Fracking Controls ‘Not Enough’

This is a dedicated thread for discussing article: Fracking Controls ‘Not Enough’

What are "exceptional circumstances" ?

thecrow said:

What are "exceptional circumstances" ?

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I googled it and Mikipedia says: "Circumstances the Crow takes exception to!"
- most things then ?! mg:

greenie62 said:

I googled it and Mikipedia says: "Circumstances the Crow takes exception to!"
- most things then ?! mg:

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Mike I am not for or against fracking as I don't know enough about it to have formed an opinion, I do however know enough about governments (any of them) to not trust a quote such as exceptional circumstances.

One thing I do know is that if anything was to go wrong (not saying it will) it could end up as a massive ecological disaster possibly bigger than anything this country has seen before.

I see Germany have banned it for the next 7 years.

I am concerned with the lack of clarity in the weasel wording that accompanies the announcement:

National Parks and Areas of Natural Beauty will be afforded special protection and fracking developments will only be allowed within them under ‘exceptional circumstances’. ...
Other wildlife sites which often include important fisheries, such as Special Protection Areas (SPAs), Special Areas for Conservation (SACs) and Sites of Scientific Interest (SSSIs) as well as nature reserves and Local Wildlife Sites, have been excluded from the new safeguards.

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Does this mean that the 'other ... sites' being 'excluded' don't even get the safeguard of 'exceptional circumstances'? OR am I just being paranoid (again)? mg:

I wonder how much an "exceptional circumstance" costs these days...

I wonder how much an "exceptional circumstance" costs these days...

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Probably less than a seat in the House of Lords - or maybe not - ?

The Germans are simply waiting for other nations to test it all out first.

Money money money, must be funny, in a rich mans world.

I listened and watched some government dullard (don't know his name) spouting on and on and on about how we need this oil and how much it will benefit "us" and how we won't be reliant on other countries for our oil again blah blah blah to the point it was either switch him off or toss the telly out the window!

I seem to recall many moons ago similar members of the then government ministry for telling porkies saying the same thing about North Sea oil? Thing is though, our politicians have wasted the incredible revenue gained from North sea Oil. Norway’s thrifty governments have stashed away $840 billion from their share of the North Sea’s treasure. Gavin McCrone, an economist and former government adviser, calls Britain’s failure to save its oil money “a serious mishandling of the greatest opportunity for the economy in the last half century”.

Well whoop de doo dah. Hands up all those who think the latest crop of politicians will do any better? This mob will probably squander any profits quicker or sell off all fracking rights to foreign companies anyway.

One thing I am sure of, is that the vast majority won't benefit from this oil adventure one bit. No matter how much crude goes down we still pay high prices for our fuel.

I saw a Facebook graphic post the other day picturing the area of the Sahara in PV panels it would take to power a) Germany b)Europe c) The world. It was a relatively tiny area. Probably all BS though

Wether it is just mere coincidence I could not possibly tell, but when the Fracking was going to be confined to the North and North West there wasn't any mention of restrictions or exceptional circumstance. Couldn't be anything to do with the discovery of Fracking opportunities in the Home Counties or the affluent Southern Counties could it, surely not.

I wouldn't trust any politician to tell me wether it was night or day without checking myself.

A method that been used for years to tap geothermal heat in places like Iceland, It'll be fine.

Lee as the saying goes "follow the money" to the investors and board of directors of these companies, Then see who they are related to. Then you'll understand why we are being had over backwards to swallow the line "It will mean cheaper energy bills!" Somewhat at odds with what Cuadrilla (principle Fraking Co in the the UK) has said "any savings on energy bills will be marginal at best!"
Sounds to me very much like they will be looking for Govt subsidy....Err US to fund their activities.

Last nights BBC 1 Northwest Tonight had Cameron on for a soft interview about Fraking, where he peddled the cheaper energy bills line. This is the same programme where the Cuadrilla CEO stated any saving on energy bills will be marginal at best. But yet the cr*p interview failed to challenge him with the Cuadrilla statement. What an erection player!

