Britain relies on oil and gas for around three-quarters of our energy – a level that has hardly changed in decades. We will be relying on oil and gas over the coming decades, as the Climate Change Committee itself acknowledges. Responding to the Climate Change Committee's (CCC) 2023 Annual Progress Report to Parliament - GOV.UK Our own oil and gas production is forecast to be cut from 74 million tonnes in 2022 to 33 million tonnes by 2030, but we will still need these 33 million tonnes.
Even on government projections, oil and gas will meet a fifth of our needs in 2050 - the year when the government aims for us to have net zero carbon emissions.
Yet successive governments have chosen to import energy rather than produce it. And Energy Secretary Ed Miliband has gone even further by banning all new drilling and all new exploration in our waters.
Not a single exploration well was drilled in British waters last year – for the first time since 1964. But Norway, which shares the North Sea basin with us, drilled 49 exploration wells last year, making 21 new discoveries in the process.
Miliband has imposed effective marginal tax rates of over 100 per cent on some companies. As Offshore Energies UK says, the 78 per cent flat rate total tax imposed on oil and gas profits is driving companies away. Ditch windfall tax on North Sea oil and take back control of UK energy, Starmer told
The results? A recent study from the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology looked at areas known to hold oil and gas resources, but which Miliband has refused to license for drilling. North Sea oil and gas - POST It found that Britain will miss out on more than 4.6 billion barrels of oil and gas under Labour's ban on new drilling.
So, we imported last year 42 per cent more liquefied natural gas [LNG] than we did in 2024. LNG has higher emissions, making it four times worse for the environment than our domestic gas. We bought it mostly from the USA. (Is the intent to make us ever more dependent on the USA?) Its transport adds yet more to emissions.
We squander £50 billion of the previous investment in the North Sea. And we become less energy secure.
Energy resources
Offshore Energies UK, the trade body for Britain's oil and gas industry, says that there are 51 gas fields in our waters, including the Glendronach and Glengorm fields, plus 60 possible extensions to existing fields. They could provide us with a total of the equivalent of 3.25 billion barrels of oil.
The North Sea Transition Authority's latest Reserves and Resources report, published on 17 October 2025, estimates proven and probable UK oil and gas reserves at 2.9 billion barrels of oil equivalent (boe) at the end of 2024.
Contingent resources - petroleum estimated to be recoverable from known deposits, but not ready for commercial development – stand at 6.2 billion boe. And prospective resources – undiscovered potentially recoverable resources in mapped leads and prospects that have not yet been drilled - are estimated at 4.6 billion boe. Reserves and Resources as at end 2024
There are also potential gas fields onshore, for instance the giant one under Lincolnshire, which could provide us with 425 cubic metres of gas. But this could only be extracted by hydraulic fracking - which Miliband has also banned.
Two important North Sea fields, as yet unexploited, are Rosebank and Jackdaw. Rosebank is a reserve 60 miles west of Shetland, buried 5,200 feet beneath the seabed. It is the largest undeveloped oil and gas field in British waters. It is estimated to contain possibly around 500 million barrels of oil. Miliband called exploiting this field "climate vandalism" when he was in opposition.
Jackdaw, 150 miles east of Aberdeen, has already been partly drilled. If Jackdaw is approved, its gas could enter our pipes from the field as soon as the summer, adding to our gas supplies and cutting prices. It could provide 6 to 7 per cent of our production, enough gas to heat 1.4 million homes.
Together these two fields could produce up to 2.3 billion cubic metres of gas per year.
When Boris Johnson's government granted Equinor ASA, the state-owned Norwegian oil company formerly known as Statoil, permission to drill at Rosebank, the Scottish Court of Session overturned that decision in January 2025. The court also blocked production at Jackdaw.
Public support for North Sea drilling
On 23 March, the oil and gas workers of Unite launched their 'Keep the North Sea Working' campaign to demand protection for jobs and for the communities those jobs sustain. Current policies are destroying 1,000 skilled, productive jobs a month. Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said, "The government's energy policies in Westminster and Holyrood are putting jobs and energy security at risk. Blocking oil and gas production in the North Sea, especially now, is an act of monumental political self-harm." Keep the North Sea Working campaign launched by Unite for Scottish elections
Generally, people across Britain agree that we should develop our energy resources. A UK-wide survey of 2,000 people, conducted 10-13 March by Opinium on behalf of Offshore Energies UK, found that 76 per cent say that "because global events can disrupt energy supplies, the UK should continue producing oil and gas at home rather than relying more on imports." 74 per cent say that Britain should "produce as much of its own oil and gas as possible rather than rely on imports."
40 per cent believe the best approach to our energy security is investing in a balanced mix of renewables and our oil and gas, compared to just 26 per cent who want a renewables-only approach, and 13 per cent who want oil and gas only.
Offshore Energies UK CEO David Whitehouse, commented, "The public are clear – the UK needs homegrown energy and a balanced transition that strengthens our national security." PressReader.com | Public supports North Sea oil and gas, poll reveals
A poll for The i, reported on 28 March, found similar results: 48 per cent said that we should allow more exploration to boost our energy production, even if this makes it harder to reach net zero targets. Only 26 per cent backed the government's approach, that we should keep drilling at current levels to help meet net zero targets, even if this meant relying more on imported energy.
