36 billion barrels gone but enough left for another 30 years

Published on Wednesday 31 October 2007 00:57

THE helicopter drops through white clouds to reveal the dark blue of the North Sea and the white flick of cresting waves. In the distance is Alwyn North, two steel platforms linked by a walkway, resembling chained fists punching up from the deep.

Welcome to the most expensive real estate in Britain: here in the North Sea, it's all about location, location, location.

They do not come much more remote than Alwyn North. To get here, visitors must fly 270 miles north-east out of Aberdeen, sealed inside rubber survival suits, with the knowledge that even the Shetland Islands are a distant 100 miles back.

Total E&P UK, a subsidiary of the French oil giant, spent 1.5 billion developing Alwyn North and its neighbouring platforms, which began oil production in 1987 and are still pumping out 150,000 barrels of oil or gas equivalent each day.

The public daily consumes the products of the oil and gas industry, while remaining largely ignorant of its achievements.

In the 1960s, Britain was sliding down the economic table. The discovery of North Sea oil in 1969 stopped that slide and pushed Britain back to the top. Yet the history of North Sea oil is littered with erroneous estimates of when this "black gold" would run dry. The wells would be dry in a decade, government ministers thought in the 1970s; in the early 1980s, the concern was it would run out by 2000.

Today, 38 years after the first core samples were confirmed, the oil industry is drawing up plans for the next 30 years.

According to Oil & Gas UK, 36 billion barrels of oil and gas equivalent have been extracted, but 25 billion barrels remain; it's just that these will be more difficult and costly to remove.

"We've eaten just over half the cake," Jenny Costelloe, of Total, said. "It's just that the remainder of the cake is now on the top shelf and more difficult to reach."

As oil prices recently hit a new high of over $90 a barrel, the cake remains exceedingly rich: in 2006, deposits worth 32.8 billion were extracted, earning the Treasury 9 billion.

Yet the absence of the thick, easy slices means the landscape in the North Sea is set to change. Big multinational groups such as BP and Shell are in the process of winding down their interests, unable, or unwilling, to justify to their shareholders the increasing expense of extraction when easier pickings are available in Nigeria and South America. Overall investment in the North Sea has fallen from 5.6 billion in 2006 to 4 billion this year.

Jake Malloy, chairman of the Offshore Industry Liaison Committee, said: "What is clear is that there is the potential for a long-haul future for the industry, at least for the next 30 years. This is dependent on the platforms and pipelines being kept in sound operating conditions so that the smaller players can take over the operation. But if you allow them to fall into disrepair, as Shell and BP have been doing, then the curtain will fall on the North Sea."