Another week, another fracking fiasco. The Government has just published a report on the likely effects of the drilling on Britains countryside communities – including its possible impact on house prices – that is so heavily redacted it might instead be devoted to a military assessment of options for intervention in Iraq. Rightly or wrongly, it can only raise suspicions in Middle Britain that ministers and the industry have a lot to hide on how fracking will affect its vital interests. And this would make it even harder for them to get the “social licence” of public support that they acknowledge will be essential if the exploration and exploitation of shale oil and gas is to succeed. The reports conclusions are reduced to eleven lines – overwhelmingly devoted to the financial inducements ministers and the industry are offering councils and communities that accept fracking – surrounded by 16 redacted passages. Most ludicrous of all, the report says it has examined a third “major social impact” besides the impacts on property prices and local services, but refuses to tell us what it is, let alone what was found: the sections title and all its 12 paragraphs have been entirely excised. But doubts are growing, not just as a result of mounting opposition, but because the resources are looking less bountiful than had been thought. Last month the British Geological Survey reported that the South of England – recently hyped by ministers as ripe for a bonanza – contains no significant amounts of shale gas and only limited reserves of shale oil, which are thought to be hard to exploit. blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/geoffreylean/100282976/want-to-know-how-fracking-will-affect-you-sorry-thats-a-state-secret/
Posted on: Thu, 21 Aug 2014 06:49:30 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015