Rosebank Development "a missed opportunity for Scotland" says Salmond

Former First Minister, Alex Salmond, has slammed both sides of the Rosebank debate accusing UK and Scottish Governments of “shouting slogans at each other while economic and environmental opportunity is allowed to pass Scotland by”

He said;

“Outright opposition to Rosebank is daft. The UK would end up importing more dirtier hydrocarbons at greater cost and you cannot secure the so-called “just transition” by shutting down the North Sea.

However, the field licence condition for Rosebank could and should have imposed a net zero carbon condition on this field, not as a general industry aspiration, but specifically for this hyper-lucrative field development.

The development plan for Rosebank already proposed reducing the upstream CO2 footprint by three quarters, by electrification of the platform’s FPSO power.

The further step to full field zero, could have been achieved by forcing an Equinor commitment to the developing carbon capture network as a condition of the go-ahead for this large and lucrative 300 million barrel field. Given that Equinor has more practical experience than any other oil company in full scale carbon capture in the Norwegian sector, it would be totally appropriate to force their investment in carbon capture on this side of the North Sea.

It would have signposted the way to an accelerated carbon capture development which is the one way that Scotland could make a real difference in reducing not just Scotland’s, but Europe’s carbon footprint.

Instead of a coherent energy strategy, we have a missed opportunity played out between a revenue greedy Tory government, a hapless Labour opposition and a Scottish administration who are all at sea on energy policy. They shout slogans at each other while economic and environmental opportunity is allowed to pass Scotland by.

In the Scottish referendum, the Better Together coalition told Scotland that there was no oil and gas left in waters around Scotland. Now, but nine years later, the UK Government have announced the development of a single oil and gas field with a hydrocarbon value of £30,000 million! No one in Scotland should forgive or forget the blatant hypocrisy and lies of the Better Together coalition."