The Don’t Drill The Wight campaign team has written to MP Bob Seely asking him to contribute to the Environment Agency (EA) Consultation and to object to issuing a drilling permit to UK Oil and Gas for the Arreton site.
The Planning Officer has not yet finalised his report and recommendation for UKOG’s Planning Application for the drill site and access road. Neither has a date been scheduled for the Planning Committee to consider the proposal.
The International Energy Agency has published its new roadmap for emissions reduction, which declares that there should be no new fossil fuel wells from 2021 onwards: Net Zero by 2050 – A Roadmap for the Global Energy Sector (windows.net).
A spokesperson for the group has said.
“This is an operation that will directly damage the environment or introduce environmental risks at every stage of its lifecycle.
“In February this year the Head of the EA spoke passionately about the Climate Crisis being the biggest threat to human existence and that we must change our thinking faster than the climate can change. Recently the EA also ran a public consultation on how to manage water in areas where the supply is stressed.
“Day to day actions however do not seem to match the fine words of its leader. The EA raised no concerns or objections when consulted on UKOG’s planning application to create a well site west of Arreton. This, despite the area being a designated protection zone for fresh water and the Island being one of the most ‘at-risk areas’ for water shortages in the coming years.
“Therefore, we need to do our best to present a strong case, with hard evidence and we urge as many officials, businesses and members of the public as possible, to oppose the granting of this drilling permit.
Article continues below this advertisement “There were 3406 objections sent to the planning department of IW Council during the two consultation periods and a petition opposing the drilling, launched by the Blue Seas Protection group currently has 4294 signatures.
“It would be great if we could get even 10% of this figure sent to the EA”
The group has also contacted Southern Water,* asking them to re-evaluate their assessment of UKOG’s low-risk claims to the Island water supplies, in the light of evidence from an independent hydrogeology report submitted to the planning department.
They have also asked them to consider estimating the economic repercussions of supplying 100% of the island’s water supply, indefinitely, if our aquifers and water sources are accidentally contaminated.
In the letter to Bob Seely MP, the group has commented:
“We know that you are hoping for the Island to become recognised as a National Park. Recently the Environment Agency has given permission for IGas to re-inject radioactive wastewater from an oil well in Singleton, near Chichester, despite the fact that it is in a protected zone in the South Downs National Park.
“Radioactive waste disposal allowed to continue at oil site in national park – DRILL OR DROP? . We need to prevent this happening here in the future by stopping this application in its tracks.
“We sincerely hope that you will act on the concerns of many Island residents by responding to the EA consultation, with strong objections to granting this drilling permit, as you did for the planning consultation.”
Links to the EA Consultation, documents and factual comments to help formulate responses are available from the home page of Don’t Drill The Wight’s Website.
Bob won’t help you…. too busy feathering his nest, and it’s not near him.
Mr Seely & the gov claim to care about our environment, but Boris says we must build build build, which is total opposite to caring about our environment & if this drilling etc creates jobs & mobilizes money, that will always come first. If the gov want to help our environment they should bring in new laws to protect existing gardens for one thing. But they won’t do it because concrete, gravel and cement generates money for someone. They don’t see any financial benefit in caring about our natural world. House price will increase if garden is destroyed & hard surface put down,which is madness but that is the sad reality.
I hope when you sent the letter you included a ‘donation’. Nudge nudge wink wink……..
Why is this even being considered ? We all know we have to wean ourselves from fossil fuels so this helps how ???? Sometimes I think ,did I hear correctly about climate change and the need to meet climate regulations ???
On the one hand we are always hearing about how important it is to care about the environment because of the climate change, and at the same time, we see the environment being destroyed by other humans everywhere we look, if it’s not trees being cut down and gardens being concreted over, it is something like this. There are two complete opposite things going on concurrently, the talk about how we must protect and the fact that destroying is going on everywhere.