Saturday Review: Do we really want to see oil fields in rural Sussex?.
If they get their way, there will be wells across the Weald, with West Sussex the prime target.
What UKOG is planning bears little resemblance to the environmental permits and planning permission granted to the site in 2013.
Back then, the intention was to drill very deep, for gas.
“This type of oil deposit very much depends on being able to drill your wells almost back to back so that it becomes very much like an industrialised process,” CEO of UKOG, Stephen Sanderson, told investors.
UKOG is not the only company planning wells across the region.
The oil industry has acidised in the Weald for decades.
Whatever the truth of what companies say at exploratory stage, local communities believe they will want to acid frack when they start producing, to get at more of the oil-bearing rock.
Calling these new Weald oil wells “conventional” risks making them a non-issue for communities, media and planners.
It would mean no need for planning permission, no council influence on lorry routes, no say for local communities.