28th Jul 2014 12:02
LONDON (Alliance News) - The UK government on Monday opened up the bidding process for fracking licences to extract shale gas as part of its 14th licensing round, the first licensing process for onshore oil and gas for six years.
The Department of Energy and Climate Change published details of how companies can apply for licences which will enable them to start initial exploration for shale gas. Any company which is given a licence will also need planning permission, as well as permits from the Environment Agency and sign-off from the Health and Safety Executive.
As part of the licensing process, about half of the entire UK is open to exploration, including certain national parks and other protected areas in 'exceptional circumstances.'
?Unlocking shale gas in Britain has the potential to provide us with greater energy security, jobs and growth. We must act carefully, minimising risks, to explore how much of our large resource can be recovered to give the UK a new home-grown source of energy," Business and Energy Minister Matthew Hancock Hancock said in a statement.
"As one of the cleanest fossil fuels, shale gas can be a key part of the UK?s answer to climate change and a bridge to a much greener future," he added.
His department said that as part of the application process, Communities Secretary Eric Pickles will give particular consideration to recovering planning appeals arising from these types of developments for at least the next 12 months and that any application will also require the company to show that it understands the complex environmental impacts of drilling.
Hydraulic fracturing, otherwise known as fracking is the process of extracting natural gas from shale rock layers underground by injecting fluid at high pressure to split the shale and release the gas.
In the US, fuel prices have been falling sharply as fracking has become commonplace across such states as North Dakota and Mississippi.
So far in Europe, fracking has had mixed results, often being either controversial or unreliable. In the UK, there have been major protests against the method, which critics fear will pollute water tables in rural areas and may cause small earthquakes.
On Monday, the Green Party MP for Brighton Pavilion, Caroline Lucas, who was arrested at an anti-fracking rally last year, called the government decision 'reckless and irresponsible' on Twitter.
However, the shale industry in the UK is seeing a major push, with companies such as Total SA, Cuadrilla Resources Ltd, IGas Energy PLC and Egdon Resources developing fracking operations around the country.
In May, the British Geological Survey and the government provided a central estimate of 4.4 billion barrels of shale oil in the Weald Basin in the south-east of England and in 2013 the two groups announced a central estimate of 1,329 trillion cubic feet of gas in the Bowland shale region of the UK.
In June, the two parties added that shale gas resources in the Midland Valley of Scotland have a central estimate of 80.3 trillion cubic feet of shale gas and 6.0 billion barrels of shale oil.
For comparison, the equivalent of roughly 45 billion barrels of oil has been extracted from the UK North Sea in the past 40 years, according to the UK Office of Budget Responsibility. Offshore UK gas resources were estimated at between 92.7 trillion cubic feet and 109.0 trillion cubic feet at the time of the Bowland shale gas estimate.
However, until significant exploration drilling is conducted on the Weald Basin, Bowland shale and the Midland Valley of Scotland, the estimates cannot be considered representative of what is able to be economically produced. More detailed understanding of the geology along with non-geological factors such as oil price, operating costs and the scale of development agreed by the local planning system will affect the amount of oil which can be produced.
By Tom McIvor; [email protected]; @TomMcIvor1
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