Cambo Oil Field: Climate change activists gather outside Scottish Parliament to protest against development of controversial new Shetland oil field

Climate change activists gathered outside the Scottish Parliament on Friday to protest against the development of a controversial new Cambo oil field.

The group, known as ScotE3, called for an “immediate end to all new exploration, development and drilling activity in the British sector of the North Sea.”

The UK government awarded the original exploration licence for Cambo, off the West coast of Shetland, in 2001.

If the Oil and Gas Authority (OGUK) approves the development plans, drilling at Cambo could begin as early as 2022 - and continue to produce fossil fuels for around a quarter of a century.

The Edinburgh protest comes after First Minister Nicola Sturgeon weighed into the climate debate last month, writing to the Prime Minister to request Cambo’s license be reassessed.

"Such licences, some of them issued many years ago, should be reassessed in light of the severity of the climate emergency we now face,” Ms Sturgeon wrote, “and against a compatibility checkpoint that is fully aligned with our climate change targets and obligations."

In August, OGUK insisted that output projections for Cambo and other oil and gas fields already demonstrated “that these are compatible with net zero."

A UK Government spokesperson said it was supporting the oil and gas industry's transition to green energy by 2050, and had already ended support for fossil fuels overseas.

They added that ministers were currently working on “a climate compatibility checkpoint to ensure any future licences will only be granted if they are aligned with the UK's climate change objectives."

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