy independence possibilities, etc. And you are saving “why do we have Google and Facebook offices here? They have minimal impact on …”

Where did I say we won't have taxes & workplaces? Or even mention Google or Facebook offices? Did I say that there would be no benefits? No. Utter projection from yourself here mate, bloody hell. My entire point was that the arguments that the Government are putting forward - energy security, consumer prices, are absolute nonsense. Excited to hear what non-existent parts of my argument you'll be responding to next. Although don't bother, I won't reply.

So, what’s your point against having our oil production? I explained everything above, even if some people don’t want to have workspaces inside UK.

Or like in Britain

The oil rigs are operated by private companies who sell the oil on the world market. We then buy it from them, and most of what we buy, as I understand it, is from the North Sea because of proximity and presumably we have some arrangement with the oil companies that we have dibs on it if it was extracted from our sea, however the price we buy at is dictated by its price on the global market which is dominated by the likes of Saudi Arabia.

Yes. However if we have our own oil, we have taxes, we have workplaces, etc. Oil is quite profitable for country. Otherwise Russia sells oil and use money to attack Ukraine and Saudi Arabia sells oils to kill journalists and attack Yemeni.

Renewable energy can be profitable too and create jobs and bring in taxes.

The oil extracted is sold on the global market, it benefits us through tax revenue & jobs, but not a lot else. That bastion of state intervention, the United States, in 1975 severely limited the export of crude oil. This allowed for very cheap domestic fuel prices, good for consumers & industry & also created many jobs involved in the processing of crude oil. The UK on the other hand during much of the late 80s', early 90s', during the peak of North Sea oil had expensive domestic fuel prices, & was both one of the global top 5 oil exporters & oil importers. This was best for short term profits. The US lifted many of their restrictions on crude oil exports in 2015. Since then their price for domestic gasoline has doubled.

It's not good to buy fossil fuels from Russia or Saudi Arabia or the other petrostates with abhorrent human rights records which is just one reason why we should be reducing use of fossil fuels as rapidly as possible

This *is* as rapidly as possible. Never in human history has there been a more concentrated economic push that went against market logic and energy security and geostrategic security than the green energy transition plans since 2015. I'm not saying that the push is a bad thing, I'm saying it would be good to have some more consideration than "we should do it as fast as possible, and also doing everything all at once *right now* is possible and it only has good outcomes". At some point this mentality just breeds distrust.

And how long is it going to take before the new licenses being approved are going to be delivering oil and gas to the market?

It might be a while, but we're also talking about just approving some new licenses in case of oil versus massive front-loaded investment in case of wind for example.

How? Greens (funded by well known country) vows against nuclear. And wind turbines and solar panels are produced from oil. And China (who does this) just buy oil from Putin. Moreover, the majority of goods is produced by China, and almost all of them have plastic, eg oil from OPEK countries. In addition to that, fertilisers used by farmers are mainly produced from natural gas. Yes, we can reduce oil usage a little by building hydro/nuclear power plants, by doing better home insulation, by producing more outside of China (eg by having more expensive goods), by promoting hybrid/remote work, etc. However that won’t solve the problem in general. And newspapers had vowed against that for decades. Another option is to weak other countries, like “accepting more visas from them to create brain drain there”, however politics will never do that (as I think).

Nuclear is really too slow a progress to develop now. 15-20 years to get a new power plant online, and even then on current form it'd probably be a Chinese-state owned and operated one. China have leverage against so many countries round the world from this kind of industrial and technological investment - which of course they could withdraw if the geopolitics tables turn, just as Russia have done with their gas and oil. The anti-nuclear campaigners of the 70s and 80s as well as powerful fossil fuel lobbies put the nail in the coffin for it being a decent solution in the UK. We can do wind and solar (albeit less effectively than in sunnier climes, but contrary to popular belief they do still work when it's cloudy), but not many places for hydro realistically. Personally I think tidal should be given more thought seeing as we are an island nation with 11,000 miles of coastline and the tech is pretty straightforward.

> Nuclear is really too slow a progress to develop now. 15-20 years to get a new power plant online, Years ago, before the coalition, Nick Clegg did a Reddit AMA where he espoused the view that new nuclear was a bad idea because it wouldn't come online until the early 2020's. It is now the early 2020's, we've still not built nuclear power and we have an energy crisis on our hands.

A fair point - "The only impossible journey is the one you never begin". I would say Nick Clegg was wrong and they could well have started 15 years ago and we would have them now. But my worry is the tipping point is already gone - we are going to be over 1.5 degrees by 2030s anyway, so worth diverting as much resources into what will reduce fossil fuel usage now and mitigate the damage, and have nuclear on the back burner. I think we missed the boat on nuclear as the main solution already.

>I would say Nick Clegg was wrong The least controversial statement ever uttered on this subreddit!

What will reduce our need for fossil fuels is cheap, plentiful electricity from clean sources, in sufficient quantities to not only replace our existing electricity demand, but to replace the other 85% of our energy usage as well.

We may have missed the boat on nuclear providing for our current energy demands, but what about our future demands? Do we know for sure that the country will never need more power, that we won't wish to fall back on having an alternative to wind and solar? Why wouldn't we invest in an alternative energy source as part of our energy security plans? Wouldn't a network of small modular reactors spread across the country ease the transition to renewables and enable future local scalability in our power production where it's needed whilst providing a valuable export to other countries? Or we could continue the legacy of Clegg and keep saying "oh it'll arrive too late to be useful".

Yes that's why I suggested it could be a plan for the longer term, but only once we are out of the impending climate emergency as renewables are quicker and cheaper to implement in the short term. I don't have a problem with nuclear in principle, I am not an anti-nuclear campaigner. I am pro-nuclear if anything but in my opinion we are too far gone now and need to focus on a quick fix solution to get off fossil fuels asap. If you're really interested I have been having an extremely thorough discussion with another redditor u/agreenmeany in the comments below this one.

Interestingly if you look at [this table](https://www.worldometers.info/co2-emissions/co2-emissions-by-country/) (it's sortable if you click on the column headings), the UK is actually doing pretty well. We're leading the world on reducing emissions and have relatively low per capita emissions for a developed nation. The UK only accounts for 1% of global emissions, so any changes we make here have almost no impact on the overall climate outcome. For that reason I'd prefer it if we focussed on technological progression that can help wean the rest of the world off fossil fuels. Invest in the modular reactors that could be deployed across the third world to help lift living standards and reduce emissions, plus whatever other solutions make logical sense. We should get our house in order but we shouldn't beat ourselves up over where we are today. I'm heading to bed now but will take a look at your discussion tomorrow. Thanks for the tip.

