Fracking

Debate between David Mowat and Duncan Hames

Tuesday 25th November 2014 Westminster Hall

[David Mowat]

My next sentence would have been that oil prices have fallen by about a third in the past three or four months, because the USA, which was a large global market for oil, is no longer importing oil. The result is huge in terms of geopolitics and the position of countries such as Saudi Arabia. Of course, that cost reduction would happen with gas, too.

It is not only the cost of the material that matters, but the economic activity that comes with exploiting it. Such activity is not a displacement of renewables. Aberdeen and the areas around it have the four parliamentary constituencies with the lowest unemployment rates in the UK—the rates are lower even than those in the south-east of England and London. That record has been built on the back of the North sea oil industry, and some of that activity will happen if shale reaches its true potential.

People have said that that potential may not be there. I believe I heard the right hon. Member for Lewes say that the reserves may not all be recoverable. That is true. The assumption is that 10% of the technically available reserves will be recoverable. If so, that means 50 years of supply in the UK. It may not be that 10% is recoverable—it may be 1%—but let us find out, because a load of MPs in a room talking about it will not allow us to understand whether the true figure is 1%, 10% or 15%.

I mentioned our energy security and gas imports. They mostly come from Norway, but increasingly come from Qatar. The first contract between Centrica and Gazprom has been signed, starting now, so gas is also starting to come from Russia. The gas situation has changed in the past 15 years. Previously, we were a gas exporter, but no longer.

It is also true that we have security of supply problems in terms of keeping the lights on in this country. During the past decade or two, we have failed to replace power stations. We are turning off our coal-powered stations—we are the only country in Europe doing that at scale. The consequence is that the capacity margin here for next year is thought to be 2%. We are not building any kind of power stations. That needs to change. The Minister might well talk about that in his remarks.

Any student of the subject who does not believe that nuclear power globally is part of the decarbonisation solution does not have a thoughtful response to offer. Last year and the year before, 87% of the world’s energy came from fossil fuels. Of that, by far the majority came from coal and oil. If we could replace that coal and oil with gas—that is a big aspiration and it will not be done overnight—it would be equivalent in decarbonisation to the world increasing by nine times existing global renewables.

[Duncan Hames]

Does the hon. Gentleman accept that coal will not be displaced by gas if coal is burned elsewhere—those carbon emissions still enter the atmosphere?

[Mr James Gray (in the Chair)]

Order. With an eye on the clock, I call David Mowat to respond.