By Megan Darby for Climate Homeย News
The UK government has rejected calls from shale gasย companies to loosen limits on earth tremors, in a potentially fatal blow to Britishย fracking.
Ineos and Cuadrillaย said the rules, which require drilling to be halted for 18 hours after any tremor exceeding 0.5 on the Richter scale, are โabsurdโ and โunworkableโ. In the US, the limit is 4ย magnitude.
In principle, the Conservative administration supports shale gas exploration.ย Climate minister Claire Perry said in October gasย had a role in a low-carbon future and it was โpragmaticโ to backย fracking.
However in a statement on Thursday morning, the energy ministry said: โWe set these regulations in consultation with the industry and we have no plans to reviewย them.โ
Campaignersย celebrated the latest obstacle to building new fossil fuel infrastructure, which they have long argued is incompatible with a safe climate future. Greenpeace UKโs Hannah Martin tweeted: โThis is essentially an end to the frackingย industry.โ
Ok Iโm now calling it. This is essentially an end to the #fracking industry. Itโs going to continue to fizzle out until a new Tory leader can officially announce its โbannedโ in an attempt to be green. https://t.co/24Y3oRGdBY
โ Hannah Martin (@Hannah_RM) February 7, 2019
In the US, hydraulic fracturing transformed the oil and gas industry, opening previously untapped resources. Injecting water, sand and chemicals underground at high pressure breaks up shale rock, allowing gas to flowย out.
Advocates hoped to repeat the trick in Britain, to replace dwindling North Sea reserves and reduce reliance on imports.ย But theย countryโs denser population, tricky geology and tighter regulatory environment made conditions lessย favourable.
A governmentย survey in December 2018 found 35 percentย of people opposed fracking, against 13 percentย who supported it. The remainder did not know. Of those against fracking, 40%ย cited the risk of earthquakes, up from 26 percentย just three monthsย earlier.
Cuadrilla, the only company actively fracking in the UK, restarted operations in the northwest of England last October after a 7-year hiatus. But it admitted they had struggled to produce gas as they repeatedly recorded tremors over the allowedย limit.
Image:ย Pixabayย CC0ย Publicย Domain
