Arguments on Fracking
Anyone who has been following the media hysteria about the possible use of shale gas, sometimes extracted by a controversial process called "fracking" will have gathered that some people are very concerned about the possible impact. It's harder, though not impossible, to get the other side of the story.
When I was asked about this a few weeks ago at a Conservative selection conference I gave cautious support to the idea of shale gas exploitation in the UK. I declared an interest as I have relatives in Lancashire who live not all that far away from some of the possible sites, emphasised that I thought it was extremely important to carry out full environmental checks and tests to ensure that the process was safe before it went a head, but supported it provided those tests produced a clean bill of health, pointing to the enormous economic benefits that shale gas has brought the USA.
Over the past weeks, as exactly the same type of hysteria, scaremongering, and downright lies have been deployed against any energy company which it is suggested might apply to do "fracking" in the future that we in Cumbria all too often see anti-nuclear extremists and scaremongerers use against the nuclear industry. Including, as in Surrey, protests designed to make a point against "fracking" for gas but are actually targetting operations drilling for oil which do not involve fracking.
In all candour the protests against fracking in recent weeks have made me more likely, not less likely, to support shale gas exploitation provided all necessary environmental assessments and protection measures are taken and after appropriate community consultations.
I respect the right of anyone who is concerned about their local environment to the peaceful expression of those concerns, the right to ask questions, the right to non-violent and non-disruptive local protest.
Violent or disruptive protests are an entirely different matter. They are not acceptable and I note that the chairman of Balcombe Parish Council has asked anti-fracking protesters not to break the law.
The statement by energy company Cuadrilla that they are scaling back drilling activity at Balcombe on the advice of the police is deeply troubling.
I hope and expect that the Police and Crime Commissioner for Sussex, Katy Bourne, may wish to discuss with the Sussex constabulary what advice has been given and how the police hope to balance the over-riding need to protect law-abiding citizens of Balcombe and employees of Cuadrilla with the need to protect the right of Cuadrilla to carry out lawful and properly approved commercial operations.
If there was a scintilla of evidence that Cuadrilla were breaking the law, the appropriate action would be to encourage the authorities to investigate and stop any illegal activity. If there was any hard evidence that anything they are actually doing or currently proposing to do was harmful to the environment, it would be appropriate to campaign for the government to change the law to stop such activity.
But for a company to have to scale back lawful activities because protesters such as the "No dash for gas" group are planning a mass action in which they say they plan to risk their "liberty and personal harm" and which they openly admit is a protest against government policy, frankly, completely intolerable.
What makes it all the more daft is that most of these protesters are telling people that their concern is to protect the environment. If we don't use shale gas, the two most realistic alternatives is that Britain will either have to buy more gas from Putin's Russia, doing as much or probably more damage to the environment in the process, or make more use of coal fired power generation. Coal does vastly more damage to the environment than gas.
Of course there is another source of energy which actually would do less damage to the environment than shale gas, and that is nuclear power. Anyone like to take any bets that the people who are protesting in Balcombe would like to see nuclear power instead?
I thought not.
Two recent articles giving another side from the protesters are worth a read. One is by Matt Ridley who has just written an article in the Times and on his blog debunking The five myths about fracking which you can read here. The "five myths" spread by opponents of shale gas exploitation and a summary of Matt Ridley's responses are:
1) shale gas production has polluted aquifers in the United States
ANSWER - The USA has had "tens of thousands of wells drilled, two million fracking operations completed and not a single proven case of groundwater contamination. Not one."
2) it releases more methane than other forms of gas production
ANSWER - "Study after study has refuted" this claim.
3) it uses a worryingly large amount of water.
ANSWER - Fracking uses 0.3% of the water consumption of the USA - less than golf courses.
4) it uses hundreds of toxic chemicals.
ANSWER - this claim is out by an order of magnitude - more than 99.5% of what fracking uses is water or sand, and the other half a percent uses only thirteen chemicals, all of which can be found in your kitchen or bathroom: things like citric acid (found in lemon juice) and guar (found in ice cream.)
5) it causes damaging earthquakes.
ANSWER - Durham University’s definitive survey of all induced earthquakes over many decades concluded that “almost all of the resultant seismic activity [from fracking] was on such a small scale that only geoscientists would be able to detect it” and that mining, geothermal activity or reservoir water storage causes more and bigger tremors.
The other piece I would recommend anyone interested in the issue to read, again putting the other side of the argument from the protesters, is the article which the CEO of Cuadrilla, Francis Egan, wrote in the Daily Mail a few days ago and which can be read here.
Among the points made in the article is that his company's operations in Balcombe are looking for oil, not gas, and they have no current plans to do any fracking there at all. If they did decide to do any such thing in the future they would need to submit a fresh planning application which would need to follow a full environmental impact assessment and involve fresh community consultation before such permission could be considered.
He also writes that the total area which would be required for enough shale gas drilling operations to supply a third of Britain's need for gas would be two square kilometers.
To answer the other question which people always ask when you are percieved as supporting something - how would you feel if this was proposed in your district? - my answer is this.
If "fracking" was proposed in my district I would want to see a full environmental assessment, appropriate community consultation, and before it went ahead an appropriate community package providing real benefits to local people. If it passed those three hurdles I could support it.