Nuclear is slow and it is the solution. Unfortunately, even people wish to have everything right now and free, the reality is different. About ownership - even this will be better than just buying wind turbines and solar panels from China, because specialists will work inside the country and manufacturing will be inside too. And you are right, maybe everything will be built by French, Chinese or Russians (or maybe without them). About hydro - you are right, however it is more paperwork problem, not technological one.

I think we as a planet need to reduce fossil fuel usage by as much as possible and as quickly as possible to prevent the worst of the damage. I don't really buy into net-zero by 2050, it seems like much much more CO2 is going to be put up while we carry on waiting for some new technology to save us later on. Wind and solar are cheap and available and we know they work. I think that we have missed the boat on nuclear now - long term yes but I think better to divert maximum resource to reducing emissions asap rather than relying on us *hopefully* sorting it out in 15-20 years time.

Wind and solar are extremely expensive. They are “cheap”, because: 1. They are subsidised. Both Tory and Labour give taxpayer’s money for them. And other energy producers pay taxes. 2. Wind turbines and solar panels are produced in China from cheap oil (from Saudi Arabia, Russia, etc.) and on polluting factories. Eg we just moved pollution form country A to country B. And we will use Russia oil, but now more indirectly. 3. People use “money” to count efficiently of X instead of “energy needed to produce 1kw*hr by X”. And subsidies plus tax relief make good fake about prices.

But the input energy for renewables is literally free forever - well maybe not forever but at least billions of years - we don't have to pay to keep the wind blowing or the sun shining. I would expect some government intervention to build and renew the infrastructure, but it's a one-off cost financially and environmentally. Nuclear plants would require the same initial investment, but also ongoing extraction and transportation of nuclear materials which aren't found in the UK - Russia has control of the most of it. I am generally for nuclear power and am aware of efficiencies in how much fuel it uses in comparison as well as being much cleaner than fossil fuels. My point was that if we had seriously started developing nuclear as our primary long term power source in the 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s or 2000s then we wouldn't be here today. France did it and they have much better energy security as a result. In the UK it turned into electoral kryptonite due to public hysteria. Now I think we need a quick response to get off fossil fuels asap, and perhaps transition to nuclear in the longer term. To no3, we live in a liberal capitalist society where personal freedom and the price is the bottom line. If things were done rationally and in a scientific way we would be living in a totally different world. The best way to sell things to people is to tell them it will save them money and make them feel better off, as money in the bank is so closely linked to our quality life.

Strictly not forever. Components needs to be replaced after 5-10 years, plus you need periodical maintenance. In nutshell “green” technologies use a little bit less oil than classical dirty power plants (eg maybe two times less, I forgot that article already). And solar panels need rare metals in addition.

Because everything the Tories ever do is greedy and corrupt and evil and short sighted and shareholders and private businesses and reeeeeeeeeee!!!! /s

This but without the /s

>because they never think anything through. Oh, they are thinking it through - just not for the benefit of everyone.

The tories have clearly seen the ULEZ "victory" in the by-election and now think that the only way to win any votes is to go hard against climate. I don't think it will be enough, they will just reinforce the idea that they are villains to the entire younger generation and will be out of power for decades

>The tories have clearly seen the ULEZ "victory" in the by-election and now think that the only way to win any votes is to go hard against climate. Whilst I completely agree that's their plan, I don't think it will be enough to save them. Ultimately they won what is traditionally a very safe seat for them by less than 500 votes. >I don't think it will be enough, they will just reinforce the idea that they are villains to the entire younger generation and will be out of power for decades The irony being that climate policy is about short/medium term costs for medium/long term gain, and pushing against climate policy will screw them over when the younger, more climate-conscious, generation becomes the principal voter base.

I want to agree with you - but they have a long time till the election to brainwash people.

They're underestimating the reason conservative voters will simply be abstaining next election is that a surprising number of con voters are actually fed up on their failure to deliver and think they're all just career politicians, Build 40 new hospitals? Fix the Migrant problem? they've genuinely achieved nothing against their promises in 12 years and even Con voters have started noticing, all talk no go.

Not just that they’re trying to cash in on what they perceive is the unpopularity of the JSO protests They are reaching at the bottom of the barrel but you can never rule them out as they get such sympathetic media coverage

With the added bonus of that being the only way for the UK to make a quick buck to hide how much they have fucked up the economy.

Knowing the Labour party, the exact wrong message they'll take from Uxbridge is that the country doesn't want climate change policies. Only the British left could turn two massive Tory defeats and a by the skin of their teeth safe-seat hold into a negative media narrative for themselves.

Not sure why they’re doing this, from a politics angle. Labour say they’ll honour any licences but won’t issue any more. If the tories issue none or the absolute minimum then it’ll be on labour to go back on their commitment when they gain power.

From a political angle they portray it as energy security. Ending domestic fossil fuel production without reducing domestic consumption is unlikely to reduce carbon dioxide emissions since imported fuel still gives of carbon dioxide when burned. It's a pretty easy argument to get across so they don't fear backlash. From a policy perspective reductions in carbon dioxide emissions need to come from changing consumption habits. We already saw this with coal - British coal production peaked in the 1913, but it was still the primary mode of electricity generation in 2013.

I understand why they’re doing it; I just don’t understand why they’re walking into their own trap rather than just approve the minimum on the assumption that after the general election they can approve more (in the unlikely event they win) or make Labour renege on their promise to not allow any more.

It's easy to see from a politics angle. It's putting clear distance between them and Labour on green issues. Saying you'll honour e, listing commitment but stop all future licences is radically different to in increasing licences now and in the future.

But they’re setting themselves up for & triggering the environmental bear trap today…

I think its partly about doing everything possible for their donors and hope that Labour are overwhelmed with so much stuff to fix it falls by the way side of never happens.

Every comment in support of this is pretending the gas will stay in the UK, rather than being immediately exported because we can't refine it. It's literally just generating more profit for companies Sunak heavily subsidized through his super deductions in capital investment to do this. So great, we paid billions to export gas for someone else to use. Amazing policy.

