In recent years, natural gas consumption in the United Kingdom has grown rapidly. At the same time, there has been an abrupt change in UK natural gas supplies, brought about by depletion and decline. In the first part of this two part series, I look at historical developments in EU and UK natural gas consumption, production and imports and the challenges posed by declining production.

In the second part of the series, I use a simulation approach to test the likely adequacy of natural gas supplies during the upcoming heating season. In these simulations, I use data from the UK Department of Business, Enterprise, and Regulatory Reform (BERR), UK National Grid, as well as information about recent UK Continental Shelf (UKCS) and Norwegian Continental Shelf (NCS) develpments. Based on what I refer to as the reference scenario, it seems likely that the UK will increasingly have to rely on Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) imports to secure adequate supplies.