Andy Sawford
Main Page: Andy Sawford (Labour (Co-op) - Corby)
Michael Fallon
We have a separate plutonium management strategy. I think that that will answer my hon. Friend’s inquiry on that matter. It is worth saying that local communities that are prepared to host shale will receive significant benefits, including some £100,000 for an exploration well and, potentially, between £5 million and £10 million over the lifetime of any production well. Those are significant amounts, and they would rightly recompense local communities for any of the disruption involved.
Andy Sawford (Corby) (Lab/Co-op)
Bloomberg’s new energy analysis of shale gas states that
“the expectation that UK shale gas could lead to gas prices similar to those which have been seen in the US in the last two years can be discounted”.
Does the Minister accept and agree with that analysis?
Michael Fallon
We know from the British Geological Survey, which we published two weeks ago, of the central estimate of 1,300 trillion cubic feet in the Bowland-Hodder basin. What we do not yet know is whether that resource can be recovered as economically or, indeed, technically as it has been recovered in the United States. That is why we need to get on and explore to see whether that resource can be made available in the same way and have the same significant reductions in the cost of energy for our businesses and our households.