The UK onshore industry drilled no oil and gas wells during 2025, according to official data.
At the time of writing, information from the North Sea Transition Authority’s public wellbore search, showed no onshore wells were spudded (started drilling) in the past 12 months.
In the same period, 41 wells were drilled offshore in the UK, the database confirmed.
This is just the second time in more than 100 years that no onshore wells were drilled in a calendar year. The other time was in 2021.
According to the data, the largest number of onshore wells drilled in a year was 162 in 1943. But that was the one time the annual number exceeded 100.
In the past decade, the number of wells has been in single figures every year.
In the previous month, there have been signs that operators may be becoming concerned about risks to the onshore industry.
UKOG explained it had relinquished its PEDL234 licence in West Sussex and Surrey because of “financing and regulatory issues”.
Egdon Resources abandoned its challenge to a refusal of planning permission at Biscathorpe in Lincolnshire. A partner in the scheme said the development could no longer be justified.
Despite this, there are plans across the country for new developments and site expansion. See our article What to Watch in 2026
2020s onshore drilling
In 2024, three wells were drilled onshore. But these were all on a single island in Poole Harbour as part of Perenco’s Wytch Farm oilfield – the UK’s largest onshore oil producer.
In 2023, two sidetrack wells were drilled onshore, also at Wytch Farm, on the M wellsite.
In 2022, just three onshore wells were drilled, despite record oil and gas prices. Two were at Perenco’s Wareham oilfield, also in Dorset. The other was a sidetrack on Angus Energy’s Saltfleetby gasfield.
In 2020, the database listed two wells drilled at Rathlin Energy’s West Newton-B site in East Yorkshire. The first, West Newton-B1 missed one of its targets. The sidetrack, West Newton-B1z, was spudded the following month.
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