Ex-energy minister takes fourth oil job

A FORMER energy minister has taken up a fourth lucrative job in the oil industry.

Charles Hendry, who owns a £2.5m castle in Scotland, has been made deputy chairman of troubled explorer Atlantic Petroleum.

It comes on top of appointments advising Independent Oil And Gas, its major shareholder London Oil And Gas, and international oil giant Vitol.

As energy minister Hendry said he wanted the Government to be the greenest ever and backed renewables, including wind, biomass and volcanic power.

The 57-year-old last night denied he had turned his back on green energy, saying: ‘I remain absolutely as committed as I ever was as minister to a balanced energy mix.’

While energy minister from 2010 to 2012, Hendry backed renewables projects including a £120m biomass plant in Yorkshire. He also signed a deal to bring power from Icelandic volcanoes to Britain via undersea cables.

A year later he was installed in a £1,000-a-day job as director of Atlantic Superconnection, a firm building a 650mile cable to carry the electricity. He has since stepped down.

He has also left a post-ministerial job with Forewind, a consortium of British and Norwegian firms building the world’s largest offshore wind farm off Yorkshire. As minister he trumpeted the benefits of energy partnership between UK and Norway.

Hendry, who was Tory MP for High Peak between 1992 and 1997 and Wealden from 2001 until he stood down in 2015, said: ‘I have always advocated that our energy policy needs to be a balance of nuclear, renewables and gas. It is in our energy security interest that we should maximise the recovery of assets from the North Sea and this is a very exciting time to be joining Atlantic Petroleum, which is showing a very positive approach at a challenging time for the industry.’ Atlantic has been selling North Sea assets amid plummeting oil prices that have been hammering the industry. Last year the Copenhagen and Oslo-listed firm returned to profit, of £1.4m, after posting a £64m loss the year before.

Its assets in the North Sea, include a share in revenues from the Orlando field which is expected to produce more than 10,000 barrels of oil per day from 2018.

Hendry was nominated to Atlantic by London Oil And Gas, which can nominate a member of the board after it agreed to loan Atlantic £8m last year.