For years, gas cost less than 20 euros per megawatt hour. Today the price is more than ten times as much: 212 euros. There is still about 80 billion cubic meters under the Dutch part of the North Sea. The Netherlands uses about 40 billion euros annually, so it accounts for about two years of Dutch gas consumption. Around 9 billion cubic meters are now pumped up annually from Dutch North Sea fields, but that is decreasing year after year because existing fields are exhausted and few new ones are being developed.
“Gas is still being discovered,” says René Peters of TNO. “It is becoming more and more complicated, in deeper water further from the coast, where it is more difficult to set up a platform. But at the current gas prices it is of course quite profitable.” According to him, there are also gas fields that have already been discovered, but are still waiting for an extraction permit. “The expectation is that we cannot increase North Sea extraction very much, but that we can postpone the decrease by drilling new fields.”
Less from Groningen
An additional advantage of extraction from the North Sea is that we don’t have to look as quickly to Groningen when the need arises. “Groningen, of course we have to handle that very carefully,” says Peters. “If you get more gas from the North Sea, you need to get less from Groningen. But with the quantities from the North Sea, about 10 billion cubic meters, you can’t cover much more than a quarter of the domestic gas demand.” The Groningen gas field still contains more than 450 billion cubic meters, but extraction of this is very sensitive because of the earthquake risk.
Greenpeace sees little in new gas drilling in the North Sea. “It is neither necessary nor wise,” says Faiza Oulahsen. “It will take at least a year or two before you can actually extract and use gas and that will simply come too late. If you look at that period, you might as well invest in energy-saving measures. That is good for the climate and the environment.” wallet and then you are also really independent of Russian gas.”
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