New research from the Global Sustainability Institute has found that Britain, France and many other European countries have low reserves of fossil fuels, and their home grown energy could be entirely reliant on imports in several years. The study found that the UK has just 5.2 years of oil, 4.5 years of coal and three years of gas before it completely runs out of fossil fuels, said the researchers at the Institute based at Anglia Ruskin University, in the East of England.