I'm still on annual leave this week so here's another guest post. This one's from our Head of Climate Change Policy, Harry Huyton.
The debate over fracking for shale gas has taken over the environmental agenda in the past two weeks and voices on both sides are getting more and more shrill by the day. You can learn more about our position here.
RSPB submitted its first objections to two fracking sites last week and signed a joint statement with other environment NGOs in the Sunday Times. Our position led to coverage across broadcast and print media over the weekend and has caused debate amongst some of our members and supporters. So it’s worth examining the reasons we have voiced our concern now.
We don’t have any objection to new technology being used to help us produce energy – this is an exciting and important area of research. However we have, and always will, oppose individual developments in our countryside which have the potential to harm wildlife, be it a wind farm, a drilling well, a road or an airport.
Fracking at Singleton in Lancashire – where Cuadrilla have proposed a well – may not disturb the thousands of wintering pink footed geese and whooper swans which arrive nearby each Autumn. It may not pollute water sources and it may not lead to us overshooting our climate targets.
But the unquestionable fact is that we just don’t know. This is untested technology in the UK – a very different prospect to the US where fracking is now widespread. Developers do not need to fully investigate the impact drilling will have on the local environment. And the Government has not explained how extracting more fossil fuel from the ground will help us meet our climate targets.
These are the central questions we are raising. But this debate is really another example of a deeper, underlying challenge our environment faces in the UK.
The choice between renewed backing of fossil fuel extraction in the UK or continuing the transition to low carbon, renewable energy is a fundamental one. Too often, however, the currency of the debate is money. The Prime Minister recently talked about how “we cannot afford to miss out” on the benefits of fracking, for example, whilst the Environment Minister Owen Paterson talked of shale as a ‘god-given’ windfall. Fracking opponents often take a similarly human-centric approach, arguing about house prices and aesthetics.
These are important considerations, but their dominance in Government’s thinking is a reflection of how disconnected politics has become from our natural environment. It has been argued that our dire economic straits make cashing in on our natural resources necessary, but recession is not an excuse to shed our values. The biggest single piece of wildlife protection legislation in this country was developed during the Second World War, yet today’s leaders appear to be clambering over themselves to reel in environmental progress at the mere whiff of economic benefit.
Over in the ‘desolate’ North, along the banks of the Ribble, there remains a richness of wildlife that could inspire even the most urbanite Southern peer. In the spring and summer, you can see waders like avocets, redshank and godwit roaming the mudflats and wetlands. In autumn, hundreds of thousands of pink-footed geese arrive from as far as Siberia, providing an awesome wildlife spectacle. If you pay a visit, be sure to pop into Hesketh Out Marsh, one of our reserves in the area where you can see all this and more. It is our job as the RSPB to protect these special places, for wildlife, for people and for future generations.
We are here to defend nature when it is under threat, whatever that threat may be. Without any reliable evidence that fracking is not a threat we will continue to do everything we can to stop it in its tracks.
You can get involved in writing letters and e-mails to support RSPB campaigns and use your voice for nature. Click through to find out how you can campaign with us.
I agree with the need for a larger and more encompassing debate about the potential role of shale gas and hydraulic fracturing in this country's energy supply ( / what sort of energy economy we want moving forward / the place of and pace of switch to renewables etc).
And I would like to add a few points which I believe are important to consider in the context of this debate:
- although the technology is untested onshore in the UK, there is a considerable amount of experience from the USA, and much of that experience will be relevant for the UK (despite the impact of differences in the legislative approach).
- while we continue in our hydrocarbon based economy and during any transition, I would personally prefer to see gas, as a relatively cleaner fuel, replace our reliance on coal and oil in our power stations. It is worthwhile noting that in the USA, the boom in unconventional gas and the consequent fall in gas prices has displaced coal from US power stations, consequently coal producers have sought out markets in Europe and as a result Europe is now relying heavily on coal fuelled power generation and moth-balling proposed gas fired power stations – meanwhile the US without CO2 reduction targets is reducing its CO2 emissions while Europe with CO2 reduction targets is failing to lower its CO2 emissions.
- one of the notable differences between shale gas (and shale oil) developments, compared to ‘conventional’ oil or gas field developments is the need for a substantially higher number of producing wells. It may be that we are prepared to have thousands of wells across the southeast of England if the shale gas potential is proven and permitted here, it may be that the price is too high for the majority.
Whichever way we decide to go, it should be after a full, open and more encompassing debate that considers the type of energy economy we want moving forward as well as the full current body of evidence from the global experience to date of producing ‘unconventional’ oil and gas. The possible impact of permitting, or not permitting, shale gas developments on the environment, the UK economy, the local economy and population are all part of this larger debate.