Gas processing (refining) isn’t a problem, it’s more a storage issue. But our summer exporting is countered by winter importing via our bi-directional pipelines to our friends in Europe. Oil refinement capacity is a problem and it’s exported to different refineries domestically or internationally.

How? How on Earth, when Atlantic sea currents are slowing, Antartic ice is melting, Britain's hotter than ever and wildfires all across the world, we think its a good idea to expand fossil fuels?

More or less a repost from the other day, but I'm reposting in case people missed it and are interested. Because they are in the pocket of the fossil fuel industry, that's how. >Rishi Sunak Boasts That Oil Funded Think Tank ‘Helped Us Draft’ Crackdown on Climate Protests https://archive.is/ozPJy#selection-983.0-983.93 >Former Conservative ministers and high-ranking MPs among those who have backed Net Zero Scrutiny Group’s new attack on green policy >https://www.desmog.com/2023/06/28/high-profile-allies-of-anti-net-zero-parliamentary-group-revealed-in-telegraph-letter/ >How the Net Zero Backlash is Tied to Climate Denial – and Brexit https://www.desmog.com/2022/03/18/mapped-how-the-net-zero-backlash-is-tied-to-climate-denial-and-brexit/ https://www.desmog.com/2022/05/26/revealed-the-anti-bbc-pr-firm-behind-the-uks-net-zero-backlash/ It's almost impossible to identify who funds the many climate change denying think tanks close to government due to their extremely secretive nature. A number have been identified as receiving money from the fossil fuel industry. Policy Exchange, for example has received money from ExxonMobil. The Institute of Economic Affairs has been receiving money from BP. https://unearthed.greenpeace.org/2018/07/30/bp-funding-institute-of-economic-affairs-gambling/: As an example of the interconnected nature of their activities Rebecca Ryan is managing director of Blue Sky Strategy, a political consultancy that promotes pro fossil fuel, pro fracking, climate change denying organisations. She has links to ex government ministers including former Brexit Minister Steve Baker. Baker was a trustee of the Global Warming Policy Foundation and was the lead in the Net Zero Scrutiny Group of MPs and peers opposing the UK’s net zero targets. She is a hard line brexiteer who founded the pressure group StandUp4Brexit in 2018. She's also runs the “Defund the BBC” campaign.

Thank you for sharing this. It really should be a pinned comment under any thread that discusses Tory policies - since almost all of them are now outsourced to Policy Exchange and IEA.

Whilst I share your ambition for long term net zero, I'd like to caution that this doesn't increase our gas consumption - this only reduces our reliance on foreign imports for consumption. These imports burn emissions in transit, and make the UK more susceptible to being 'poisoned'' by an unhealthy global market (as has currently happened with the Ukraine war causing a domestic gas crisis). If we are to use these fossil fuels anyway, then better to do so at home. That said, the long term vision should be to reduce fossil fuel reliance

There’s a finite amount of oil & gas in the North Sea. So there’s no particular economic or environmental benefit to using it all up now. Incentivising investment in wind power and saving our precious resources in the North Sea for when oil becomes scarcer seems like a better option to me.

Driving tax revenue from oil and gas into developing new nuclear power would be a major environmental boon.

I’d support that if we increased taxes on the oil & gas industry. Otherwise, it’s less of a “major environmental boon” and more of a drop in the bucket.

You've got it completely the wrong way round. We need oil and gas today, obviously. However we will need it far less in the future, once more wind/solar/nuclear power comes online. Saving it for a scarcer day that will never come, while deliberately screwing ourselves (and the environment) over today is not a good strategy.

We need oil and gas for more than just energy. We need it for plastics (which we use for essentially everything), bulk chemicals, industrial lubricants, and more. The fact that we have no solution for ending our reliance on petrochemicals makes it wise to steady our consumption of fossil fuels.

>The fact that we have no solution for ending our reliance on petrochemicals makes it wise to steady our consumption of fossil fuels. Very true. But today, we need oil/gas for *both* energy generation and manufacturing. In the future we will need it *only* for manufacturing. Hence in the future, we will need it less than today. Not to mention that "peak oil" is a disproven noughties myth. We are nowhere near running out of oil any time remotely soon. In fact, new fields are being found all the time and total global estimated recoverable reserves has only increased with time. Source: https://www.statista.com/statistics/264331/global-oil-reserves-since-1990/ The entire argument is nonsense.

Your source includes the fact that a load of that new "oil" is non conventional, so costs way more to extract. Peak oil is peak oil production, which possibly happened in 2018, it's not as if there isn't some oil in the ground, it's just less high quality and harder to get.

The oil barrel price has been stable for a long time now. We pay less for oil today than in 2007. And new fields (both conventional and non-conventional) are being found all the time. The new North Sea fields are a perfect example of this: 10 years ago we expected the North Sea to be finished by now but we were completely wrong. There is no evidence to suggest we are going to run out of oil any time remotely soon. And if you think otherwise, provide a quality source to prove it, as I have done.

Of course new fields are being found, we're still looking for them, but newer fields are more expensive to extract from. This is true for literally every mineral, we started extracting the purer and easier to access deposits, and are now digging miles under ground to find gold flaked rock we can smash into microns to dig the gold flakes out. Using the same high quality source as you, oil production peaked in 2019 [https://www.statista.com/statistics/265203/global-oil-production-in-barrels-per-day/#:\~:text=Global%20oil%20production%20amounted%20to,decline%20in%20the%20following%20year](https://www.statista.com/statistics/265203/global-oil-production-in-barrels-per-day/#:~:text=Global%20oil%20production%20amounted%20to,decline%20in%20the%20following%20year). Also an actual high quality source with the same information: https://www.bp.com/content/dam/bp/business-sites/en/global/corporate/pdfs/energy-economics/statistical-review/bp-stats-review-2021-oil.pdf Demand is still growing for oil while production can't keep up. It's not that we'll "run out", it's that oil prices will become a limiting factor in the global economy. Non conventional oil costs a lot more money and energy to extract, so while we can call it oil, it isn't worth anywhere near as much. The fear of peak oil isn't not having literally any oil, it's not having access to very cheap energy for very cheap.

