Over the last few days there has been a steady stream of good news about Eastern European shale gas. At the start of the week, it was reported that Estonia has become self-sufficient in power, having exploited oil-bearing shales near the Russian border. Meanwhile, on the exploration front, test fracking results in the Ukraine have been very positive and there is also good news from Poland, a country widely cited as demonstrating that a shale gas revolution can't take place in Europe.
While it's fair to say that the eventual success of unconventional oil and gas is not assured across eastern Europe as a whole, it's all looking very encouraging. What is not clear to me is the extent to which a shale revolution that far away would affect us here in the UK. Here's a map of European gas pipelines:
;)
As you can see, even though the distances are large, the network is complete between the UK and all of the Eastern nations where shale exploitation has shown promise. So while there may be capacity constraints, it seems likely that a shale revolution in the east will bring benefits here in the UK.
But expect the government to try to wipe them out by taxing away any benefits to consumers.
Bishop Hill