This nation of ours, tolerant to the point of being patiently naive, are sick to its back teeth with lying scheming downright underhanded two faced politicians. I bet those dullards in Parliament cursed the day the ordinary masses got educated then got educated again when the internet was born. You see, we all know now that when you shake hands with any politician you'd better check that rings, watches and even fingers come back after having the wet lettuce experience.

We simply don't trust them or believe a word they say. What is it? 43% of the population never vote?

Moderation note:

Let's please keep comments non-political other than where angling politics is concerned.

Peter is it not angling related politics given the vast volumes of water that is going to service the 1000s of wells that may be bored? Then theirs the storage of return water, one spill of that's and a whole river’s gone!
Again one failed well and the industry itself admits about a 10% failure rate and an aquifer gone along with the water supply for some and the same aquifer that feeds water into the rivers in limestone areas.
And the people pushing and running headlong into this are who? Politicians Peter!

The bad one said:

Peter is it not angling related politics given the vast volumes of water that is going to service the 1000s of wells that may be bored? Then theirs the storage of return water, one spill of that's and a whole river’s gone!
Again one failed well and the industry itself admits about a 10% failure rate and an aquifer gone along with the water supply for some and the same aquifer that feeds water into the rivers in limestone areas.
And the people pushing and running headlong into this are who? Politicians Peter!

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I agree that the topic is angling-related politics, but that should not open the flood gates for comments, pro or anti, against a single Party or politicians in general.

It is a difficult line to tread and the moderation team have allowed some leeway and will continue to do so, within reason.

Fair comments Peter and respect given for your moderation skills but Phil does have a valid point. What do politicians know about the risks posed from fracking? I suspect that to be little to nothing outside of the "advice" they are given. But where does this advice come from? Independent experts or experts who are tied up with the fracking industry?

If political angling find themselves negotiating in order to protect our watery environments from perceived threats from fracking, who will they be negotiating with? Domestic politicians.

A short extract from the Centre For Research Into Elections And Social Trends (CREST)

"Britain is widely believed to be suffering a crisis of democracy. Levels of turnout at elections have fallen. Cynicism about politics and politicians is thought to be rife. And nowhere are these problems perceived to be more evident than amongst young people who appear to comprise a new generation
of the politically disengaged. In short, we no longer participate in politics and no longer lend respect, authority or legitimacy to our political leaders. "

It is politicians themselves, by their actions, ( actions where some MP's have been handed out prison sentences no less) who have caused cynicism and mistrust among the electorate. So where grave concerns exist for angling over perceived threats to the watery environment via fracking, can we trust them? I feel that the trust issue is as legitimate as the concern itself.

For me, the world of domestic politics is a world away from the quiet pastime we indulge ourselves in. But on occasion the path of the angler and that of the domestic politician cross. With fracking however, the threats do not merely effect anglers but life itself if our rivers and aquifers were to come under serious threat from fracking.

For me, and many more like me, the rhetoric coming from domestic politicians is all too familiar as they talk endlessly about the so called benefits to be had for our nation from fracking but say nothing at all about the threats.

Fracking has been going off in America for some time so data has been collected and verified by various bodies.

So what are the threats from fracking that our politicians appear to have forgotten?

Hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking”, is the process of drilling and injecting fluid into the ground at a high pressure in order to fracture shale rocks to release natural gas inside.

Each gas well requires an average of 400 tanker trucks to carry water and supplies to and from the site.

It takes 1-8 million gallons of water to complete each fracturing job.

The water brought in is mixed with sand and chemicals to create fracking fluid. Approximately 40,000 gallons of chemicals are used per fracturing.

Up to 600 chemicals are used in fracking fluid, including known carcinogens and toxins such as…

LEAD
URANIUM
MERCURY
ETHYLENE GLYCOL
RADIUM
METHANOL
HYDROCHLORIC ACID
FORMALDEHYDE

DOWN 10,000FT

The fracking fluid is then pressure injected into the ground through a drilled pipeline.

THE MATHS

500,000 Active gas wells in the US X 8 million Gallons of water per fracking X 18 Times a well can be fracked. 2 trillion gallons of water and 360 billion gallons of chemicals needed to run our current gas wells.

SHALE FRACTURING

The mixture reaches the end of the well where the high pressure causes the nearby shale rock to crack, creating fissures where natural gas flows into the well.

