Don't agree with this fracking business at all. Sounds pretty Scary to me, all these earthquakes going on in Blackpool since they started, only quite small ones but still. It can't be right to do this to the Earth .Think we,ll all have to go back to horse and carriages to save the planet. Being Abit facetious there but it is worrying , no wonder we having all these natural disasters....
I feel much the same way, Cools. Others will feel differently and in an unstable world we can't always rely on gas from other regions in the world.
That doesn't make the process any more appealing , and as per usual ,only when something drastic happens will the money makers sit up and take note (maybe).
Our gas will not get any cheaper from this, that's just plain eyewash and bribery.
The poor old earth is being battered from every available possibility and then we wonder why climate ,seasons etc are going awol. If we upset the balance and ecology of the planet, we will reap the repercussions.
A few larger tremors might just be the death knell for fracking
They'll always deny it's anything to do with fracking. It could be anything from grand dads teeth falling out to grandma's purse dropping, but never fracking !
Think insurance claims !
Yes Granny you're right, it'll take something like Blackpool Tower collapsing before they will admit it's to do with this fracking , even then I soppose they'd come up with something unrelated.. worrying stuff...
They aren't earthquakes, they are just a bit of seismic activity which is bound to happen when fracking (by definition), nothing at all would have been felt at the surface, your kids photos won't have fallen off the mantelpiece.
To put this in perspective, today's activity was 0.8 which is over the 0.5 point initially set for fracking (but was about to be increased anyway because it is ridiculously low). It was 2km below the surface and very localised to the area.
Quarries often hit 2.0 on the scale without the world falling apart.
The Horse Hill (non-fracking) well near Gatwick hit a 1.9 and a 2.4 earlier on in the year at 1km below the surface, this wasn't even properly investigated.
Ffestiniog had a 1.3 the other day.
Newbridge had a 2.4 this month.
Blackpool tower is still standing.
And before the media continue the perpetuation of the multiple dangerous chemicals used, they aren't dangerous. Unlike other less regulated Countries, our fracking only uses one non-hazardous chemical added to the sand and water apart from the low level radioactive tracers they have to use by law.
I don't suppose you have a list of the chemicls they use have you dd?
I believe acrylimide is one.
[quote=granny]
They'll always deny it's anything to do with fracking. It could be anything from grand dads teeth falling out to grandma's purse dropping, but never fracking !
Think insurance claims ![/quo
Grandma's purse dropping, now that's interesting, I take it the next meat in is on you then granny?
On a serious note, we are slowly but surely sucking the life out of planet earth, and the measures that are being taken are to little to late.
We dont hear as much about the use of lignite that is mined , admittedly minimally here but ever more extensively in Germany. It would seem theres more evidence that emissions from that are more harmful to us than proven harm arising from fracking. There again, who knows what really goes on . You can have all the safeguards and rules you like in any operation , but you'll not know about the shortcuts and blind eyes till something goes wrong.
I don't suppose you have a list of the chemicls they use have you dd?
I believe acrylimide is one.
No, acrylamide is not used by Cuadrilla, acrylamide is toxic. Acrylamide is banned in the UK (and EU) for most uses.
Cuadrilla's fracking fluid is 99.95% water and sand with 0.05% polyacrylamide (PAM)
Polyacrylamide is non-toxic, used in lotions, contact lenses etc as it is a water soluble resin. In the UK (and EU) the amount of residual acrylamide in polyacrylamide is regulated, in the States it isn't.
That's the difference, fracking in the States was virtually unregulated and isn't much better today. The UK is very strict.
We've been fracking for years in the UK its just been whipped up by the media now we are doing it in shale. Its pretty normal that when a well starts drying up to try fracking it to increase flow rates whether it be or land or at sea.
The gas not needed. It will all be sold off abroad.
I imagine the hope is that this will boost our exports and make things look a bit better than they really are after brexit.
The important thing is that the British public don't want it. That trumps everything, or should do!
The media have made the decision to wind the population up. As I said, we’ve been fracking for years, causing minor tremors for years and suddenly it’s a big issue.
We are an importer of gas, even if we export gas it will be good for the economy.
The media have made the decision to wind the population up. As I said, we’ve been fracking for years, causing minor tremors for years and suddenly it’s a big issue.
We are an importer of gas, even if we export gas it will be good for the economy.
