Asked by
To ask Her Majesty’s Government when the moratorium on fracking
will become a ban.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for
Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy and Northern Ireland
Office () (Con)
My Lords, the Government have no plans to turn the moratorium on
shale gas extraction into a ban. The Government have always been
clear that we will be led by science, will continue to take a
precautionary approach and will support shale gas exploration
only if it can be done in a safe and sustainable way. The
moratorium is intended to give a clear message to the sector and
to local communities that fracking, within the current corpus of
scientific evidence, will not be taken forward in England.
(GP)
The very welcome delay to carrying on with fracking means that we
have to move a bit faster in reducing our dependence on gas, so
will the Government ban new builds having gas central heating and
perhaps look at subsidising heat pumps and renewable energy? It
is all in the Green New Deal, if the Minister would like a copy.
The noble Baroness raises an important point. Let me stress at
the beginning that we need to decarbonise, and moving from coal
to the lighter hydrocarbons is one way of doing so. It has
ensured that the US has met and measured its own decarbonisation
very well. We will look at how to decarbonise our internal
central heating processes and anticipate putting new ideas
forward very soon.
(Con)
My Lords, is it sensible for the Government to continue with the
moratorium when we are so dependent on gas supplies from the
Middle East? Are we not lucky that the noble Baroness, Lady
Jones, was not here when we discovered North Sea oil?
I would not like to comment on the age of the noble Baroness,
Lady Jones, in this regard—I mean that in a complimentary way. We
currently have a number of sources of gas to ensure that we are
not dependent upon any one. We have our own domestic, indigenous
gas from the North Sea; we have piped gas, LNG; and of course we
bring in gas from the Middle East. We have such a broad base that
we are not wholly dependent upon any one and therefore we can be
sure that we will be safe into the future.
(LD)
The Government may not ban fracking, but do they agree with the
National Audit Office’s recent report that states that fracking
has no demonstrable benefit for local people, communities or the
environment?
It is a question that I cannot answer, because at present there
are no fracking sites in the United Kingdom that are in any way
functional. The question of how we invest in local communities
has already been realised by the onshore wind sector; we have
seen significant benefit to local communities through investment
in those communities by companies that have located their wind
farms there.
(Lab)
My Lords, does the Minister agree that there is a strategic
benefit in being able to produce gas ourselves? At the moment we
see that Germany, for example, is in a very poor position,
because she is reliant on gas from Russia. It puts her in a poor
strategic position.
The answer to that question is yes. Many years ago when I was a
geologist I found myself digging out fossil insects in central
Colorado. That was designated a strategic naval reserve, because
it was oil shale and in a crisis it could be removed for the US
Navy. It is vital.
(Con)
My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend and the Government on
introducing this moratorium. It is great news for North
Yorkshire, particularly where fracking was going to be considered
in a national park, which I believe is totally inappropriate.
Will the Government look at energy from waste and the work going
on at the Allerton Park facility? This is generating huge amounts
of electricity from household and other waste, but it is going
into the national grid. To make energy from waste more palatable
for local communities, will the Government allow the electricity
that is being generated to go to houses that lie closest to
Allerton Park itself?
To answer to the first part of my noble friend’s question, waste
will become an important generator of electricity and we need to
recognise its value. We need to consider how district heating may
be based upon such approaches, which may indeed benefit those in
the proximate area—the local community—and we will give further
consideration to that.
(Lab)
The Government have indicated that the moratorium could be
temporary if new research can show that fracking can be carried
out safely. What exactly would the Government like to see for
fracking to be able to restart?
There is a long and short answer to that. I shall try to give the
short one. We would need a geo-mechanical survey of the specific
basins concerned and the Oil and Gas Authority would have to
oversee the determination of the criteria for such an
examination. We would have to make sure that whatever emerged
from that would guarantee the safety and sustainability of the
resource and of the local communities. At present, it is not the
intention of the Government to commission such work, but we
understand that certain companies may themselves undertake it.
They must do so within the limits set by the Oil and Gas
Authority.
(Lab Co-op)
My Lords, could the Minister as a fellow Scotsman clear up a
mystery for me? Is the position of the Scottish Government a ban
or a moratorium?
I would not like to inquire too far into the mystical workings of
the Scottish Government. As the noble Lord will be aware, the
situation is clear: they have declared it to be a ban but have
been shown in court to be guilty only of a moratorium.
(Con)
My Lords, there has been speculation that there might be more
support for nuclear, which is a zero-carbon source of energy.
Could the Minister comment on that?
Yes, nuclear must be part of our wider energy mix. It is a
zero-carbon approach and we will continue to invest not just in
the plants we have seen so far but in different smaller-scale
investments. We are also very interested in fusion and will
continue to be so.
(LD)
My Lords, given that the moratorium seems to be going on for a
long time, what can local residents around the Preston New Road
site in Lancashire expect to happen in the near and medium term?
Also, are the areas that have been given licences for exploratory
drilling, which is not fracking per se, still able to go ahead
with that?
Cuadrilla has removed all its fracking equipment from the Preston
New Road site and no work whatever is anticipated to continue
there. The noble Lord will be aware that drilling can take place
for a whole range of reasons, not just for the wider energy
world. We will continue to monitor it to the highest possible
standards where it can continue to be done.
(Con)
My Lords, could the Minister advise the House of Her Majesty’s
Government’s view on tidal energy?
Love it—we should be doing a lot more of it.
