Energy Supplies

Lord Lilley Excerpts
Wednesday 12th October 2022

(2 years, 2 months ago)

Lords Chamber
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Lord Callanan Portrait Lord Callanan (Con)
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The Prime Minister and the Secretary of State have said that local support for fracking projects is very important. It is one of the factors that we will take into account.

Lord Lilley Portrait Lord Lilley (Con)
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My Lords, more than a million shale wells have been drilled in North America and elsewhere. There is no record of a single building having been shaken down by the occasional microtremors, nor of a single person being poisoned by allegedly contaminated aquifers. Is not the scaremongering of the anti-frackers as bad as that of the anti-vaxxers? Should it not be treated similarly?

Lord Callanan Portrait Lord Callanan (Con)
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The noble Lord makes an important point. A number of scare stories have been circulating, although I would gently point out that many parts of America are much less densely populated than many parts of the UK.