CENTRICA, which owns Scottish Gas, has said the development of the giant Cygnus gas field off eastern England will generate £323 million for the Scottish economy and secure 1,450 jobs in the country.
The utility said the estimate, based on research by Oxford Economics, highlighted the contribution the project will make during its five-year construction period.
Oxford Economics reckons the project will add £1.29 billion to the UK economy and support more than 4,820 skilled jobs during the construction phase.
Research by the consultancy found 19,000 tonnes of offshore infrastructure will be built at yards in Fife, the Highlands and Hartepool to produce gas from the field, which is operated by GDF Suez.
One platform and the bases for all four platforms are being built by Burntisland Fabrication at facilities in Methil and Burntisland in Fife and Arnish on the Isle of Lewis.
Colette Cohen, senior vice-president for the UK and the Netherlands at Centrica Energy, said: "This report underlines how significant an impact the Cygnus project is having across the UK both in terms of investment and jobs, as well as strengthening our security of gas supply."
Centrica, which has a 48.75% stake in Cygnus, said the field will produce enough gas to meet the demand of 1.5 million UK homes.
GDF Suez expects production to peak in 2016. The French utility has a 38.75% interest in Cygnus. Germany's Bayerngas has 12.5%.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article