Cambridge entrepreneur completes 700-mile walk to highlight oilfield threat
Cambridge entrepreneur Andrew Dames concluded a 700-mile walk from the Shetland Islands with a call to end all UK oil and gas extraction licences.
The inventor and prolific entrepreneur started his walk on 3 August at Esha Ness on Shetland Island, averaging 20 miles a day and stopping off to hold a ‘No New Oil’ vigil outside the Court of Session, Edinburgh, on 21 August.
The walk, which concluded with a protest outside London’s Supreme Court earlier this month, highlights the danger of allowing the new Rosebank offshore oil field - a major oil and gas field off the coast of the Shetland Islands- being given the go-ahead.
Last year the UK Supreme Court ruled that tertiary emissions must be taken into account when giving planning consent for new oil and gas fields. On the back of this, courts in London and Edinburgh have ruled several new coal and oilfield projects unlawful.
However, the Supreme Court ruling does not affect projects such as Rosebank which have pre-existing licences. And despite the Scottish court ruling that the Rosebank go-ahead was unlawful, oil companies are expected to resubmit applications to drill.
“I am on this walk to draw attention to the foolhardy decision to give the green light to an oil and gas field that will only add thousands of tons of new carbon dioxide emissions to the atmosphere and further worsen the climate crisis,” said Andrew, who was founder and CEO of Cambridge-based photonic optical matrix switches Polatis, which was sold to Huber + Suhner for $35million in 2016.
“Rosebank is not consistent with the UK’s climate commitments of limiting global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees centigrade. It is clear from the intense heatwaves that we have had over the summer that the weather in Britain is becoming more and more changeable and damaging to our agriculture, biodiversity and human health itself.”
Prof Hugh Hunt, deputy director of the Centre for Climate Repair at Cambridge University, joined Andrew on his walk on 12 August.
“It’s too late now to rely just on emission reductions alone, we’ve got to stop burning fossil fuels,” said Prof Hunt.
Referring to the legal loophole that allows oil fields that have already been given licences to be developed, he said: “If these licences are granted and new development takes place, that puts us into a decade more of burning fossil fuels which we just cannot afford.”
Along the way Andrew had the opportunity to appreciate the British landscape, and talk to people from different walks of life.
“Everyone’s been very friendly and cars have been considerate on the road,” noted Andrew, a chartered engineer, Quaker and father of four, who holds numerous patents in electronics and sensors, and has latterly devoted his energy to raising awareness of climate-related issues.
He was joined for a vigil outside the Supreme Court in London to mark the walk’s successful conclusion.
Buoyed by the success of the mission he may be, but Andrew knows there are many challenges to come.
“The Department for Energy Security and Net Zero, which is run by Ed Miliband, has said it is permanently taking us out of fossil fuel production, though they haven’t announced that yet,” he told the Cambridge Independent. “I hope they announce it sooner rather than later.”