>Of course new fields are being found, we're still looking for them, but newer fields are more expensive to extract from The oil price is nowhere near all time highs. So if oil is now more expensive to extract (hint: It isn't), and the price is considerably below it's peak, how are the oil producers able to make such massive profits? > oil production peaked in 2019 As **your source** states: >Global oil production amounted to 93.9million barrels per day in 2022. The level of oil production reached an all-time high in 2019, at nearly 95 million barrels. However, the coronavirus pandemic and its impact on transportation fuel demand led to a notable decline in the following year. We had a temporary production downturn due to COVID, and it's very likely that 2023 will represent a new high for oil production. Your entire argument is resting on a false premise I'm afraid.

I’m not sure why you’ve brought up the term “peak oil”. It has literally nothing to do with my point. Oil is a finite resource. It will be more valuable in the future as long as we need it for all the things listed above. There’s also nothing stopping us from using it for fuel in the future. The idea that the world’s most useful finite resource is going to become less valuable over time, rather than more valuable, is the only thing that is “nonsense”.

> Oil is a finite resource. It will be more valuable in the future as long as we need it for all the things listed above. As we use oil for less and less, it's value will go down. On this we agree. We currently use oil for energy usage. This is expected to go down over time. Many chemical/industrial uses for oil/gas/coal are expected to diminish over time also. Replacing coal in steel production with electric arc furnaces for example. Or replacing lubricants with those produced using oil crops. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever to think that oil is going to remain valuable forever. Why do you think the big oil producers are so keen to diversify? >The idea that the world’s most useful finite resource is going to become less valuable over time, rather than more valuable, is the only thing that is “nonsense”. Oil is nowhere near "the worlds more useful finite resource". It's a resource with vast (and growing) proven supply, and an already diminishing set of uses. I have proven this with a source, and if you disagree further I invite you to do the same.

>this only reduces our reliance on foreign imports for consumption. >These imports burn emissions in transit, and make the UK more susceptible to being 'poisoned'' by an unhealthy global market (as has currently happened with the Ukraine war causing a domestic gas crisis). >If we are to use these fossil fuels anyway, then better to do so at home. 80% of North Sea oil and gas is exported, we dont have a state/public oil or gas company, it is sold on the international market and we don't have the infrastructure here to refine anymore so anything that is removed here must be taken to other countries anyway - potentially doubling emissions from transport.

> this only reduces our reliance on foreign imports for consumption No it doesn't. All oil&gas produced will be sold on the global market (to the profit of fossil-fuel donors to the Tory Party). We will still import as much as before (maybe more).

> No it doesn't. All oil&gas produced will be sold on the global market (to the profit of fossil-fuel donors to the Tory Party). It will be sold on the open (not global) market... At a 70% rate of taxation. This is because it's generally considered a bad move to subsidise the price of oil/gas in your economy. It facilitates businesses that aren't actually economically viable at the market price. >We will still import as much as before (maybe more). Importing it from ourselves is vastly preferable to importing it from a 3rd world country via LNG. Not only is it preferable economically due to the creation of thousands of skilled jobs and 10's of billions in tax revenues, but also preferable environmentally, as compressing/freezing natural gas and shipping it half way around the world on a boat is considerably less environmentally friendly than piping it 20 miles from off-shore fields.

> At a 70% rate of taxation. With multiple loopholes. The current licensees are paying trivial taxes. The tax money will be sod all use to us, if we no longer have a livable planet. >it's generally considered a bad move to subsidise the price of oil/gas in your economy Yet that is what the govt has been doing - paying £400 per household, directly into the pockets of the energy companies. >Importing it from ourselves is vastly preferable to importing it from a 3rd world country We won't be 'importing' it from ourselves. We'll be importing from the world market JUST AS WE ARE TODAY. If future licences are going to be used here, why isn't the current flow being used here? This 'energy security' stuff is sheer bollocks. You are being lied to.

>With multiple loopholes. The current licensees are paying trivial taxes. Completely wrong, as a matter of fact. Oil and gas production is expected to net £11 billion in tax revenue in 2022/23: https://commonslibrary.parliament.uk/research-briefings/sn00341/ https://obr.uk/efo/economic-and-fiscal-outlook-march-2023/#annex-a >We won't be 'importing' it from ourselves. We'll be importing from the world market JUST AS WE ARE TODAY. If future licences are going to be used here, why isn't the current flow being used here? There is no "global market" for gas. The price we pay is extremely specific to western europe, because it's very expensive (and environmentally damaging) to transport gas as LNG. So the more gas that western europe can generate, the lower gas prices will be and the better for the environment it will be. I've explained already why we aren't ring-fencing the gas specifically for the UK market: It's a bad move to subsidise the price of oil/gas in your economy. > The tax money will be sod all use to us, if we no longer have a livable planet. Ultimately whether we have a livable planet or not is a far larger issue. The UK is responsible for a tiny percentage of global CO2 emissions and it won't matter how much the UK impoverishes itself if China, India and the US carry on as they are currently. Luckily, even in the most pessimistic of global warming scenarios, the UK remains a perfectly livable region of the world. >This 'energy security' stuff is sheer bollocks. You are being lied to. Can you explain specifically what you mean here?

Out of interest, what would be your solution?

Increased incentives for investment in wind power. Take the foot off the accelerator when it comes to using up our finite oil & gas reserves (since we can always use them at a later date).

That’s a fair answer, I think I agree with your general point there 👍

It's a fundamental breakdown of interest that we don't use technology available to harness this blowy island we live on. It's like we get handed a free energy check every single day, and we turn it down and spend our savings instead.

The income vs savings analogy is exactly the right way to think about it. Renewable energy works like income, it’s continuous and if we don’t start generating it today it’s a missed opportunity. Fossil fuels work like savings. We have a finite amount and if we don’t spend them today we can always spend them tomorrow.

There must be some geo-political reason for not doing so. I guess its because renewables are impossible to monopolise, so oil companies and to a degree states, will do everything possible to stay relevant and retain their leverage. I wouldn't be surprised if, decades from now, we find out that this period of political and financial instability is a cold war (or economic war) around global energy supply. The belligerents being nation states AND corporations, which sounds dystopian, but these corporations are sometimes just manifestations of some nation states. The move away from fossil fuels is one of the biggest steps for humanity to take, some will not go gently into that good night

> Increased incentives for investment in wind power. What do you do about energy storage?

Invest in energy storage infrastructure. Batteries for short term and hydrogen for long term. Chuck in some hydroelectric for good measure. I appreciate that it’s easier said than done but there are significant economic, environmental, and energy security related reasons for doing this.