Who will benefit ? will we have cheaper gas? I think not, if it takes off, the legislation will be watered down to benefit the industry as always ordinary people will be the loser's, we have crooks and shysters running the country, devoid of any integrity or honesty.
We are a net importer of gas, about 60% of our natural gas is imported, we export about a tenth of that.
Gas is taxed, the Government will have increased revenue. Provided we don't have a Tory Government it should also produce cheaper gas, which will be getting cheaper anyway as the amount of renewable energy increases.
One of the really good things is that is makes us less dependent on other countries and improves our balance of trade.
Although only 3% of our gas is Russian, if Russia stops the supply of gas to the EU then all of our imported gas would be under threat and certainly escalate in cost enormously.
Two bits of news from Cuadrilla today, their fracking hit a Richter of 1.1 and also they have completed their second fracking well.
I should imagine the 1.1 would have been a bit unexpected however it is still 1000 times less than anything that causes damage to even the most rickety structure. There are millions of natural earthquakes that exceed that level every year and go totally unfelt.
No doubt there will be a bit of experimentation going on to find out how the fracking reacts to different pressures and speeds.
So far there have been no significant "after shocks" from today's event, the biggest being a 0.1 about 100 minutes afterwards.
The 0.8 "after shock" on Saturday occurred around 23 hours after its fracking shock of 0.8 on Friday, pretty soon after its compulsory 18 hour stop time.
The media have made the decision to wind the population up. As I said, we’ve been fracking for years, causing minor tremors for years and suddenly it’s a big issue.
We are an importer of gas, even if we export gas it will be good for the economy.
Who will benefit ? will we have cheaper gas? I think not, if it takes off, the legislation will be watered down to benefit the industry as always ordinary people will be the loser's, we have crooks and shysters running the country, devoid of any integrity or honesty.
Just on the news, a number of North West MP's are worried that the government is pursuing a permitted development strategy, now there's a surprise, no doubt the first of many more to come.
One thing I noticed in one earlier news report was that it was said tremors were to be expected (it is fracturing rock underground after all). But this has been removed from more recent reports, its focusing more on the fear factor of "earthquakes" (aren't they actually tremors?)
I also noticed on the BGS website, there were three stronger tremors over a 48 hour period in Cornwall. But no fracking going on there! So if its man made its inherently bad, but OK if naturally occurring?
I've still no doubts or fears about the process, I think its sound and has been since it was first started in this country in 1945. But Cuadrilla have to tread carefully here from a PR point of view otherwise this is going to get thrown in their face every time fracking is mentioned.
The whole thing has been a complete pantomime from start to finish. Protesters talking about an ugly tower on the landscape - erm how about Blackpool tower just a few miles away, or the massive radio towers at Inskip?
Then they talk about possible pollution if something goes wrong. OK, how about the nuclear facility a few miles away at Salwick (they have history)? Or even an oil tanker accident in the Mersey? Again, this has happened. Not to mention the palm oil poisoning of our beaches from the past year or so.
As for cheaper gas, France imports shale gas to save money. But won't allow fracking for shale gas in their country.
One thing I noticed in one earlier news report was that it was said tremors were to be expected (it is fracturing rock underground after all). But this has been removed from more recent reports, its focusing more on the fear factor of "earthquakes" (aren't they actually tremors?)
I also noticed on the BGS website, there were three stronger tremors over a 48 hour period in Cornwall. But no fracking going on there! So if its man made its inherently bad, but OK if naturally occurring?
I've still no doubts or fears about the process, I think its sound and has been since it was first started in this country in 1945. But Cuadrilla have to tread carefully here from a PR point of view otherwise this is going to get thrown in their face every time fracking is mentioned.
The whole thing has been a complete pantomime from start to finish. Protesters talking about an ugly tower on the landscape - erm how about Blackpool tower just a few miles away, or the massive radio towers at Inskip?
Then they talk about possible pollution if something goes wrong. OK, how about the nuclear facility a few miles away at Salwick (they have history)? Or even an oil tanker accident in the Mersey? Again, this has happened. Not to mention the palm oil poisoning of our beaches from the past year or so.
As for cheaper gas, France imports shale gas to save money. But won't allow fracking for shale gas in their country.
So your argument is that we already have eyesores, earth tremors, pollution so the possibility of more of the same( that could be avoided) makes little or no difference( two wrongs don't make a right) you state the French won't allow fracking, I wonder why? well lets hope there are no gas seams near to you Gibbo because if the Tories get their way with permitted devolopment you could end up with a gas well in your backyard.
