Bishop Hill Lords tell government to get fracking
May 8, 2014 Climate: Parliament Energy: gas The House of Lords Economic Affairs Committee has told the government to get the finger out on shale gas development.
We recommend that:
- the Prime Minister should establish a new Committee or Sub-Committee of the Cabinet, chaired by the Chancellor, dedicated to ensuring that his commitment to “go all out for shale” is matched by action;
- the Government should streamline and improve the unwieldy regulatory structure to make it effective as well as rigorous;
- the Government should take the lead in setting out the economic benefits of shale and in reassuring the public that with proper regulation environmental and health risks of developing it are low;
- the industry should engage better with local communities, building on its community benefit schemes, ensuring that its plans are clear and well-explained, meticulously observing regulations and planning conditions and generally being a good neighbour;
- exploration, appraisal and then development of the United Kingdom’s substantial shale gas and oil resources should be recognised as an urgent national priority.
This is nice stuff, but one has to wonder whether it will have any effect at all. The bureaucracy at DECC is in the hands of environmentalists, the ministers are all greens too, the brakes have applied and there is no sign that they will be released any time soon; the only solution I can see is a dedicated ministry for unconventional fossil fuels. But with Cameron and Clegg wedded to the green vote this is only a pipe dream.
We await a cold winter with interest.
Bishop Hill
In related news, the Scottish government has rejected calls for an all-out ban on unconventional gas developments, although you have to wonder if their buffer zones plan will have the same effect.
Reader Comments (26)
I caught the tail end of an item about this on BBC's Breakfast programme. The last word was that the Green Party says we shouldn't be using this fossil fuel, but should be relying on renewables. So much for BBC balance.
I agree entirely with your conclusion. There have been a string of anti green reports frm the Lords over the years but they have all been ignored. The one difference this time is that Putin's antics in the Ukraine at least means that the government is at.least a clear threat. I doubt if any political party with.the exception of perhaps UKIP will give this matter any tractio in the coming general election in 2015.
It might help a little if the BBC could be persuaded to desist from continually describing fracking as "controversial" - a practice which is nothing less than a form of subliminal indoctrination in green-think.
The Green Lobby and the BBC have done a highly efficient job at poisoning public opinion about fracking.
Extensive exploration and extraction in Britain is going to be a difficult enough job as it is (planning, protests, logistics) and it would be a brave consortium who was prepared to spearhead it when richer and easier pickings are to be had elsewhere.
I would guess we are a decade and a couple of crises away from any major exploitation of this resource.
Having said that, the cynic in me says that the exploitation of shale gas in Britain is likely to bring very little to the majority, a great deal to the minority and to make very little difference to the little guy's fuel bills. So overall I am philosophical about it...other than I hate to see a campaign of smear and disinformation succeed.
Plus there is the comfort that it will still be there when we need it....and we might need it even more desperately in the further future. Think of it as money in the bank.
Fracking has caused a considerable shift in the tectonic plates, simply reading that statement put out by the Lords - I had to read it twice.
But sad to say, the eejits in the Commons, in the quangoshire and up at the department of [pressing green boondoggles on the nation aka] the ED's Climate Change shindig - logo; get green, cause blackouts, go bust - on hydraulic fracturing the rearguard actions continue and in the near future: nothing will be done.
Thus, NO hydraulic fracturing mainly thanks to the bbc and the green propagandists.
Have we moved on from square one?
I can only say, not at all.
Nearly half the narrative on the BBC's news site is devoted to environmental concerns and a quote from a Greenpeace spokesman:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-27312796
At DECC, while Davey and Barker may be greens, Michael Fallon, the Energy Minister, doesn't appear to be.
Philip Bratby (8:35 AM): I saw the full article – it was full of contradictions, starting on a site in Elswick, Lancs, where there had been fracking for over 20 years, then a lord declared “We haven’t tried it yet…” (or words to that effect). Then a local complaining about how it would threaten his garden, as they were to drill only 300 metres away (nigh on quarter of a freaking mile, for goodness sake!), and the rig would rise 70 feet above the trees otherwise hiding it, and the work would be 24 hours a day, etc., etc. (It would be interesting to hear his opinions should they want to build a wind-farm there...) As usual there were demands for more laws, and, naturally, as you state, the article ended with the dangers of its effects on “climate change”.
Hopefully, the threat to our present gas supply from Putin will concentrate the minds a bit more. However, I suspect it will take a severe winter before people actually wake up and realise they cannot smell the coffee, as there is no gas to make it.
So essentially,
1. The Government should fix the problem of Government over-regulation.
2. The Government should counter the propaganda of the (state broadcaster) BBC and the (partly state-funded) green lobby.
3. Politicians should stop spreading alarmist disinformation about shale.
Good to see the committee making it very clear who is the root cause of the whole problem.
Rumor has it, the Independent is now a Lawsonian mouthpiece
RR: I saw the end of an interview with Prof Jim Watson of UKERC (another green Government organisation heavily into sustainability, decarbonising the economy, CCS, wind etc) about fracking. Looking at the UKERC website, I see next to nothing about shale gas and fracking, in other words they have no expertise. One has to wonder why the BBC couldn't find a professor who actually knows something about fracking - but we know why.
