Angus Energy has withdrawn proposals to drill four new wells at the UK’s largest onshore producing gas field.

The company submitted a planning application in July 2024 for the Saltfleetby field near Louth in Lincolnshire.

But the county council and Angus Energy confirmed today that the application had been withdrawn.

The council also confirmed that Angus had withdrawn a formal request to council planners for advice on what it should address in an environmental impact assessment (EIA).

The advice, known as a scoping opinion, sets out key issues that the company should include in an environmental statement – the outcome of an EIA that accompanies bigger planning application.

The application documents did not include an environmental statement, nor any discussion about whether an EIA was needed.

But Angus Energy hinted earlier this year, in an interview with DrillOrDrop, that the application might need to assess carbon emissions at Saltfleetby in an EIA.

This followed a landmark judgement on climate emissions by the Supreme Court. The court ruled that EIAs for hydrocarbon sites should account for greenhouse gases from the burning of oil and gas, known as indirect, downstream or scope 3 emissions.

Angus Energy’s chief executive, Richard Herbert, told us in the interview:

“We have a planning application which has just been submitted to drill additional wells at the Saltfleetby gas field and that approval process could be affected by this. At this stage, we remain optimistic that we will get the right outcome and if this involves more work to be clear about the impact of what we’re trying to do then so be it. We can live with that.”

DrillOrDrop asked Angus Energy today why it had withdrawn the application. A company spokesperson said the application was being reformatted “with an intention to resubmit shortly”.

The Saltfleetby gas field was discovered in 1996 and is currently the UK’s largest onshore gas producer.

Average monthly production at Saltfleetby was 5,620ksm3 (thousand standard cubic meters) for the most recent 12 months for which data is available (August 2023-July 2024) . This represented 68% of UK onshore gas but just 0.65% of total UK gas production.

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