Is 100 billion barrels of oil good news?
Yesterday the corporate media rejoiced in the news that up to 100 billion barrels of oil have been discovered whilst drilling near Gatwick airport in Sussex.
The numbers are staggering, one hundred billion is almost beyond contextualisation. Why is that such large numbers are only expressed in terms of money or barrels of oil?
This discovery means that energy companies have an opportunity to extract the oil — between 3% and 15% has the potential value of £406bn
Is this good news and if so, who is it good news for? Estimates say that this oil reserve could provide around 30% of our need for oil based energy by the year 2030.
Is this good news for the environment? The Guardian have been doing good work recently in raising awareness of the “Carbon Bubble”. This is the idea that of all the identified reserves of carbon-based fuel still in the ground we can only extract around 20% if we wish to keep global warming below 2 degrees.
So although we’ve found another 100 billion barrels which will be cheaper to extract — not least because we don’t need to start a war to get access to the resources — in the wider context it isn’t responsible to extract and burn this new resource.
We can only safely extract around 20% of all known carbon-based resources without raising global temperatures above 2 degrees Celsius
Energy companies are massively over-valued and headlines purporting a £406bn boost to the economy don’t consider the global consequence of continuing our addiction to oil
Also read:
- Carbon bubble will plunge the world into another financial crisis
- ‘Carbon bubble’ poses serious threat to UK economy MPs warn
Is this good news for the residents near Gatwick? Another striking angle in the corporate press around this story is the assurance that they “don’t think” that fracking will be required to extract this oil.
Fracking is a contentious issue at the moment. Banned in Scotland and Wales and in many locations around the world, this is a dangerous and poorly regulated practice. Would you be surprised to hear that fracking is needed after all once the easy to extract oil has been taken?
Yes — this project will create jobs extracting the oil. But there have been campaigns to create one million green jobs, working on renewable energy projects that could employ people. These campaigns are suppressed by the lobbying arms of energy companies.
Don’t be fooled by the argument that extracting this oil will generate employment — it’s an emotive argument from organisations that suppress our collective will to create jobs in renewable energy
Is this good news for the economy? £406bn is a huge amount of money and of course some will filter into the economy through taxation. But don’t forget that energy companies are structured to be as “tax efficient” as possible (meaning they are structured to funnel profit into tax havens to avoid paying corporation tax) and our government is too weak-willed to tackle the issue properly.
Certainly access to cheaper gas through this discovery won’t lead to cheaper gas bills in your home.
So who is this good news for? The corporate media are reporting this as great news employing terminology like “world class oil” and “national significance”.
This is good news! For the corporations that stand to profit massively. Because the corporate-owned media are the propaganda machine for the 1% they want you to share in this optimism.
For the environment and for renewable energy this is a disaster.
Imagine a man with an alcohol dependency problem. One morning he wakes with a hangover and looks under his bed discovering — to his excitement — a hundred billion cans of Tenants Super Strength lager.
Is this good news for the man? It might seem so initially but in the long run he’s going to have a hell of a hangover.
