Environment & Energy
Related: About this forumUK fracking ruling due to be announced by government
Source: BBC
UK fracking ruling due to be announced by government
6 October 2016 Lancashire
The government is due later to reveal whether it backs fracking plans, in a landmark ruling for the UK shale gas industry.
Communities Secretary Sajid Javid is deciding on a planning appeal by firm Cuadrilla to test frack in Lancashire.
His backing would enable shale rock to be fracked horizontally for the first time, in a bid to yield more gas.
But, protesters say it uses techniques that risk the environment because of the chemicals and pressure used.
Lancashire County Council refused permission to extract shale gas at two sites - Roseacre and Preston New Road - last year on grounds of noise and traffic impact, forcing Cuadrilla to appeal.
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Read more: http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-lancashire-37567866
kristopher
(29,798 posts)**press release**
The chairman of the environment agency for England and Wales voiced support for shale gas extraction - which critics say can pollute ground water and cause earth tremors - and he backed government plans to expand nuclear power generation.
Shale gas is extracted using a technology called hydraulic fracturing or fracking, which involves pumping large amounts of water and chemicals underground.
The chairman, Lord Smith of Finsbury, said on Tuesday fracking could be done safely and that the technology could improve Britain's energy security and end the need to import gas from abroad.
The Environment Agency is largely government funded and is the main environmental regulator for England and Wales, including areas important for the shale gas and nuclear power sector, such as air and land pollution and waste regulation.
"Domestically available (shale) gas supply would be beneficial for our energy needs and our energy security and it could be affordable," Smith said on BBC Radio 4.
"However, we would want to monitor and regulate that process very rigorously," he added.
The technology has been blamed for causing slight earthquakes and been banned in several countries, but it has also transformed the U.S. energy sector and caused domestic energy prices there to plummet in recent years.
Smith said that fracking should only be developed if carbon capture and storage (CCS) methods were also available to make gas more environmentally friendly.
The UK plans to develop CCS technology to bury carbon dioxide emissions from its coal and gas power plants underground, but the technology is not commercially proven yet.
"If we end up going for a dash for gas in a few years time, which I suspect we may do, we have to have carbon capture and storage for gas fired power stations to capture the carbon rather than just releasing it," Smith said.
Smith also said that Britain needed nuclear power to combat climate change, although he doubted that the technology would play as great a role as the government wants it to.
"Building nuclear power stations is a long and difficult process and that means that 40 percent (of the power generation mix) is probably going to be difficult, but I would say that nuclear has to be part of the overall landscape," he said.
"Twenty years ago I would have said 'over my dead body' for nuclear power, now climate change has made a realist of many of us and I have to say it has to be part of the mix."
The agency is a statutory consultee on local government planning matters and failure to comply with its regulations can lead to criminal prosecution.
http://www.eauc.org.uk/uk_environment_agency_backs_fracking_nuclear_po
muriel_volestrangler
(101,368 posts)The council cited visual impact and noise when it turned down the companys two planning applications to frack on the Fylde last year, but a month later Cuadrilla submitted an appeal.
On Thursday, the communities secretary said he had accepted the appeal for one of the sites, at Preston New Road. The move marks a major step up in the scale of exploratory fracking in the UK, as it green lights four wells compared to the single well approved for fracking in North Yorkshire earlier this year.
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Javid deferred a decision on the second site, at Roseacre Wood, to give Cuadrilla more time to provide evidence on road traffic issues and to allow other parties to make further representations. But he said he was minded to grant planning permission at that site too, which would see a further four wells drilled and fracked.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/oct/06/uk-fracking-given-go-ahead-as-lancashire-council-rejection-is-overturned
dubyadiprecession
(5,722 posts)T_i_B
(14,749 posts)Both the Tories and Labour in my local area have suddenly become very vocally anti-fracking. Although you have to wonder how much of that is both parties attempting to use scare tactics to win votes. Not to mention the whole matter of whether or not Theresa May & Co in Westminnster will be paying any attention to local council's objections anyway.