Environment
groups oppose licence for Corallian Energy extractions along protected
coastline running to March
Thu 14 Feb
2019 14.22 GMTLast modified on Thu 14 Feb 2019 15.30 GMT
An oil
company drilling off the Dorset coastline is attempting to extend its licence
into the spring, challenging the conditions imposed to protect the sea’s many
sensitive wildlife species.
Corallian Energy has
set up a rig visible from the protected coastline and in close proximity to 58
marine and coastal protected areas. Sensitive and protected species offshore
include bottlenose dolphins, seahorses, rays and breeding populations of
seabirds including sandwich terns and little terns.
Despite
opposition from environmentalists and local people, the government offshore
petroleum regulator (Opred), part of the Department for Business, Energy and
Industrial Strategy, gave permission for Corallian to carry out exploratory
drilling last year.
But after
representations from the Environment Agency and Natural England, among others,
the company was restricted to drilling in the winter and not in the spring to
mitigate “significant concerns in relation to both landscape and seascape
impacts and potential effects on migratory fish”.
Despite the
conditions Corallian has gone back to Opred seeking permission to extend the
drilling into March.
The rig was
approved after an application for a windfarm
off the coast was turned down on grounds it would harm
the views from designated Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty and England’s
only natural Unesco World Heritage Site, the Jurassic Coast.
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