Industry is a necessity, there always have to be some compromise.
If you want to pick fault with any industry look at cement manufacturers who have licenses to discharge extreme poisons into the air that nobody else is allowed to do, the sooner we have cheaper energies to compete with burning car tyres etc the sooner we can do away with processes that are actually killing people.
I just hate the word same as brexit soon as anyone says it on TV or radio I turn it off
well lets hope there are no gas seams near to you Gibbo because if the Tories get their way with permitted devolopment you could end up with a gas well in your backyard.
I've already lived close to two sites - the one at Elswick and the iGas site in Warrington. There were no unsightly wells, no pollution, death or destruction. I'd have absolutely no problem living near another, which is why I'm not put off by a possible new well near Southport where I'm thinking of getting a new place. The only thing which would bother me are ignorant, ill-informed protesters who need to cite the film
Gasland and other inaccuracies which have been portrayed as fact.
As for France, that was a ban on producing fossil fuels - so that also includes coal mining. But that didn't really make the news headlines as it doesn't sound as scary as the fracking bogeyman.
The plan was for France to lead the world with switch to renewables, but it was a largely symbolic gesture as the country is 99% dependent on hydrocarbon imports.
If France chooses to think they don’t need natural gas, that’s one thing, but to import 40 bcm (billion cubic metres) of gas for heat and industry while the lowest carbon and highest tax alternative lies beneath the benighted banlieues of Northern Paris, this entirely political choice moves from paradox through contradiction to hypocrisy with alarming speed.
Shale has emerged with little or no of the horror stories of contamination prevalent in the debate of the Gasland movie era
Its also funny that France is the leader with nuclear power - both there and with their plants in the UK - again far more inherently dangerous than fracking - not just from nuclear leaks, but:
Hackers obtain nuclear power plant plans in Francehttps://www.dw.com/en/hackers-obtain-nuclear-power-plant-plans-in-france/a-46126878and extending the life of their already ageing power plants.
If you want to pick fault with any industry look at cement manufacturers who have licenses to discharge extreme poisons into the air that nobody else is allowed to do
You're spot on there. A village near where I grew up had a cement factory. The whole area was tainted with white dust.
So, 9 days on and no "earthquakes".
https://earthquakes.bgs.ac.uk/earthquakes/recent_uk_events.htmlAlthough I see Leominster had a 2.3 yesterday but it didn't make the news.
Caudrilla stopped drilling on the 2nd of November after causing 37 minor earth tremors over a 17 day period, to date they have not yet restarted operations.
Caudrilla stopped drilling on the 2nd of November after causing 37 minor earth tremors over a 17 day period, to date they have not yet restarted operations.
Is that someone guessing? Cuadrilla made a statement that would be at odds with that.
Caudrilla stopped drilling on the 2nd of November after causing 37 minor earth tremors over a 17 day period, to date they have not yet restarted operations.
Perhaps they stopped drilling because they'd completed what they needed to do, and were able to release the gas?
From 3rd November:
Cuadrilla confirms the first shale gas has been produced at Little Plumptonhttps://www.otsnews.co.uk/cuadrilla-confirms-first-shale-gas-produced-little-plumpton/An oil well stops drilling when it reaches the oil.
A quarry stops blasting when it has loosened the rock.
Caudrilla stopped drilling on the 2nd of November after causing 37 minor earth tremors over a 17 day period, to date they have not yet restarted operations.
Perhaps they stopped drilling because they'd completed what they needed to do, and were able to release the gas?
From 3rd November:
Cuadrilla confirms the first shale gas has been produced at Little Plumptonhttps://www.otsnews.co.uk/cuadrilla-confirms-first-shale-gas-produced-little-plumpton/An oil well stops drilling when it reaches the oil.
A quarry stops blasting when it has loosened the rock.
This is Lancashire, stopped so I believe because of the number of tremors, they are trying to raise the threshhold so they can carry on, no doubt they will be given carte blanche by our wonderful caring government, you know the ones that follow the peoples wishes, when it suits.
The people are being scared by the media. There have been seismic events, nobody has felt an “earthquakeâ€.
The only reason most of the events are measurable is because there are sensors directly above them.
On a daily basis developments are putting piles into the ground all around the country which are bigger “earthquakesâ€.
