Oil prices closed this evening at $126.29 (£64) a barrel in New York, the highest since trading began, and almost double the sum that each barrel cost in August of last year.OPEC, which contributes over 40 percent of the world's oil, announced this March that it will not increase production, whilst Saudi Arabia has announced that it will increase its output by 300,000 barrels a day, a figure which has been viewed as insignificant in combating rising prices.
For some people, the soaring cost of oil will be seen as another reason for promoting cars specifically engineered to be as energy efficient as possible, or cars which do away with the need for visiting the forecourt altogether. However, according to the Times newspaper, the rising costs on global oil markets has led the Government into allowing for prospectors to explore land beneath or around over 200 communities in rural England, in the hope that they will discover domestic oil fields.
Whilst rising international costs potentially justify the desire for domestic production, there is concern that drilling will result in significant environmental damage to some of England's most valuable countryside. Of particular concern is the Government's decision to green-light exploration of Markwell Woods, a designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty near Chichester on the South Downs. The drilling company concerned believe that the ground beneath the ancient woodland could easily match the 29,537 barrels produced last year alone from a seventeen year old pumping station in nearby Singleton.
If oil were to be found on the site then pumping would be active for twenty-four hours a day during a six week period. Locals and environmental groups are concerned that during this time there would be a significant increase of traffic in the area, as the 200 million barrels of oil which the prospectors believe to be tucked away underground would be transported away from the site by truck.
In addition, whilst the scheme has been given permission to use just one hectare of the eleven hectare site, the Woodland Trust fears that this could just 'be the start of continued destruction of this ancient site and the surrounding Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty'
The environmental group points out that ancient woodland ecosystems are Britain's most productive and valuable sites in terms of bio-diversity, describing them as 'the UK's equivalent of rain-forests.' Such sites are long established, and once destroyed or altered can not simply be replaced by storing the original soils and planting new trees, as the oil companies claim. The Woodland Trust argues that business interests should be placed against an understanding that such sites are finite, and argue that the current economic climate of rising oil costs should be driving the move away from fossil fuels and toward renewable forms of energy.
'Climate change is the greatest long term threat to ancient woodland,' says Alice Farr from the trust ' this decision [to allow drilling on the South Downs] flies in the face of that.'
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This post was written by Matthew Gammie on May 19, 2008