Reuters shows the BBC how professional reporting should be done
http://uk.reuters.com/article/2014/05/08/uk-britain-shalegas-idUKKBN0DO00320140508?feedType=RSS&feedName=domesticNews
There is no reason whatever why the BBC couldn't be as professional. The report is perfectly readable and goodness knows the BBC has the resources.
What's increasingly annoying is that I'm paying for the BBC (I'm not forced to buy The Guardian) and the BBC thinks such shoddy news coverage is acceptable.
John Page: an interesting article by Reuters, but I do note that it, too, ends with the (perhaps obligatory – who knows?) quote from the enviros; it is long held that people remember the end of an article/programme more than they do anything earlier.
There will never, ever, be significant shale gas production in the UK - we simply don't have the space nor the approval processes to accommodate the thousands of wells needed (latest government report, referenced in MSM, says four thousand wells for fifty percent of demand). Meanwhile, this is a huge red herring that is allowing the powers-that-be to prevaricate over our future energy security when they should be concentrating on re-establishing our coal-fired power industry like the other Europeans are doing (and without CCS which is another myth that just won't die).
Vernon, it might be an idea to take any information from a government report with a hefty pinch of salt. If we do not have space for hydraulic fracking, how do we have space for manual fracking? Like mines, each drill-site could reach out for several miles in all directions; unlike mines, drill-site personnel are not sent into extremely high-risk environments.
We all know the opposition is nothing to do with environmental concerns. It is because shale gas will stop the windmills being built.
Off topic but while we're talking about BBC bias... I just watched the last episode of the latest "Jonathan Creek" series and they managed to sneak in a (mercifully) short Global Warming scene, on the flimsiest of pretexts.
Give me strength!
Department of Unconventional Fossil Fuels? Can't say the acronym will sound encouraging.
May 8, 2014 at 11:34 AM | Unregistered Commenter Vernon E
I totally agree with Radical Coat-hanger that the government should not be seen as a source of reliable or accurate information on fracking. It also seems clear that most people do not understand that the rig is temporary not permanent. The rig is only needed while the well is being drilled, it is then fracked and left to allow the gas to flow. How long the rig has to stay depends upon how easy it is to drill the well but then it moves on to another site.
The government knows diddly squat about fracking or shale gas and even the British Geological Survey does not know enough about how much resource we have.
Cuadrilla have now been investing in the UK for a number of years and had no pay back, I just wonder how much patience they have left?
Vernon E:
Sainsbury's has over 1,000 stores. At 4 wells per store, you really wouldn't notice. At 40 wells per site, it's only 100 sites. It's complete nonsense to suggest that we can't afford the space. We already have more windmills. They take up much more space, and produce much less energy. In fact, as a reminder, the handful of Wytch Farm wellpads will have produced more energy than every windmill in operation in the UK will do in their lifetimes.
Radical Dung: i have been posting for years that thousands of wells won't happen - i allude to the fact that at last there is some public recognition (a serious guy from balcombe said on dp today "tens of thousands" of wells will be needed - first time the truth has come out on tv. he is right of course if it takes into account that a shale well has a life of less than two years. please don't teach grandma to suck eggs - I know what rigs are, I've been in oil and gas for over fifty years. i also know that all these wells have to be interconnected and manifolded and trunklined, then the gas has to be processed, then the wells have to be re-fracked at least once before they are worthless. it ain't going to happen - end of.
Vernon: if the whole of the UK can't accommodate 4000 wells, how did the Americans manage to squeeze close to 2000 inside the city limits of Dallas-Fort Worth?
Close to 2100 onshore oil and gas wells have been drilled here but no-one seems to be aware of them.
Give the hobby-horse a rest before you wear it out.
mikeh ; you are mixing apples pears and pigs. you are not actually saying anything.
Vernon,
I'd like to know a little bit more about the "50 years in oil and gas" What specifically was your experience. I was in the industry for 35 years, it is highly diverse and can be very compartmentalized. The 50 year statement would suggest you are retired like me, I do know that the revolution of horizontal drilling was quite dramatic and not on the radar of even some of the best companies. Similarly the apparent success and financial viability of fracking for natural gas here in North America was not on the radar of even some of the largest and best energy companies.
What I'm trying to politely say is that your experience may or may not be relevant depending specifically on what it was. Were you on the rigs? Were you part of a company exploration group? Part of technology development group? In the industry service industry or in a resource owning production company?
I'm agnostic on the prospects for the UK regards fracking production potential. If you do have experience in the management of exploration and drilling then you know that despite the best seismic information, 2d or 3d, and reservoir delineation data, any and all wells can be considered in part a crap shoot. You also know that unless you punch some holes it is just a guessing game despite the sophistication of todays seismology.
I suspect that Vernon was either in Marketing or in Media Affairs/Public Relations. If I were not so charitable, he might have been in HR.
Diogenes,
Thanks for my daily chuckle
Mike
We do not need a new Govt Dept for Fracking. It would be more sensible to split Climate Change out and put it into the Dept of Environment leaving the Department of Energy to concentrate solely on energy. No man can serve two masters in conflict.