But the reason it would not be my first choice is that, like the majority of people who live in Copeland, I would like to see something which would make an even bigger contribution to Britain's energy needs, and which would release less carbon into the atmosphere than gas: I support a new nuclear power station at Sellafield.
When I was asked about this a few weeks ago at a Conservative selection conference I gave cautious support to the idea of shale gas exploitation in the UK. I declared an interest as I have relatives in Lancashire who live not all that far away from some of the possible sites, emphasised that I thought it was extremely important to carry out full environmental checks and tests to ensure that the process was safe before it went a head, but supported it provided those tests produced a clean bill of health, pointing to the enormous economic benefits that shale gas has brought the USA.
Over the past weeks, as exactly the same type of hysteria, scaremongering, and downright lies have been deployed against any energy company which it is suggested might apply to do "fracking" in the future that we in Cumbria all too often see anti-nuclear extremists and scaremongerers use against the nuclear industry. Including, as in Surrey, protests designed to make a point against "fracking" for gas but are actually targetting operations drilling for oil which do not involve fracking.
In all candour the protests against fracking in recent weeks have made me more likely, not less likely, to support shale gas exploitation provided all necessary environmental assessments and protection measures are taken and after appropriate community consultations.
I respect the right of anyone who is concerned about their local environment to the peaceful expression of those concerns, the right to ask questions, the right to non-violent and non-disruptive local protest.
Violent or disruptive protests are an entirely different matter. They are not acceptable and I note that the chairman of Balcombe Parish Council has asked anti-fracking protesters not to break the law.
The statement by energy company Cuadrilla that they are scaling back drilling activity at Balcombe on the advice of the police is deeply troubling.
I hope and expect that the Police and Crime Commissioner for Sussex, Katy Bourne, may wish to discuss with the Sussex constabulary what advice has been given and how the police hope to balance the over-riding need to protect law-abiding citizens of Balcombe and employees of Cuadrilla with the need to protect the right of Cuadrilla to carry out lawful and properly approved commercial operations.
If there was a scintilla of evidence that Cuadrilla were breaking the law, the appropriate action would be to encourage the authorities to investigate and stop any illegal activity. If there was any hard evidence that anything they are actually doing or currently proposing to do was harmful to the environment, it would be appropriate to campaign for the government to change the law to stop such activity.
But for a company to have to scale back lawful activities because protesters such as the "No dash for gas" group are planning a mass action in which they say they plan to risk their "liberty and personal harm" and which they openly admit is a protest against government policy, frankly, completely intolerable.
What makes it all the more daft is that most of these protesters are telling people that their concern is to protect the environment. If we don't use shale gas, the two most realistic alternatives is that Britain will either have to buy more gas from Putin's Russia, doing as much or probably more damage to the environment in the process, or make more use of coal fired power generation. Coal does vastly more damage to the environment than gas.
Of course there is another source of energy which actually would do less damage to the environment than shale gas, and that is nuclear power. Anyone like to take any bets that the people who are protesting in Balcombe would like to see nuclear power instead?
I thought not.
Two recent articles giving another side from the protesters are worth a read. One is by Matt Ridley who has just written an article in the Times and on his blog debunking The five myths about fracking which you can read here. The "five myths" spread by opponents of shale gas exploitation and a summary of Matt Ridley's responses are:
1) shale gas production has polluted aquifers in the United States
ANSWER - The USA has had "tens of thousands of wells drilled, two million fracking operations completed and not a single proven case of groundwater contamination. Not one."
2) it releases more methane than other forms of gas production
ANSWER - "Study after study has refuted" this claim.
3) it uses a worryingly large amount of water.
ANSWER - Fracking uses 0.3% of the water consumption of the USA - less than golf courses.
4) it uses hundreds of toxic chemicals.
ANSWER - this claim is out by an order of magnitude - more than 99.5% of what fracking uses is water or sand, and the other half a percent uses only thirteen chemicals, all of which can be found in your kitchen or bathroom: things like citric acid (found in lemon juice) and guar (found in ice cream.)
5) it causes damaging earthquakes.
ANSWER - Durham University’s definitive survey of all induced earthquakes over many decades concluded that “almost all of the resultant seismic activity [from fracking] was on such a small scale that only geoscientists would be able to detect it” and that mining, geothermal activity or reservoir water storage causes more and bigger tremors.
The other piece I would recommend anyone interested in the issue to read, again putting the other side of the argument from the protesters, is the article which the CEO of Cuadrilla, Francis Egan, wrote in the Daily Mail a few days ago and which can be read here.
Among the points made in the article is that his company's operations in Balcombe are looking for oil, not gas, and they have no current plans to do any fracking there at all. If they did decide to do any such thing in the future they would need to submit a fresh planning application which would need to follow a full environmental impact assessment and involve fresh community consultation before such permission could be considered.
He also writes that the total area which would be required for enough shale gas drilling operations to supply a third of Britain's need for gas would be two square kilometers.
To answer the other question which people always ask when you are percieved as supporting something - how would you feel if this was proposed in your district? - my answer is this.
If "fracking" was proposed in my district I would want to see a full environmental assessment, appropriate community consultation, and before it went ahead an appropriate community package providing real benefits to local people. If it passed those three hurdles I could support it.
But the reason it would not be my first choice is that, like the majority of people who live in Copeland, I would like to see something which would make an even bigger contribution to Britain's energy needs, and which would release less carbon into the atmosphere than gas: I support a new nuclear power station at Sellafield.
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