In the 1800’s small deposits of oil were found in Scotland and Germany, and other sites surrounding the North Sea. As the age of coal slowly became the age of oil, prospectors in the UK and continental Europe made further discoveries as attention slowly came to focus on the North Sea. In 1964 the UK enacted the Continental Shelf Act and the race was on. By 1971 the UK had produced its first commercial oil. Norway was not far behind, and for close to two decades UK production smoothly increased, then plateaued for a little more than a decade (as Norway’s production swiftly rose), and has since been in apparently terminal decline.
North Sea Exclusive Economic Zones (EEZs).
The organic deposits forming the source of the oil come largely from the eroded remains of the Caledonian Orogeny, mountains formed roughly 500 MYA by the collision on proto-North America with proto-Eurasia. The continents later began to rift apart again, and during the Jurassic (200-145 MYA) the sediment eroded from the Caledonian mountains became the marine sediment which led to today’s commercial oil and gas. The North Sea basin is quite shallow, having been largely dry during the last glaciation. Once the glaciers, which extended about halfway down through modern continental Europe, had melted back, much of what is now the North Sea was at some point exposed to the air before it was inundated by the rising ocean.
North Sea oil production.
Scotland, as part of the UK, has seen local benefits from the rise of a huge offshore oil industry in the form of many thousands of jobs, but the great majority of royalties from oil extraction has gone to the Crown Estate, the UK royal government’s money-making arm. Aberdeen, the home port of much of the UK’s north sea petroleum operations, has become a minor metropolis in the last five decades. For quite some time there has been discussion that Scotland, short of exiting the UK altogether, should claim more of the royalties for itself.
Aberdeen harbor, mid-20th century.
In recent years Scotland has wrestled on the one hand with this frustration, and on the other with growing environmental awareness of the danger which oil and gas use poses to the environment. The North Sea field, from the southern reaches up to the area north of the Orkneys, has been in terminal decline since the late 90’s, with more than 50% of the basin’s oil already extracted. Economically offshore oil is a riskier investment now, even as the evidence has become insurmountable that the climate is changing.
Aberdeen harbor, mid-2000's.
The application of subsea fracking has slowed the field’s production decline somewhat in the past 4-5 years. With these newly applied methods, commercial deposits have opened up to Scotland’s north and west. Nationalistic talk of declaring them Scotland’s national property has rekindled. But the sadly well-worn debate of recent years has come to light again: economic business as usual, though with more precise methods, or a step into a more sustainable future? The oil industry is pushing with main strength for the former.
Tomorrow: Scotland and offshore wind.
Be brave, and be well.
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