They're still all at sea

Now that the Brent Spar's fate is decided - it is to be turned into a quayside for ferries in Norway in a decision that is costing Shell UK some #43m compared to the original #10m cost of disposal at sea - the Government is trying to negotiate for itself the option of disposal at sea for the biggest steel or concrete platforms.

The Government will not itself say how many installations it might have to treat as exceptions from its policy of bringing back to land redundant oil and gas platforms. But some estimates of 64 installations, due to come to the end of their natural lives between 2010 and 2020, out of a potential 260-270 were yesterday being suggested.

Today, UK Government officials will try to secure this loophole at a preliminary meeting of the Oslo-Paris (Ospar) Convention for the protection of the marine environment of the North-east Atlantic. In July, Environment Minister Michael Meacher and, in all likelihood, Deputy Prime Minister John Prescott, will try to carry their Ministerial counterparts with them, although, so far, only Norway is supporting the UK position, with countries such as Germany and France arguing that what has been installed must be capable of being dismantled using techniques that either are or soon will be available.

To Meacher's embarrassment, his Tory opposite number, Tim Yeo, was yesterday taunting him with

his promise at a Labour Party

conference last October that there would be ''no more Brent Spars under Labour''. Labour is also being reminded that some of its senior

figures, including its then Shadow Environment Secretary Frank Dobson, called at the height of the Brent Spar controversy for a commercial boycott of Shell.

To Yeo's claims that ''Michael Meacher is now leading the fight to secure international approval for dozens of platforms to be dumped - this is hypocrisy on a breathtaking scale'', Meacher responded that there were probably 260-270 platforms in the North Sea but it was always understood that for some bringing them back to land was not appropriate. The largest platforms, those made of concrete and in very deep waters or those that were fractured, were better being dumped at sea, he added.

However, other Opposition parties have weighed in against the Government.

Sir Robert Smith, Scottish Liberal Democrat environment spokesman, said: ''The industry put these rigs up in the knowledge that they would be required to remove them in the end. Now, having made vast profits, the industry wants to dump them, and it looks like Labour plans to let them.''

SNP energy spokesman Alex Neil argued: ''The Brent Spar incident proved the strength of public feeling on this issue, when people from across Europe forced a multinational to change its mind about dumping the installation at sea . . . Scotland has the opportunity to lead the way in developing methods to deal with redundant oil platforms. For example, the possibility of using redundant oil platforms as sites for wind generation should be explored.''

Greenpeace, whose Brent Spar campaign cost it #1.3m and which was left somewhat discredited after its claims that the Spar was carrying 5500 tonnes of contaminated oil proved inaccurate, claimed yesterday that its position that no oil installations need be dumped at sea was supported by engineers working within the oil industry.

Campaigner Rick Lecoyte admitted that Greenpeace's mistakes had allowed its opponents to capitalise, but added that public opinion surveys still backed its position on ocean dumping overwhelmingly.

On the other side of the fence, the UK Offshore Operators' Association's operations and technical director, John Wils, accepted that the industry had had to learn to be more transparent, but argued that part of its problem was putting across to the general public the details of a technically complicated industry.

He insisted that the exceptions that might have to be disposed of at sea would be the biggest steel and concrete platforms - those in more than 75m of water and weighing more than 4000 tonnes, and that in any case the topsides and vests of these platforms which would be the parts carrying any toxic materials would always be removed anyway. All that would therefore be left would be the tower structures which might prove, for a variety of reasons, difficult to remove.

Dr Gordon Picken, an honorary research fellow at Aberdeen Univer-sity and director of environmental consultancy Cordah, believes that in practice virtually all operators will be trying to remove all structures completely, if only to eliminate any residual liabilities.

He added that under International Maritime Organisation regulations, any material left in the sea must have at least 50m clearance, which would leave only some 50 installations eligible for the kind of partial decommissioning for which the Government is seeking permission, and that in practice only a small number of these will be left in the North Sea as stumps.

Those installations whose lower structures may be toppled in situ are likely to be so heavy that cutting them or exploding them underwater would involve very high levels of risk, said Dr Picken.

By the law of diminishing returns, the environmental benefits of removing the last 15% or 20% of the structure became negligible, he said.

Scientists at Dunstaffnage Marine Laboratory near Oban have been involved in studying the environmental effects of cutting piles around the bottom of oil installations in contact with the sea-bed. The results of the first year of work will be reported tomorrow, but Dunstaffnage director Dr Graham Shimmield confirmed that quantities of heavy metal were being released from the cuttings piles as a result of certain procedures.

He added: ''If the Government objective is to keep the window open on seabed disposal versus on-land decommissioning, then they are probably right to keep that option open as long as possible.''