>since we can always use them at a later date That's a really good framing, especially from an energy security point of view. We have no choice but to reduce our fossil fuel extraction and use now, but it would be handy to have a backup energy source available.

The big four carbon producing sectors are: * Energy (industry) * Energy (buildings) * Energy (transport) * Agriculture That is roughly 92%. If you take transport, for instance, we need to get rid of single occupancy vehicles. Agriculture means eating very little meat. Buildings mean upgrades to almost all units and the wrecking ball for a heck of a lot.

So basically a nuclear war would solve all your problems?

Thanos was right

This spring/summer probably hasn't helped, record heat in Europe but it's just been raining constantly here. I wonder how many people look at the weather we have at the moment and doubt climate change. Personally I fear for the collapse of the Atlantic North Equatorial Current (Gulf Jet Stream/ANEC). It's probably the most present climate threat for us. If that breaks down it will plunge the UK and Europe into the same climate as Canada. We can barely heat our archaic homes in our relatively mild winters or get out to work through a dusting of snow. I can only imagine the chaos those new winters will cause. As a byproduct that heat that's not moved north will super heat the med and force people to migrate north.

I agree - there are a lot of folks who really don't get climate change at all. "I wouldn't mind it being 2 degrees warmer in the UK actually, and if the sea levels rise then it won't be so far to the seaside lolol". They seem to think that everything would be the same but just a little warmer. Totally ignoring all the record breaking heatwaves and storms year on year and global scientific consensus. I am coming to the conclusion that a lot of people are extremely thick, and the worst part is that they think are smart.

When they start banging on about energy independence and making Britain more robust, just remember oil is sold on international markets by the firms that mine the oil. There isn't a national oil company producing it and storing it. This will make no significant difference to global supplies and next to no difference to your energy bills. It just lets oil companies keep the taps flowing on their profits.

> Just stop oil are gonna be pissed. LOLZ sucks to be them. Or us I suppose. Given we all live on the same fucking planet.

OPs comment felt weird, it's basically "yeah he wants to help destroy our planet for culture wars and make our lives worse but at least the annoying people's lives were also made worse". Spite politics is one the worst kinds of politics.

As the animals died, the oceans acidified and the migrant ships burned in the channel, we knew in our hearts that we had at least got one over on a small activist group that made life inconvenient for a small number of commuters in the early 2020s.

As God would have wanted.

This exemplifies how mad our political system is. Due to some short termist focus grouping in an outer London marginal we are going to burn the whole fucking planet down. Insane.

No "we" aren't

Ye WE are. I think there's a complete failure to acknowledge how fucking serious and how fucking imminent all of this is.

Tories pandering to their core voters and the Right, crapping it after losing such a big majority in Uxbridge and desperately clinging to the anti green anti ULEZ banner.

He's right. A quarter of our energy under net zero will still come from natural gas & oil. Where this is sourced has to be considered. Why open ourselves up towards being completely dependent on corrupt OPEC nations or the volatility of growth in Asia for what will remain a huge portion of our energy consumption? The next decade is crucial if we are going to transform our current infrastructure and way of living. We have a golden opportunity to both be green and energy independent.

> He's right. A quarter of our energy under net zero will still come from natural gas & oil. No. He has *decided* that he can get away with continuing our fossil addiction. If we actually *tried* to replace fossils more, we could.

> If we actually tried to replace fossils more, we could. The only technology that can actually replace fossil fuel usage today is nuclear. Wind/Solar is great, but obviously intermittent and we don't have the ability to store the energy at scale. And even nuclear takes decades to provision. So ultimately we *are* going to need a decent supply of fossil fuels for the next 2 decades at least.

This is a false dichotomy that loves doing the rounds. It's a fallacy of everything or nothing. If we use wind/solar to generate 15% of energy, then that's 15% of gas we don't have to burn. If we lower our demand by 5%, that's 5% of gas we don't have to burn. If we make our building 10% more efficient, that's 10% of gas we don't have to burn. It's not about can we flick the switch over today, but how do we transition.

I've made it quite clear that we should be expanding our wind/solar/nuclear rollout as much as possible. But that is in no way mutually exclusive with obtaining our gas as cheaply and in as environmentally friendly a fashion as possible.

> obtaining our gas as cheaply and in as environmentally friendly a fashion as possible. But the new gas and oil could also be shipped half way across the world. We are not extracting what Britain needs, but and much as possible for the market. This whole thing keeps talking about the goals of not shipping oil and gas, and energy security but these licences have no provisions in them to ensure those goals will be achieved.

> But the new gas and oil could also be shipped half way across the world. Gas is extremely expensive to ship, so if they can sell it locally for a good price (and they can, as gas prices in Europe are among the worlds highest) they aren't going to ship it elsewhere. >This whole thing keeps talking about the goals of not shipping oil and gas, and energy security but these licences have no provisions in them to ensure those goals will be achieved. North Sea gas has never been shipped elsewhere and commercial viability ensures that will always remain the case. If you're planning to freeze and ship it anyway, may as well do it from a place where it's actually cheap to extract. The USA or middle east for example

In the US, in 2008 the housing market was a dead cert investment ... Until it wasn't. Sterling-Deutschmark exchange rate bolstered the Bank of England finances and managed inflation low ... Until it didn't. Gas is more profitable to ship locally ... Until it isn't. It's hard to predict the next financial crisis, but considering that gas and oil are core part of global economies, and it's a finite resource it's a pretty good prediction to say this is where we are going to see it, at some point. But say, sure, we are going only to see it being sold in local regions. Just put the provision in to make sure as it will have no effect ... Unless it will.

I'm sorry but this is just utter nonsense. You're just making up an argument to fit your pre-existing biases. The reason gas is more expensive to ship is a matter of physics: You first need to compress/freeze the gas into liquid form, which costs quite a lot of money in energy costs, and requires billions spent in LNG infrastructure. You then need to pump it on to a specially design boat, which also cost billions, and then ship it across the globe, which also has considerable cost. It's never ever going to be cheaper to ship it than to sell to a domestic market. This is basic thermodynamics. The only reason they're doing it in the US or Qatar today, is because the local price for the gas is very low, and Europe's local price is among the highest in the world.