Another poll, by campaign group Looking for Growth, found that support for drilling for oil in the North Sea was about 57 per cent amongst all voters. Only 15 per cent were against.
Labour voters backed it by 51 per cent to 21 per cent. 22 per cent said they neither agreed nor disagreed. 5 per cent said they didn't know. Even backers of the Green Party supported North Sea drilling by 38 per cent to 33 per cent. 70 per cent of Conservative and Reform voters supported it.
The poll also found that 49 per cent of Labour voters backed onshore fracking of oil and gas, and that 61 per cent of voters supported nuclear power, only 14 per cent opposed it.
A Mail on Sunday poll, reported on 5 April, found that the public backs North Sea drilling by 50 per cent to 29 per cent.
Even Renewable UK, which represents 500 companies in Britain's renewable energy industry, has called on Miliband to "take energy out of the culture wars" by increasing North Sea production of oil and gas. Tara Singh, its chief executive, said, "Britain will be stronger, safer and less exposed if it produces more home-grown energy of every kind. … Let's start with gas. However fast we build clean power, Britain will still need gas well into the foreseeable future: to heat homes and power industry where electrification doesn't make sense for households and businesses and to help keep the electricity system balanced. So it is entirely sensible to support continued domestic oil and gas production in the North Sea. If we do not produce that gas here, we will still need it. We will simply import more of it."
In the EU's Green Deal?
The Prime Minister wants "deeper economic integration" with the EU, to be achieved this year. He wants to give control over our energy policy to the EU, and to firm up his government's net zero targets. Starmer draws up plans for Britain to hike green targets in bid to tighten ties with Europe Starmer embraces the EU approach of prioritising net zero over industry.
He wants 'the dynamic alignment' of British law with EU rules on 'the promotion of renewable energy'. This could force us to decarbonise across the board – not just electricity, but also heating and transport – and far more quickly than we have done so far. This is a merger not a realignment.
This government aims to tie Britain to the EU's severe net zero targets and push up our energy costs. The EU's target is for 42.5 per cent of its energy to come from renewables by 2030. This is nearly double our current level of 22 per cent. It would require Britain to accelerate the rollout of electric vehicles and the phasing out of gas boilers.
On 4 March, the EU agreed its long-awaited Industrial Accelerator Act (IAA). GROWTH - Industrial Accelerator Act: strengthening Europe's clean industrial base Accelerating industry? Sounds good.
But when EU industry chief Stéphane Séjourné presented the Act, he said, "We need to be very clear — the Industrial Accelerator Act is going to accelerate decarbonization. That's the whole point of it."
So, despite its title, it is not about accelerating industry. It was originally called the Industrial Decarbonization Accelerator Act, but the European Commission changed its name to try to deflect the growing public opposition, across all the EU member countries, to net zero policies.
The Commission is trying to distance itself from its earlier 'Green Deal' language – but of course not from the reality. Former EU climate chief Frans Timmermans is the architect of the Green Deal. Frans Timmermans and EU Green Deal: Allegations & Scrutiny He recently asked, "why don't we rephrase the Green Deal? Why don't we give it another name?"
The Starmer government wants us to rejoin the EU's internal electricity market and align with the EU's 'wholesale and retail electricity market rules'. We would be bound by these rules, over which we would have no say. This deal would create a 'legally binding' financial mechanism under which we would never stop making payments to the EU.
Professor John Constable of the University of Austin, an expert on Britain's renewable sector, said the deal was 'fundamentally political'. He said, "I fear that the Labour Government is trying to poison the well for any incoming government. It will be a poisoned chalice – they will be so fettered by EU law, and it will be incredibly difficult to unwind."
For industry
Chancellor Rachel Reeves recently said she is 'very happy' to support North Sea drilling because of its positive effect on 'jobs and tax revenue'. The SNP's John Swinney echoes her. When politicians start to talk sense, you just know that elections are coming soon. But fine words butter no parsnips.
The economic choice facing us is – do we stay committed to net zero or do we rebuild industry? It is no longer the old choice - tax more or spend more?
We need to repeal the Climate Change Act, which forces us to subordinate energy security and affordability to the pursuit of net zero. We should scrap the Emissions Trading Scheme, which makes oil and gas more expensive than renewables.
As the world grows increasingly volatile, we need to prioritise our energy and industrial resilience. We have at most only two per cent of our annual usage in strategic gas stocks. By contrast, Germany stores about a quarter of its annual usage. When Centrica closed the Rough storage facility, this government washed its hands of the problem, saying that it was just a commercial decision. We need more investment in gas storage capacity.
We need to invest in developing our energy sovereignty in order to revive industry. We should impose an export ban on all current and future oil production in British waters, so that we can use our oil solely for British domestic use. Our oil should be priced in British pounds not in US dollars, priced to serve the needs of British industries and British households. Successive governments have misdirected far too much of our money into futile attempts to be relevant militarily in the Middle East and Eastern Europe, rather than investing in what we actually need to defend our country. Energy independence is vital for our national security. Without energy independence, we are at the mercy of foreign suppliers.
