MP Edward Davey
THE Liberal democrats, through secretary of state, MP Edward Davey, have further angered local anti-fracking campaigners through a statement making the case for safe and responsible exploration of shale gas in the UK.
Mr Davey was responding to the findings of a new report which estimates that the carbon footprint of UK produced shale gas would likely be significantly less than coal and also lower than imported Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG).
He said: “Gas, as the cleanest fossil fuel, is part of the answer to climate change, as a bridge in our transition to a green future, especially in our move away from coal.
“We have to face it: North Sea gas production is falling and we are become increasingly reliant on gas imports. So UK shale gas could increase our energy security by cutting those imports.
“Home-grown gas, just like home-grown renewables and new nuclear, also provides jobs for our people and tax revenues for our society.”
The minister admitted that nobody knows much onshore UK gas resource exists – and how much it can be commercially extracted, and noted that ‘rigorous’ regulation must be put in place.
“UK shale gas production must not be at the expense of our wider environmental aims – indeed, if done properly, it will support them. I am determined to make that happen.”
One sided
However, Dr Carroll O’Dolan, chairman of Fermanagh Fracking Awareness Network, described the minister’s comments as part of a ‘continued one-sided view of the UK Government headlong rush into shale-gas fracking’.
He said that the ‘the UK Government is not applying the precautionary principle and so is in effect putting at risk the health of the general population’.
He added: “Due to methane’s massively more devastating effect on the environment than conventional fossil fuels even small leaks of anything above 3% of production will negate any supposed ‘clean gas’ tag the governments and fracking industry keep telling us.”
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