Challenges aplenty but opportunity remains for UKCS

There is life in the old North Sea dog yet

The UK continental shelf (UKCS) will, despite its maturity, remain an important region in the global oil and gas sector. It is a key provider of benchmark crude in Europe and has both a relatively stable fiscal regime and a diverse and dynamic corporate landscape—supporting high levels of M&A activity, with recent growth from independents facilitating portfolio rationalisation by large IOCs. Production from the UKCS peaked at the turn of the millennium at 5.4mn bl/d oe, before falling by 65pc, to 1.9mn bl/d oe, in just 12 years. A raft of field allowances introduced by the UK government in 2012 contributed to several >100mn bl oe projects being sanctioned, including TotalEnergies’ Lag