Just had an email from a friend about proposed exploration for Oil on Leith Hill. There is an online pettition that anyone can sign or voice their individual concerns. Copy and paste link below (also includes more information):

http://www.thevirtualvillage.com/oilwell.cfm?CFID=3704834&CFTOKEN=32777736

Deadline for objections is 9th August 2009 so spread the word

What's the problem – got to come from somewhere and you can bet there will be planning restrictions up to the ceiling to make sure it's sensitivly done.

NIMBYism.

(and yes, I do live near by and yes I do ride on Leith hill).

As I understand it, its more a matter of retaining exploration rights rather than of any actual intention to carry out exploration.

I ride up there also. I have not signed this, chiefly because someone pointed out to me it would not be the first oil well in the area. As I had never, for a second, noticed the others I figure this will not be the Destroyer of Worlds. Oh, and NIMBYs boil my piss. 🙂

I think I read somewhere that it isn't actually on Leith Hill?

Good point big dummy – you litterally have to ride past the other ones in the area to spot them.

Similar to people who object to mobile masts and then moan about the lack of signal…

Lets hope someone doenst find oil close to Ewans house and of course he wont be upset if finding the oil has an impact on his home's valuation.

Worse than NIMBY is those that can cast stones and judgement as long as it doesnt affect their own owned house/land. People do live near there and christ there are soo many bloody remote places in the world to source for oil.

I love the fact that the main objection these people have to oil drilling in the area is that for a few days it will inhibit them driving their petrol powered cars down the lane.

Joe

Are the NIMBY comments because you are jealous of the houses people own round there?

Worse than NIMBY is those that can cast stones and judgement as long as it doesnt affect their own owned house/land. People do live near there and christ there are soo many bloody remote places in the world to source for oil.

Remind us where you live that gives you the right to dribble out opinions on this subject? Manchester, is it? 😉

True. Maybe I shouldn't care about Sun Yi or other world issue either 😉

And I think the Iraqis, Kazakhs, Sudanese, Saudis, Venezuelans, polar bears and other poor bastards living under your "remote places" might have a view on you wishing Surrey's oil barons on them as well. 😉

One point about Nimbys, if people who live nearby don't object who else is going to? People in Manchester?

Nimbyism has to exist as its mainly only locals that care

To qualify my interest; I've not ridden there for years but used to.

Why drill for yet more oil? It is a finite resource and found in very limited pockets around the south coast. Just get on with developing something sustainable for the future and have done with it.

Petition signed.

I've signed. It's a designated AONB. Why give it a designation which says it's to be preserved cos it brings pleasure to people. And then ignore the designation?

mtbfix – beat me to it.

Nimbyism has to exist as its mainly only locals that care

and that area isnt that densely-populated so the council could argue that only x-amount of people signed/massage the figures.

Agree- get to work on renewable energy. Where does it end? A drilling platform in every town and village?

Yes I live in Manchester but I dont want to see an area that I like have this on its doorstep. Sorry. Ive met a few locals, including a family who were teaching their son the values of charity by organising a drinks stall at the gates of their property. Many cyclists carried on riding passed when I had stopped, bought some Lemonade and shot the breeze with them. Their house was bloody big, old and on alot of grounds but they didnt act snooty with me, just chatted and chilled. Guess its all 'us and them' isnt it?

Indeed, but all locals care everywhere. No-one is desperate to have a tiny and inconspicuous oil-well in their back-yard. But if there's oil under there, and someone wants it, then endlessly grumbling that there's oil somewhere else that they could drill for instead doesn't really help.

FWIW, my house is just along from a waste-energy plant development that some people are getting their knickers in a twist over. I am happy to believe that it needs to go somewhere, and my back yard seems to be as good a place as any.

And in any case, as noted, it'll not be very noticeable, and then it will disappear when the tiny deppsits of oil they're after have been exhausted. Of course, if everyone would rather they covered Leith Hill in some of those beautiful wind turbines to catch the brisk breeze that's always blowing up there… 😉

As a local (ex Coldharbour now living in Capel) resident, I think the main concern of the villagers in Coldharbour is the site of the drilling not the fact that the oil is to be extracted.

If you all know the area as you say you do then why drill in the proposed (difficult to get to with large lorries/tankers)site when you could just as easily drill in from just off the A24 Dual Carrigeway thus solving all the potential traffic problems that is the main concern of most objectors.

This would have the added advantage of protecting the AONB and not having a flare mast on top of one of the highest points in South Eastern England.

There is a huge gas storage tank not far from my house. Indeed they have to go somewhere. Not in a place of tranquility, reflection and beauty IMO.

On the term NIMBY. Hate that term. Everyone who pays council tax/taxes in general should have the right to say what then is put into their environment around them. Its a Democracy after all.

But there's a difference between siting a gas storage facility (which can go in any old shithole) and siting an oil well, which has to go somewhere near an oil field… 🙂

If ybot is correct and there is in fact a better way of getting at the same deposit then that would clearly be preferable.

hora –
There is a huge gas storage tank not far from my house.

Don't be so harsh on yourself.

NIMBYs are normally hyprocrites in my experience. I suspect that pretty much everyone living in that area has a two cars at a minimum, and my impression is that they're not ultra high mpg vechicles either.

I can't say i'd particularly care if someone drilled for oil near me, from memory the proposed site isn't close enough to anyones house to cause the value to plummet. And forgive me if I don't shed too many tears that someones million quid home is now worth 50k less.