The first well was planned to be fracked 45 times roughly once per day. The data is now in, I see no reason why the limit shouldn’t be raised unless they apply that same limit to all industries. The same technology is used on other wells in the country without that limitation, it was an arbitrary aspirational guess and it is time to improve it.
So why bother having any limit at all? let them do as they please, pick any site they like unless of course its on or near any lords estate, can't have that can we, disrupting the peace and quiet.
Is ' fracking ' still on the menu for the river Dee ?
Even the Queen's land is being fracked as well as Lord's properties.
Currently we are shipping fracked gas from the USA which doesn't make sense.
We have fracked wells for years, its just fracking shale that is new and the media thought it would make a good scare story after the 2011 earthquake in Blackpool.
The 2011 events were a natural stress fault whose release may have been triggered by the fracking through the presence of water (not fracking pressure), it was probably going to happen sooner as other earthquakes had done in the Blackpool area previously. The fracking put nowhere around the amount of energy in to create that earthquake. The fault line still hasn't been found it was so small, it is estimated the fault was about a 100m by 100m area and the rock moved 1 cm, it is still only assumed the fracking triggered it. The worst of the two quakes was 2.3 and was just about felt on the surface, we've felt much bigger quakes on the Wirral.
Just a few words from someone who has lived through the American process at first hand. My wife and I used to live in Wellsboro, Pennsylvania. Different states had different attitudes to the fracking (for those who haven't lived this side of the pond, the USA is like 50 different countries with some common Federal regulations). Pennsylvania's attitude to the frackers was basically 'give us the money, do what you like!' Each well in the Marcellus shale deposits meant a damn great gravel pad being constructed for the well head, then approximately 1,000 tankers of fracking fluid being brought in, and roughly 600 tankers worth of returned fluid (mildly radioactive, due to the elements leached out from the ground). We had two well heads on our very quiet country road (we lived on the outskirts of Wellsboro, which had then a population of about 3,000) and decided we had to move, due to my wife's health problems. Fortunately we managed to sell up before property prices were affected, but friends we kept in touch with gave us sufficient information to confirm that we'd made the correct decision.
Now, before somebody states the blindingly obvious, yes, this is America and the UK regulations may be different. I did do some research into the sort of stuff that they pushed down the wells as 'fracking fluid' (I've a Ph.D. in Chemical Physics, I know what I'm doing!) but that was almost 10 years ago now. It certainly wasn't water plus a single chemical, anything but! There was a percentage of hydrochloric acid in there for starters, that was the main reason for the leaching out of the trace radioactivity from the ground - even Pennsylvania's regulation required the returned fluid to be disposed of as hazardous waste.
The USA is more dependent on well water than the UK (we had a well in Pennsylvania, and have one now here in Maine), and certainly pollution of wells was far from unknown, you can't map out every underground fissure when you're drilling fracking wells, and at least when they were doing it in Pennsylvania (I'm talking about the years up to 2010, when we moved) they were limited to a 5000 foot radius (call it a mile) from each wellhead. A map of the well sites across the county sure showed the scale of the operation, and Pennsylvania's legislature put in a ridiculous escape clause for the drilling companies where they could either clean up after themselves or pay a derisory sum (I think it was a couple of million dollars) as a one-off payment and that got them out of any further cleanup obligations.
Guess what happened?
America seems to try its hardest to contaminate its water supply from every industry, even the water companies themselves, I'm surprised most houses don't have water purification plants. The dollar has always come before people.
I can't comment on most houses in the USA not having water purification, because I just don't know the figures. In many places where there's no mains water, the filters are essential, and that's not due to fracking. There's no fracking in this area, but the ground is rich in arsenic, and our well water contains almost 9 times the safe level of arsenic. We're 20 miles from the nearest water main, so we have no option. Fortunately a two-stage filtering process makes our water safe (arsenic below detectable levels) for about $250 a year in filters, which I suspect is a lot less than mains water would cost us.
None of that excuses what they did to the water supply in Pennsylvania, though. There was one place (Dimock, PA) where they could actually put a lit match next to the stream of water coming out of the tap, and the amount of methane dissolved in the water was such that you would get a flame burning at the tap.
