Looking at the oil dependent approach to independence from the SNP you have to ask if they are happy with rise of oil to $130 a barrel as this would be a dramatic rise in revenue for an independent Scotland but at whose expense?

There is a visible excitement from our government over the rise in prices and how this will fuel the economy of Scotland even when our everyday living is being severely affected by the increased costs. Unsustainable rises in the cost of petrol, food, energy, manufacturing and transportation leading to excessive subsidies are but a few repercussions from the slowdown in oil production. Surely the government recognizes that the effect on people’s lives’ is profound. Surely they don’t want to embrace this economic pressure with joyful glee?

The environment is changing, renewables are becoming a real necessity not an alternative to power supplies and yes folks the oil is running out!
Reports as far back as 1999 show that oil production has peaked in Scotland:  In may Patrick Harvie of the Green Party challenged the first minister on the oil dependent approach of the SNP by stating, “For the leader of a party which has been addicted to oil rhetoric since the 1970s, Alex Salmond is singularly ill-informed about the state of the industry. He’s apparently oblivious of the fact that North Sea oil has been declining since 1999.”

Chris Skrebowski of the Energy Institute said: “Alex Salmond’s predictions are simply wrong. Even with optimistic assumptions  about future North Sea oil production, and even if Scotland was allocated all of that production, an independent Scotland would be likely to be a net importer of oil by 2015 or 2016. By that stage, given the global decline in output which has already begun, we will have to buy oil on the open market for two or three times the current price.

As far back as 2004 the BBC published an article concerned with the state of oil supplies when the cost of $40 a barrel was seen as a warning sign: If you think oil prices are high at $40 a barrel then wait till they are four times that much. How will you pay to run your car? How will you get the children to school? How will you heat your house? How much will transported food go up in price? How will we pay for plastics, metals, rubber, cheap flights, Simpson’s DVDs, 3G phones and everlasting economic growth? The basic answer is, we won’t.

There is a wealth of statistics supporting these claims. The question for the Scottish government is how can it sustain an economic promise of security with an insecure supply? The recent rejection of some wind farms by the SNP Government and a blanket abandonment of nuclear options force the Government in one direction, renewables. Wind, wave or wood a plan is required now to deliver real solutions and achievable promises.

 

Jamie Glenday