CONTAMINATION

During this process, methane gas and toxic chemicals leach out from the system and contaminate nearby groundwater.

Methane concentrations are 17x higher in drinking-water wells near fracturing sites than in normal wells.

DRINKING WATER

Contaminated well water is used for drinking water for nearby cities and towns.

There have been over 1,000 documented cases of water contamination next to areas of gas drilling as well as cases of sensory, respiratory, and neurological damage due to ingested contaminated water.

LEFT BEHIND

Only 30-50% of the fracturing fluid is recovered, the rest of the toxic fluid is left in the ground and is not biodegradable.
The waste fluid is left in open air pits to evaporate, releasing harmful VOC’s (volatile organic compounds) into the atmosphere, creating contaminated air, acid rain, and ground level ozone.

So are our politicians deceiving us? Are they telling as "ALL" the fracking facts? And if not, WHY NOT? Given that the world generally is looking towards alternative methods of energy production with directives aimed at reducing threats to our planet is the practice of fracking taking us backwards to the days when we polluted our world with no thought as to the consequences.

Money money money, must be funny, in a rich mans world.

How does one keep comments in a non-political nature Peter when clearly its very much a political issue both in terms of angling politics and domestic politics? In this case they are inexplicably inter twinned surely?

My whole belief is that we should follow the “Precautionary Principle (PP)” where new and untested technologies come along. I hear what you say Peter about fraking offshore, but on land horizontal fracturing is untested in the UK. It has however, been done in the US and here’s the big but, the geology is entirely different and more difficult in the UK, acknowledge by the British Geological Survey.

And for that reason we should adhere more rigorously the PP. However, this government appears to have dashed headlong into this, totally ignoring it’s own commitment to PP. Where as other EU countries haven’t and have followed it.

In the above interview with Cuadrilla’s CEO I mentioned he said “We welcome tighter regulation on fraking because as it stands it isn’t there at the moment!” That concerns me greatly that we may be storing up yet again, an Environment catastrophe of the magnitude or greater that what we have done in the past. The PP was conceived and agreed by all parties, so that we don’t visit on future generations the legacies of past generations visited on us.
From my viewpoint, we are dealing with the fundamental ingredient of life here the nations water. A resource that gets scarcer with each passing decade and a relentless upward pressure of population growth. Such a catastrophe of widespread contamination of it would have huge impacts on those future generations to come.
And that I firmly belief needs more than a wing and prayer and/or seat of the pants hope it’ll all be OK and pious political promise of cheaper energy bills.

Phil,

Across the whole of northern Europe there have been thousands of wells either tested or produced by the use of hydraulic fracturing, and in all types of geological conditions. Quadrilla are just one (really very small) company who utilise hydraulic fracturing.

Personally I would rather read and listen to the CEO's of Shell, Exxon and BP who individually employ more scientific personnel than the whole of Cuadrilla company wide.

I don't doubt the Precautionary Principle at all considering that we have been following it for decades here in the UK Offshore Continental Shelf, and indeed it is through honoring those principles that we have arrived at a position in our drilling and production programmes that are about as safe as is physically possible.

Personally I believe that it wouldn't make a scintilla of difference as to which political party were in "power" concerning the need to develop Shale Gas in the UK as all the major parties realise the driving need and the reasons behind that need.

Politicians, of all parties have taken advice and commissioned studies from most, if not all, of the accepted leading specialists in this field of drilling development, including the major oil and gas companies and come to the conclusion that the process is intrinsically safe.

If you think about it, the risks to a political party are in all probability a thousand times more grave than to an individual production company.

Any catastrophic incident would ruin that political party's chances of forming a government for many years to come.

Given the impact of the relatively recent Deepwater Horizon catastrophe, (and the fact that is has virtually wrecked BP's economy for the next couple of decades), there is not an oil company on the planet that will not take every possible preventative precaution to ensure that we do not encounter a similar incident while utilising Hydraulic Fracturing processes.

Today's world is engulfed by "whats" "ifs" "buts" "maybe's" and similar scares, but it is only by facing those potential problems head-on, finding solutions and putting them in place beforehand that we are successful. And that is exactly what we have done in the offshore industry and what is currently ongoing for hydraulic fracturing.