Did you sign the petition hora? Given you live in manchester?

I was referring to someone who had oil or similar drilled close to their own house Ewan. Would you object if a mobile mast was errected <100m's to your own home?

Would you object if a mobile mast was errected <100m's to your own home?

Surely this is about 500m from any houses, and the only real thing that people are objecting over is people driving lorries down the lane, thus making it inconvenient for them to drive their cars down the lane?

Joe

Chances of anything commercially viable are slim anyway.. many exploration wells have been drilled and lots of exploration seismic has been shot all over the UK with only a small % yielding anything of commercial interest. So fingers crossed!

Yep, It would cost the oil exploraton company a bit more money, thats about it though. Take a look at the map on the virtualvillage website linked above and you'll see what I mean. Somewhere around Mid / South Holmwood /Beare Green would seem more sensible to me and by that I don't mean right in the villages but in the land between them and the lower slopes of Leith Hill.

Hora – I have a mobile mast about 50m from my home and another one about 150m away. I have excellent reception here.

Joe, you are right, lorries are the main objection and whatever you may think surely you can see that Coldharbour Lane is really not that appropriate for lorries – its the danger aspects of this traffic that is of most concern. As my previous post, can you please tell me why drilling from a site accessable from the A24 duel carrigeway isn't being put forward.

Ewan, your remarks seem wide of the mark and rather childish not to say of little relavence, does it really matter what someones house is worth and what car they drive !

ybot – I was responding to Hora. I don't really care if someone's house goes up in value, falls in value, or stays the same.

My point is that the oil has to come from somewhere – why not here? How is that wide of the mark? It's not going to appear from no where from the oil fairy is it? Clearly the site that has been suggested is a good site to proceed on, otherwise the company wouldn't be pursuing it, I'd strongly suggest that you're not qualified to suggest other sites, however if you do have access to the relevant geological mapping and expertise then I stand corrected.

"But there's a difference between siting a gas storage facility (which can go in any old shithole)"

So Albury is a "shithole" then? I take it the 10km gas pipeline that is being planned from Albury gas storage facility over the North Downs isn't a problem for you then?

As far as I can see, the Holmwood prospect (PEDL143) is a known prospect with gas being present more likley than oil – the oil estimates that I have seen range between 4 and 22mmbol and basically they need to drill an appraisal well before having to relinquish the block. The structure has been mapped from a producing well not far away and the reservoir pinches out at Holmwood. If they drill from a site
accessible from the A24 then it isn't going to tell them the areal extent of the propect.

However I do agree that the area does not have the infrastructure to accomodate the amount of lorries/traffic for this project.

Oh, I might now live in Manchester but I still ride the Surrey Hills when down in London. I dont beleive the roads/area is safe for road cyclists, car drivers or other uses considering.
Ewan, you're allowed an opinion. As is everyone. Rolling out the 'yeah mate you need oil for your car' is abit of a basic arguement though. There are many considerations to consider and the Surrey hills will never be a rival to the oil fields of Iraq/Iran etc etc. I feel the Exploration company is looking to make a relatively small profit compared to a big global business?

So Albury is a "shithole" then?

Not particularly, I was purely insulting hora's place of abode out of unalloyed malice. No serious point was intended. 😉

How is 'you need oil for your car' any more a basic argument than 'oooo, it's not suitable for the area'? At least the former is more quantifable.

Are you telling me that the photos on that website are likely to be representative of the actual situation? e.g.

or

The collary of your final point (it's a small profit), presumably means that you think all corner shops should be shut down and replaced with tesco megastores?

I need that oil out of the the ground so that I can drive to a trail park every weekend for as long as possible. Don't care were they drill just keep it flowing. Surrey, Alaska, who cares? Ironic or moronic, you choose.

Rolling out the 'yeah mate you need oil for your car' is abit of a basic arguement though. There are many considerations to consider and the Surrey hills will never be a rival to the oil fields of Iraq/Iran etc etc.

Like, do we have to fight a bloody war to get hold of the fabled Coldharbour fields? Will the population of Mole Valley welcome our troops as liberators or fight a guerilla campaign against them from the copses and barns? Will we be outbid for the contracts by Chinese conglomerates when we have established a Western-friendly parish council in Coldharbour? Can we get the oil through the Suez canal alright? Is Coldharbour politically stable? Shall we bomb some orphanages? That kind of stuff? 😉

So really, the reference to Albury being a shithole should really refer to whichever bit of the Greater Manchester conurbation that hora lives in?
On a side note, is there any chance of Albury "going up" like Bunsfield then?

The point, such as it was, is that you can choose freely where to put a gas storage facility, or a waste incinerator, or a lap-dancing club or all sorts of other things that people complain about having near them. If you put an oil well somewhere convenient that everyone is happy with that's fine, but there may not be any oil nearby. 🙂

…..but I watched that "Crude Britannia" series and they did it all in the North Sea, please daddy why don't they drill this well in the North Sea?

Oh, I rather see your point.

" is there any chance of Albury "going up" like Bunsfield then?"
Possibly but then so could Send Prison…..

The geological formation that provides the reservoir is a known producer of both oil and gas having a producing well at Brockham to the north – gas being more likely in the well at Holmwood rather than oil – the operators just need to know the areal extent of the reservoir, how much is in the reservoir and is it econommically viable to extract?