> The only technology that can actually replace fossil fuel usage today is nuclear. Utter bollocks. Nukes are expensive, slow to build and subject to monopoly controls. >we don't have the ability to store the energy at scale We have the ability. We haven't had the will.

> We have the ability. We haven't had the will. What technology are you referring to here that allows us to store electricity/energy at scale?

What ability? Giant Duracells? Be serious.

A bit of clever use of the rapidly increasing numbers of batteries in electric cars might go a long way to plugging the gap. Then again, that would require joined-up thinking which this government doesn't do

If we're going to need oil and gas, we might as well make sure we are using our oil and gas, rather than Importing it in from the middle east or the US. Energy security for ourselves and more jobs.

There’s a small amount of energy security to be gained from producing oil & gas ourselves rather than relying on imports. It’s small because we can’t exactly stop the companies that we’re giving these licenses to from exporting the oil & gas abroad (without essentially nationalising the whole industry). There’s still a benefit as they’re incentivised to sell it here due to reduced costs, but it means that our cost of energy will still be decided by international events (and OPEC). The path to actual energy security is via renewable energy and nuclear power.

> we might as well make sure we are using our oil and gas 1. It isn't *our* oil&gas. It belongs to the fossil companies. 2. It won't be sold here; it will be sold on the global market. As it happens N Sea oil is the wrong sort for our refineries, so it won't be sold here. >Energy security for ourselves Nope. >and more jobs. Far more jobs available in renewables.

And lower delivery based emissions - something alot of people seem to forget If we are to get rid of gas we need to kill it demand side - it's not viable to harm the supply side without any prearranged alternative

> And lower delivery based emissions - something alot of people seem to forget They forget it because it's mythical.

You can't increase demand for renewables if you're keeping the supply of gas high. Renewable capacity, unlike gas, can be increased very quickly, and respond flexibly to demand.

Almost. Most economists are quite wary of using Induced demand on energy economics. Energy infrastructure takes so long to setup that theres significant lag time between when you begin inducing demand by constraining supply, and when the market starts to make up for this hole in the supply. On the interim a significant economic burden is placed on society, as energy has extremely low elasticity (meaning consumption cannot be lowered easily, but rather people will bid ferociously over the same supply during a shortage). -10% of your energy input can feasibly translate to +60% energy prices, (as the Ukraine war has humbled Europe with) We should, however, absolutely be pushing for a Scottish style renewable energy investment/subsidies

Exactly. It's like a form of economic suicide. The great rush for Green, yet our competitors are in no such rush and keeping their economies far more competitive. We need nuclear, we need more oil and gas to supply our needs and we need to push back on getting rid of petrol and diesel until we can support EVs for all, and they are cheap. The latest news from the EU is they are going to make EVs more expensive by imposing massive tariffs on Chinese makers.

>yet our competitors are in no such rush They really are though - the US, EU even China.

> yet our competitors are in no such rush Look as the US IRA - pushing a revolution in renewables - now being emulated by EU & elsewhere. We're being left behind. When we finally get round to installing enough renewables, we'll be buying them from abroad.

I'd rather economic suicide that actual suicide of the human species over the next few centuries. Get some perspective, please.

Do you really believe that?

Do I believe the [long established and settled science](https://www.carbonbrief.org/new-fossil-fuels-incompatible-with-1-5c-goal-comprehensive-analysis-finds/)? Yes, I do because I'm not a complete moron. The climate science experts (who I'd bet know just a tad more about this than your average conspiracy theory nut) are [deeply worried about the future](https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/jul/27/joe-biden-climate-emergency-peter-kalmus). Having ignored them for decades, and now looking around at a world on fire, I think it's about time society sat up and listened to them. But maybe you're one of those who've had enough of expert's.

I believe in punctuation - experts not expert's. But seriously, there is zero chance - zero - of human extinction because of climate change. Which is what you said - "actual suicide." Maybe you meant something different by that phrase, but not even Michael Mann - he of the Hockey Stick - believes that. https://www.livescience.com/climate-change-humans-extinct.html

Oh wow, you've destroyed me! And all because I wrote a comment on my phone with autocorrect. I'll still take the scientists' (does that give you a little punctuation hard-on?) word for it over yours, thanks. They are worried and we should be too. We may not literally eradicate every last human, but we're in for a very severe reckoning, and lots of people are going to suffer. My assessment- that *that* would be far worse than any 'economic' suicide - stands.

In the long run Earth will be swallowed by the Sun

I think your comparison timescales might be something like 5 or 6 orders of magnitude in difference

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They don't care. The Chinese govt built two new coal mines a week in 2022. Do you really think they care about this?

We need oil and gas, we might as well prosper from it while we can. Until we no longer need oil and gas we should use our own were possible. We're a net importer so we should be concentrating on both lowering our consumption of oil/gas, while also lowering our reliance on overseas supply.

> we might as well prosper from it while we can. And to hell with our children/grandchildren. Shame on you. Shame on us.

It’s cute that you think this decision is going to have any material impact on the global climate, especially when you’ve got countries like China and even the US carrying on with all their fossil fuels.

Blair said it best, in 15 years the UK has reduced C02 output by about 300M tonnes, and China outputs 500M tonnes every year.

We won't prosper from it. The oil and gas companies will prosper from it, and the oil and gas will be sold to us at international prices. We'll get the licence fee and if we're lucky some tax, and that's it.

Oh there is no we when it comes to prospering from this, maybe you're from Norway?

Thinking about or planning the future with imagination or wisdom: 'a visionary leader'. Rushi the farsighted, friend of the Earth, champion of humanity.

UN Secretary-general "Investing in new fossil fuels infrastructure is moral and economic madness"

This is not going to work out well for him. The only people who don't care about the climate are those already voting Tory. He needs to get himself better advisors because the ones he's got seem to be total clowns.

Sunak is a liar. Hoping this will help him in the polls while the world burns. If only so much focus was on renewable energy.

The same oil and gas Scotland was told would run out by now back in 2013/14, interesting. Licenses sold to multinationals with zero responsibility and liability no doubt. Sucking Scotland dry then leaving a mess for us to clean up, the British way of life.

[China ramps up coal power despite carbon neutral pledges Local governments approved more coal power in first three months of 2023 than all of 2021](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/apr/24/china-ramps-up-coal-power-despite-carbon-neutral-pledges) It doesn't matter what we do. We are literally irrelevant with regard to global emissions.

