This page lists any entry on the site marked with one of the selected categories in the left hand column, most recent first. Selecting other categories will further hone this list.
Hospicing the Pipeline – The Oil Machine in Hawick
Blog post -
Mar 7, 2023
Julie and I talked long. And we talked of death. We talked of the passing of fathers, and husbands, and friends. An idea grew between us through that conversation in her flat. Later we shared it with those sitting in The Cornucopia Room, gathered to watch a screening of The Oil Machine. In the exchange...
The Lie of the Land – Hunting The Oil Machine in Inverness
Blog post -
Nov 16, 2022
The words of Sir David King, head of the Climate Crisis Advisory Group, haunt me. Speaking at the launch of The Oil Machine film, he explained his view on what has been taking place since 2019. “What we have experienced in the last three years is a series of extreme weather events around the world,...
Who Owns the Wind? – the promise of a publicly owned renewable energy system
Blog post -
Oct 3, 2022
The North Westerly gale billows and shakes the heavy white pvc of the marquee on the Portsoy harbourside, Aberdeenshire. Festival goers drift from stall to stall, under the pallid light of sun through plastic, dithering over the t-towels and pots of honey. At one end of the tent, a wall is taken up by a...
Tectonic shifts – the energy crisis and the leap beyond – The Economic War, part 4
Blog post -
Apr 4, 2022
Shell declares it may go back into Cambo and the oilfield’s exploration license is extended by two years. The British government pushes for renewed drilling in the UK North Sea. There is public outcry at the Chancellor’s failure to defend households from the attack on living standards driven by price inflation. The Russian government announces...
Time to kick Oil out of Football? – The Economic War, part 3
Blog post -
Mar 23, 2022
Roman Abramovich under sanctions! Chelsea up for sale! Scandal engulfs Everton FC as a key donor Alisher Usmanov is added to the UK government’s list of ‘named Oligarchs’. The Economic War has opened a new front on the pitch. Football is pulled into the Russian invasion of Ukraine just as Western corporations and the oil...
The Guns of Economic War – unpicking the decisions by BP to sell out of Russia
Blog post -
Mar 4, 2022
Far from the terrifying realities of the shelling of civilians in Kyiv, Kharkiv and other Ukrainian cities, far from the desperation of women and children trying to board trains for Poland, far from the sickening din of armour in the streets, the guns the economic war are firing. The bravery of Ukrainian citizens in resisting...
Fuel poverty and Shell profits – who possesses the gas system?
Blog post -
Feb 10, 2022
Standing in the front benches of the Opposition in the House of Commons, Rachel Reeves, Shadow Chancellor of the Exchequer, declared “Citizens Advice have said they have seen a record number of people in January … Only today Shell announced that their profits had quadrupled to 20 billion dollars. They described the results as momentous,...
Cambo, a turning point for the North Sea? – Shell departs and leaves many questions
Blog post -
Dec 8, 2021
Seven twenty in the evening of Thursday 2nd December the news breaks[1]: Shell announces that they are withdrawing from their joint venture with the company Siccar Point that intends to exploit oil in the Cambo field West of Shetland. The announcement is as dramatic as it is unexpected. That same evening it is long...
From Oil Road to Fire Road – of oil pipelines, gas pipelines and climate chaos
Blog post -
Nov 26, 2021
Authored by James Marriott of Platform drawing on the collective experience of so many others in Platform and the multiple organisations we’ve collaborated with. Prompted by an invitation from the Climate Cultures Festival in Berlin to speak about Crude Britannia and The Oil Road, co-authored with Mika Minio-Paluello, I returned to the Baku-Tiblisi-Ceyhan Oil Pipeline...
Just Transition in Glasgow – now is the time for ‘For’ and ‘Against’
Blog post -
Nov 19, 2021
“We need a massive programme of retrofitting homes”. Francis Stuart of the Scottish Trades Union Congress (STUC) is outlining his understanding of the social project that needs to take place, the transformation of pretty much the entirety of the housing stock of Scotland – and indeed the UK. Stuart sits behind a long table...
The Open Wound – keeping eyes on the constant injustice of oil production in Nigeria
Blog post -
Nov 9, 2021
26th Anniversary of the murder of Ken Saro-Wiwa and 8 Ogoni comrades Authored by James Marriott of Platform drawing from the collective experience of so many others in Platform and the multiple organisations we’ve collaborated with. On the morning of 10th November 1995 in a Port Harcourt goal, Nigeria were murdered: Ken...
How to Capture the Future and Store Capital – the plans for CCS in Liverpool Bay
Blog post -
Nov 5, 2021
You can see the future from Formby Beach. You don’t even need to climb up on one of steep sand dunes to catch a glimpse of it. It is out there yellow and white lights blinking in the grey dusk away to the North West. It has supplanted the red dots of the turbines on...
