Shale Gas

Debate between Ian Lavery and Christopher Pincher

Thursday 3rd November 2011 Westminster Hall

[Ian Lavery (Wansbeck) (Lab)]

As a member of the Select Committee I have been involved in the report and all the stages leading up to it. I am sure that my colleagues agree that the investigation into shale gas has been enlightening.

Shale gas has been declared to be an energy revolution and a game changer in the US, and heralded as a game changer for policy and for energy security. The real question here is whether it can be a game changer in the UK. It is an unconventional gas, and is classified as a fossil fuel. The three main types of unconventional gases are shale gas, tight gas and coal bed methane gas. The reserves of shale gas are known, as has been explained this afternoon, as plays, not fields. They cover a larger geographical area than a field and, because of the way in which the gas is exploited, need many more wells to be drilled than conventional gas, which will present a problem for communities in itself.

Cuadrilla has been the subject of everyone’s discussions this afternoon. It describes itself as an English independent company, and it has completed phase 1 of its exploration at Preese Hall, five miles east of Blackpool. Phase 2 of the exploration commenced in 2011, and on its completion Cuadrilla plans to equip one of its other four approved sites in Lancashire. As has been explained by the hon. Member for South Suffolk (Mr Yeo), the Chair of the Select Committee, the results were divulged today or possibly yesterday, and unfortunately I have not seen them. However, it is alarming that the hydraulic fracking process was paused because of seismic events in Poulton-le-Fylde last year.

We must understand, as politicians on both sides of the House, that people have the right to be frightened of seismic events in their area. Someone may say, “Don’t worry; it’s only a seismic event,” but when people hear things like that they go to the council or their representatives, or they go on the internet, and eventually they go to their MPs’ surgeries wanting answers. We must understand that. What the hon. Member for Southport (John Pugh) has said about fear and greed is right, and it is probably what the issue is all about.

The seventh special report of Session 2010-12 outlines the work of the Select Committee on Energy and Climate Change and the Government’s response. The whole issue of shale gas needs much more detail and clarification on a range of fronts: there are the cost implications; there is the impact of exploration and production on the environment, which is an essential issue; there are the advantages and disadvantages of shale gas production and exploration; there is the carbon footprint; and there are the possible hazards. Having sat in Committee while witness after witness gave very good statements, we heard wide and varied views before we took the view outlined in the report.

The cost of shale gas exploration and production, and the cost to the consumer, are at present relatively unknown. My hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Test (Dr Whitehead), has explained his view of different costing elements and the potential future costs.

Of the environmental issues, fracking, which leads to seismic events, is the one that people are talking about, and it is one of the most important. In a nutshell, fractures or fissures are created in underground formations to allow natural gas to flow. Water, sand and other chemicals are pumped under high pressure into the shale formation to create such fractures and fissures, and the sand then props them open to allow the gas to flow to the surface and be collected. Interestingly, giving evidence to the Committee, Professor Selley of Imperial college London observed—I would be the first to accept that this is an example of the fear factor, but it was put to the Committee—that hydraulic fracking had been blamed in the United States for the contamination of shallow water aquifers, microseisms, which are faint earth tremors, and flocks of dead blackbirds falling from the sky.

[Christopher Pincher (Tamworth) (Con)]

The hon. Gentleman has discussed the pollution dangers from fracking. Does he accept that because fracking happens thousands of metres underground, whereas aquifers are probably only a couple of hundred metres below ground, with thick layers of rock between the two, the likely reason for pollution is not seepage of dirty water upwards, but failures in the well head or the bore itself?