Should the Rosebank oilfield get the go ahead?

Rosebank, the largest untapped lipid tract successful the UK is disconnected the seashore of Shetland. Its support by regulators is expected soon and accumulation could statesman arsenic aboriginal arsenic 2026.

Should it spell ahead? If it does, what volition beryllium the biology impact? If it doesn't, what's the alternative?

Shetland is simply a cleanable spot to research these questions. Leaving speech the biology interaction of the 500 cardinal barrels of lipid it could produce, conscionable powering Rosebank and its sister fields volition usage the equivalent of fractional of the vigor being produced by a elephantine and arguable caller windfarm presently being built connected Shetland.

The archipelago of 100 islands straddling the North Sea and the Atlantic Ocean became portion of Scotland successful 1472 but ne'er mislaid its Norse links.

This week, islanders celebrated their heritage successful the aged harbour of Scalloway successful an lawsuit to people the 2023 Tall Ships race.

Locals dressed successful tunics, capes and feather-tipped helmets brandished axes and hurled burning torches into a replica of a Viking longboat.

But immoderate visitant who thought that the islands were stuck successful the past would person been severely mistaken.

This whitethorn person been a onshore of farmers and fishers until the 1970s but the discovery of North Sea oil changed everything.

The operation of a terminal astatine Sullom Voe, an inlet successful the northbound of the largest island, brought not conscionable jobs but a interest for each tube of lipid it handled.

That meant the section assembly could acceptable up an concern fund, which continues to wage for high-quality nationalist services specified arsenic roads, attraction homes and sports facilities.

In the main municipality of Lerwick - 400 miles from Oslo; 600 miles from London - a astute leisure centre stands alongside a stylish school.

Environmentalists connected the islands admit that Shetland has done good from hydrocarbons but accidental it is clip to chopped the cord.

Alex Armitage, a councillor from the Scottish Green Party, who is besides the islands' advisor paediatrician, describes lipid and state arsenic a "sunset industry".

He says the wildfires which person ravaged the Greek land of Rhodes successful caller days underline the urgency of accelerating the determination to renewable vigor by blocking caller drilling successful the North Atlantic.

The UK lipid and state regulator is presently considering whether oregon not to approve drilling successful the Rosebank lipid field, 80 miles westbound of Shetland, 1 of the biggest untapped reserves successful British waters, containing betwixt 300 cardinal and 500 cardinal barrels of oil.

The UK authorities disagrees. Earlier this week, Energy Security and Net Zero Secretary Grant Shapps said the UK should "max out" its remaining reserves.

There are plentifulness of Shetlanders who hold with that stance.

From the 1970s Arlene Robertson worked arsenic a cook, a cleaner and a caregiver astatine Sullom Voe. "I was portion of that boom," she says.

These days Ms Robertson campaigns for the islands to person greater power of their ain affairs arsenic a subordinate of a radical called the Shetland Autonomy Action Team.

She is successful favour of Rosebank.

"We each privation a amended climate. We each privation a amended satellite to unrecorded successful but I think, realistically, we person to travel what's feasible, and shutting down lipid and trying to import it from places similar Russia doesn't marque overmuch consciousness to me," she says.

Dr Armitage disagrees. "The thought that [Rosebank] volition enactment our UK nationalist vigor information is rather frankly preposterous," helium says, pointing retired that portion immoderate state would beryllium piped to Shetland, the lipid would beryllium pumped onto tankers astatine oversea and exported "to Rotterdam oregon wherever other successful the satellite it would beryllium capable to beryllium sold to the highest bidder".

This week, the Norwegian lipid institution Equinor, which is the main developer of Rosebank, underlined its "clear expectation" that the task would determination forward.

The state-controlled firm's main fiscal officer, Torgrim Reitan, said helium was "awaiting last decision connected a mates of topics, and last support from the regulators" and expected "some clarifications not excessively acold into the future".

While those discussions continue, the vigor premix connected Shetland is already changing, with the operation by SSE Renewables of a elephantine upwind workplace called Viking.

More than 70 of the project's 103 turbines, which measurement 155m (509ft) from crushed to blade-tip, person been erected truthful far.

The blades should commencement spinning adjacent summer, supplying energy to the UK National Grid via a subsea cablegram linking the islands and the Scottish mainland for the archetypal time.

SSE says the upwind workplace could supply capable energy to powerfulness astir 500,000 homes for the adjacent 25 years.

Heather Donald, the company's manager of onshore improvement and construction, says Shetland "will efficaciously decarbonise overnight with the flick of a switch," and supply "a lawsuit study" successful vigor modulation for the remainder of the UK.

Not each Shetlanders are convinced.

There are claims astir disruption of the peat moorland wherever the windfarm is being built; speech of the "industrialisation" of a once-rugged landscape; and worries astir however overmuch the assemblage volition payment economically.

Although Arlene Robertson and Alex Armitage person precise antithetic views connected the gait of switching to renewable energy, they are agreed successful a content that the lipid and state roar is not being repeated with renewable energy.

Mr Armitage says Shetlanders are "shivering successful their homes" due to the fact that of precocious vigor bills and Viking volition not bring their costs down oregon bring important other funds to the community.

Ms Robertson agrees, saying: "I'm perfectly horrified astatine the mediocre woody that we've got. It's peanuts."

Ms Donald of SSE denies Viking volition person a antagonistic effect connected the peat.

She says the task is employing 400 radical including 100 locals; and she insists it volition assistance trim bills and supply "the biggest assemblage payment money of immoderate renewable task successful the UK".

"When the tract goes into cognition adjacent year, it volition beryllium £2.2m each twelvemonth for the duration of the upwind farm," she adds.

But however volition the energy Viking produces beryllium used?

The Offshore Petroleum Regulator for Environment and Decommissioning (OPRED) is understood to beryllium keen connected the Rosebank lipid tract being powered by energy supplied from enactment alternatively than the accepted North Sea method of utilizing state oregon diesel generators.

Equinor, BP and Ithaca are exploring electrification for Rosebank; the existing Clair Ridge development; and, potentially, the Cambo field, which is presently successful limbo.

The BBC has been told that "onshore transportation to Shetland" utilizing "the oversupply of renewable energy" from the islands is an enactment nether consideration.

But biology lawyer, Tessa Khan, of the unit radical Uplift, says utilizing renewables to perpetuate the burning of fossil fuels "would beryllium laughable if it wasn't truthful serious".

Uplift's analysts reckon the powerfulness required for the 3 fields could beryllium person to 250mw, equivalent to much than fractional of the imaginable output from the 443mw Viking upwind farm.

"Rosebank volition nutrient lipid for export and volition not boost the UK's vigor security," insists Ms Khan.

"If it besides ends up taking immense amounts of cheap, cleanable vigor that could beryllium utilized to powerfulness hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses, it volition extremity up actively reducing the UK's vigor security," she adds.

"We person nary power implicit wherever the powerfulness goes," stresses Heather Donald of SSE Renewables.

Once the energy is successful the National Grid, she points out, it could beryllium exported anyplace successful the UK.

Nonetheless, the thought that Viking could supply energy to fractional a cardinal homes oregon extremity up powering respective lipid fields underlines the complexity of the UK's vigor transition.