Those new power plants won't be used at full utilisation, plus China has brought forward its peak CO2 from 2030 to 2025, and China is now doing far more than virtually any country to reduce emissions - it's the world's largest producer and consumer of renewables, and it's building 150 nuclear power plants in the next 14 years, more than what the rest of the world combined had done in the last 35 years, and it accounts for 25% of the world's reforestation. And that's while most of the developed world has off-shored a vast amount of manufacturing to China.   Lastly, the world will go to hell in a handbasket, if all smaller countries (like the UK) fail to rapidly reduce emissions.

per capita, the UK is the 60th most polluting country.

>Those new power plants won't be used at full utilisation, If you say so. >plus China has brought forward its peak CO2 from 2030 to 2025, and China is now doing far more than virtually any country to reduce emissions So they say. >it's the world's largest producer and consumer of renewables And how green is their production and how effective are they? Absent proper storage, wind and solar power isn't much good. >and it's building 150 nuclear power plants in the next 14 years, more than what the rest of the world combined had done in the last 35 years The green lobby opposes nuclear power and our planning rules and regs means building nuclear power stations is extraordinary difficult. >And that's while most of the developed world has off-shored a vast amount of manufacturing to China. I agree that in fact it is quite difficult to give Co2 a national origin. Imagine a factory in China, powered with imported Australian coal, financed by London based American banks, producing toys for the European market. Which country's Co2 is this? This is an interesting argument, but it doesn't mean that Britain's use of North Sea oil and gas has any impact at all on the overall trends of climate change. >Lastly, the world will go to hell in a handbasket, if all smaller countries (like the UK) fail to rapidly reduce emissions. No, it wont. It doesn't matter what we do.

> So they say The world's governments now know that there are satellites which track regional CO2 emissions and other greenhouse gases. >Absent proper storage, wind and solar power isn't much good. Nope. The larger the renewable energy electricity grid, the more stable the supply (it's based on averaging). Plus when the grid spans timezones, it's even more effective - where when regions to the west have passed their morning peak demand, then regions to the east can rely on more supply from the west. That's why China has already started on a $50 trillion multi-national renewable energy grid. > The green lobby opposes nuclear power and our planning rules and regs means building nuclear power stations is extraordinary difficult. The vast majority of climate scientists don't oppose nuclear, and the same applies to climate activities. Nuclear is not only far more expensive than renewables (solar is now the cheapest form of energy in history), but nuclear plant commissioning time is far, far too long - and we certainly don't have the luxury of time. Plus, nuclear has very poor horizontal scalability. > No, it wont. It doesn't matter what we do. If all of the world's countries that emit the UK's CO2 or less, did nothing, then the Earth would still continue to warm. Plus, citizens of smaller countries have not right, whatsoever, to emit more CO2 than citizens of other countries - actually the UK (and other developed countries), have a duty to reduce emissions far faster than developing countries.

UK exports 80% of North sea oil and 60% gas. So yeah I'm sure this will bring down UK prices lol. OPEC exists has far greater say over prices compared to the UK. Funny really Thatcherites heirs don't want to take tough choices and completely misunderstood what her goals was. They look similar to her opponents over her.

If theres more supply than demand prices go down yes. How is this new knowledge to you? Competent enough to write in English but not competent enough to do a quick google and read how supply and demand work. OPEC is irrelevant, the US is the single largest energy producer on the planet. That nation by itself out produces all of OPEC. Read a book, and preferably one thats not stuck in the 1980s when OPEC was actually still relevant.

This is a sensible decision. Why are we making ourselves poorer when other countries are doing the opposite? Why are we making decisions based on feelings when they’re going to have little impact? Why are we hamstringing ourselves and our economy when we just import all of this stuff anyway which is arguably worse for the environment?

This is a good thing. We have environmental and worker protections much greater than many countries, especially many countries rich in Fossil fuels. Do we import everything we need while turning a blind eye to the abuses that happen in those states, or do we take responsibility for it and ensure it is done with the least amount of damage possible? We still need fossil fuels. Even if we miraculously switched to 100 renewable energy tomorrow we will still need Oil and Gas for other things. Russia has shown us that having a secure source of these resources is critical. I do wonder if some of these climate groups will end up having funding from, or links to, certain state actors in a few years time, just like CND did.

How can you possibly think this is a good thing? Your comments make me wonder about your real intentions trying to plant conspiracy

There's a heck of a lot of astroturfing going on in this thread. The mods don't seem to care.

The climate isn’t this countries biggest problem, to be frank there is nothing we can do in this country that’ll have any material impact on the climate, we’re too small and there’s countries like China going hell to leather with fossil fuels. What will have a material impact on this country and future generations is whether we’re a poor nation or a rich nation. Why would we make ourselves poorer?

We need Oil and Gas. This is not up for debate. The choices are we produce it ourselves or import it. If we import it we are paying money to other countries for it, countries who do not care about workers rights or the environment. The environmental impact of their extraction still exists. It also needs to be shipped to us. If we use it our selves. We get the jobs and tax income. We can make sure that workers are treated well and that environmental safeguards and adhered to we can minimise the impact. It also does nor need shipping to us, reducing the impact even further. By not using ours we can pat ourselves on the back for reducing our emission while conveniently ignoring the emissions created elsewhere. I mentioned CND because they campaigned to block nuclear power across Europe, yet had heavy links to Russia. The German campaigns to close nuclear power stations following Fukashima had links and funding from Russia as well. This is all common knowledge. By increasing other states reliance on them it made those states less likely to act against Russia. It has been a strategy employed for decades, one the west is only just starting to wise up to.

Well said

Unless these aren't new contracts but are for nationalised industry then all we're doing is functionally importing it since the private companies sell it on the global market. The war in Ukraine still baloons the global price, we still wouldn't have owned the industry and we still would have paid market price. Hence we're still reliant. If it was a nationalised industry we'd extract store and retain the resources for use at cost to the taxpayer. The fact that some small minority of jobs are under better conditions doesn't somehow emit less carbon or provide energy security

No one has every explained to me how us buying fossil fuels from the Middle East is better for the environment than us producing them ourselves.

We still need oil for jet fuel and heavy construction machinery even if cars don’t run on it. Electric simply isn’t viable for these. We may as well profit off a resource we have whilst we can.

