The House of Commons Energy and Climate Change Committee last
week published a report entitled "UK Deepwater Drilling
– Implications of the Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill". The
report comes almost 6 months after an inquiry was set up to examine
a range of issues following the Gulf of Mexico incident in April
last year which resulted in the death of 11 workers and a very
major oil spill.
The controversial call by European Commissioner Guenther
Oettinger for a moratorium on deepwater drilling, and the positive
and negative impacts this could have, was one of the issues that
the Committee sought evidence on in its enquiry. The conclusion of
the Committee is that there should not be a moratorium on offshore
drilling in the UKCS, one reason being that such a moratorium would
cause drilling rigs and expertise to migrate to other parts of the
world. Another disadvantage highlighted is that a moratorium would
decrease the UK's security of supply and increase the UK's
reliance upon