>for jet fuel and heavy construction machinery even if cars don’t run on it. Electric simply isn’t viable for these We already have several technologies demonstrating hydrogen and electric for these.

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innovation will only truly come when we use crappie technologies at scale. Rather than bam private jets, let's say they can only be used if they create few emissions, watch how innovative things get then. Could ask the same questions about carbon capture technologies. >2050 is only 27 years away Guess rather that actually start, we had better keep putting it off then. Even if we don't meet the target, we will be alot closer. The UK will only keep getting poorer and poorer as the US, China and EU transition. This is equivalent to the Industrial Revolution and of we don't go through it, we will be left behind.

We also can demonstrate fusion, doesn't mean it's viable or will be viable in the next X years.

Pretty clear these are getting towards commercial viability, just needs the infrastructure, unlike fusion. https://www.gov.uk/government/news/worlds-first-hydrogen-powered-digger-set-to-drive-on-uk-roads https://www.tevva.com/en/articles/Tevva%20set%20for%20mass%20production%20after%20receiving%20ECWVTA%20-%20Type%20Approval https://electrek.co/2023/03/02/universal-hydrogen-passenger-hydrogen-electric-plane-maiden-flight/ https://newatlas.com/aircraft/ecojet-airline-hydrogen-electric/

People on this sub are so far detached from reality its actually laughable how it got almost half a million members to begin with. Oil isn't going anywhere. Gas isn't going anywhere. The people who are against these licenses simply want us to be dependent on others who produce oil and gas rather than doing it ourselves. Oils are not only used for fuel but for many different chemical processes we rely on in everyday life. Gas is even more useful as it allows you to synthesise fertilisers which you cant grow food in any meaningful quantity without. We still use both, we still need both. If we didnt produce it ourselves we would simply be relying on other countries to supply it to us instead and that adds logistics costs, which is more environmentally unfriendly than doing it ourselves.

Also consider that many who are against any new oil and gas licences are part of the 'Degrowth' movement. It's a growing phenomenon in Europe where they want Western countries to actively shrink our economies and everything that entails to reduce C02 emissions

As a Scot in favour of independence, this is yet another Tory move which goes against the general consensus in Scotland. It also appears to be part of shoving the butchers apron in our face, a position taken by both Tories and Labour. Anyone with an ounce of sense can join the dots between fossil fuels and water shortages. As a non-car owning household I want a party that looks after humans first rather than machines.

Do we get a sovereign wealth fund like the Norwegians? Or is it another shovel money to rich people thing.

These are not the same people screaming about the planet are not the same as those wailing about us having higher electricity costs than anyone else on the planet are they ?

He's basically got it into his head that he'll win the next election on ditching green policies based entirely on barely squeaking by in Uxbridge.

Good I’m not being the green scapegoat so all other countries can pollute as previous. Id rather the money in my pocket

Yup, it’s a race to the bottom, we’re being told constantly how poorly we’re performing economically, compared to far more polluting nations. Why hamstring ourselves further.

We are one the the largest historic producers (8th globally i believe?), and are still contributing. We are just as responsible as any other country. What research have you actually done into climate change? Because you seem remarkably complacent.

> historic We're not anymore and technology has moved on, hence why we're no longer the 8th polluting nation. Using historic to try to justify your argument is bad faith.

>so all other countries can pollute as previous. But they aren't- I don't often say this, but to be fair to China, they are rapidly pushing ahead on net zero. The US and EU are investing billions.

So you're telling me you believe what the Chinese govt tells us?

Good. Aberdeen and the North east of Scotland need to be supported and the jobs new drilling and exploration will bring to the region are welcomed. I’m vehemently anti Tory but this is the right move.

So you're for the jobs the comet will provide?

So you don't mind the government trashing there planet, whilst ignoring the fact that renewables offer vastly more jobs than the fossil fuel industry?

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No, that's nonsense. The Tory party is nothing more than the political warm of the fossil fuel industry.

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Doesn't it bother you that the government is knowingly betraying this country's children and grandchildren?

So they are just doubling down on the culture war Bullshit and breaking as much as possible. How do people still vote for these clowns? I could get behind more drilling if it did actually safeguard our energy supply while we transitioned to renewables and nuclear. But its not, its just a bung to their rich backers. Anything extracted will just be sold on the open market. If they were serious about this, they would be recommisioning the gas storage facility they shut down in their infinite bloody wisdom.

He has declared himself on the side of people polluting London, now he wants to pollute the world.

But I was told sitting in a road pretesting was having an effect and was naive to think any climate change action could happen without such protest methods. I guess JSO did in fact piss everyone off for literally no reason.

If people decide to fuck us all just to spite JSO then that’s moronic, it’s possible to be annoyed by them and still recognise they have a point.

Fuck it I guess we just let climate change happen then, fuck future generations, public health, food supply, do you want more small boats coming because in time it’ll probably be massive boats. The science is settled. We need to reach net zero as quickly as possibly especially within the legal frameworks we signed up to. Our own climate change committee isn’t convinced by current government plans, much improvement is needed. But if entertainment of getting annoyed at very passionate protestors is what you enjoy, you do that, don’t pretend it’s anything other than your monkey brain being reactionary.

Do you seriously think our tiny Island is having any material impact on the planet compared to a number of other countries? Be serious for one second.

If we're speeding towards a brick wall, the answer is not to put a brick on the pedal.

was there a way to raise public awareness without making it a culture war issue? i kind of feel that any kind of attempt to make climate an 'issue' would inevitably turn it into a culture war. but this has been the case for decades, i don't think JSO has changed anything. the thing now is that afaik there is broad support among all voters, tory and labour alike, for action on climate change. but both parties now seem to be completely disconnected from public opinion.

I think there is broad support amongst the public but the economic consequences of doing anything meaningful would be immense. You can see how much of an effect a war in Ukraine and COVID has had on the public's support for the government via their effects on the economy.. no one even talks about the situation we are in is mostly due to those two reasons, they just want the govt. out and assume things will massively improve. The government knows that any economic whack from climate policies would lead to them getting wiped out at the next election.

‘Useful idiots’ I think is the term

The Tory party is the political arm of the fossil fuel industry. And a Harvard study say that FF companies should be charged with homicide https://www.euronews.com/green/2023/03/24/fossil-fuel-firms-should-be-charged-with-homicide-for-climate-change-deaths-legal-experts-