There was one academic at Cornell (Tony Ingraffea) who did a lot of research work on contract to the drilling companies, and then when they came to drill in his neck of the woods, he jumped ship and became an anti-fracking man. I have one of his talks from about 10 years as a video, with full permission to distribute it. It's on You Tube,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mSWmXpEkEPg (I think that's the same talk, it's certainly the same man!) but if anybody reading this hasn't got the internet connection to handle the download and wants it badly enough to cover my costs (via Paypal) in burning and mailing a DVD from the USA, I'll be happy to do so. Send me an e-mail.
Let me close by saying that I have no idea whether the stricter regulation you'll undoubtedly have in the UK will enable fracking to be undertaken safely. Knowing what I know, I would be on the side of opposing it unless proven safe, and I've no real idea as to how you prove it safe other than doing it and see what happens. I sure wouldn't want to live near a fracking site - that's why my wife and I moved to Maine.
Thank you for your well informed input Brian, I have no doubt that regulations here will be watered down to suit the fracking companies, they are already applying to relax standards now.
None of that excuses what they did to the water supply in Pennsylvania, though. There was one place (Dimock, PA) where they could actually put a lit match next to the stream of water coming out of the tap, and the amount of methane dissolved in the water was such that you would get a flame burning at the tap.
A number of sources on the web say that methane was in the water for many years prior to any fracking.
This region of Pennsylvania has a long history of naturally occurring methane in the water — not only prior to the first Marcellus Shale, but before the first oil well, the Drake Well, was drilled in the United States in Southwestern Pennsylvania in 1859. In fact, the first recorded instances of lighting water on fire in the county took place a short drive up the road at Salt Springs State Park in Franklin Township in 1795. As the Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources (DCNR) reports:
“Numerous attempts were made by different entrepreneurs to develop the spring for commercial gain between 1795 and 1870. The brine obtained produced a high quality salt, but not enough could be coaxed out of the ground to yield a profit.
The water was noted to be more sulphureous than salty.
Bubbles would rise to the surface and when touched with fire would flash like black powder…When methane gas continued to seep up through the plug, a simple container was built at the top of the well to gather the escaping gas, which was then piped into the Wheaton home where it was used for cooking and lighting. These pipes still run through the house.â€
Fair enough, I note the report of the trial to which you linked was dated 2016. As I said upthread, my knowledge of the situation in Pennsylvania ended in late 2010, when we moved out of the state (apart from a few later reports from friends who still lived there). If they were lighting the water in Dimock pre-fracking, I wasn't aware of it, and I heard no reports of it when the anti-fracking movement started.
The Dimock situation was the only thing on which my knowledge was second hand, though. What I said about the disruption caused (1000 tankers in, 600 tankers out, approximately of course - the drilling companies said about 5,000,000 gallons of water to frack a well of which ~60% was usually 'returned') and the free hand that the Pennsylvania legislature gave to the fracking companies, that's from first hand experience. My wife has severe asthma and allergy problems at the best of times, and living in a house that was 30 feet from the very small country road that was going to have to bear all that traffic just didn't bear thinking about. That's why we sold up ASAP and moved up here to Maine.
Just to give you an example of how fracking-friendly the situation was in Pennsylvania, there's a law there which says that sub-surface rights trump surface rights. What that means (and one of my friends was on the receiving end of this!) is that if you didn't get the mineral rights when you bought your house, then whoever owned said mineral rights could come on your land and do whatever was necessary to extract the gas (or whatever), even contrary to your wishes. They also passed a law which said that if at least 60% of the landowners in a particular area sold out their mineral rights, then the drilling companies could assume that the other 40% would follow suit, and they could extract the gas provided they could do so without coming on the 40%'s land (the 40% owned their mineral rights, but they lost the right to refuse to sell a gas extraction deal). As I said before, at least in 2010, the drilling companies said they could go up to a mile horizontally from each drilling site.
I hope the UK doesn't go as far down the drilling company road as Pennsylvania did, I really do - but I'll tell you now, nothing would induce me to live close to a fracking site, I'd be looking to move as I did here.
I think Pennsylvania is just seen as the US's fuel reserve and its just pillaged at any environmental expense for cheap fuel.
Wasn't that where the Carbondale coal mine fire happened? Started in 1946 and ended in the 1970s.
And you also have Centralia.
I really think it's a bit more complicated than that. As far as the coal mining is concerned, there are (AFAIK) three main coal-mining areas in the USA, Wyoming/Montata, Illinois and Appalachia (the latter being Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Kentucky, as far as coal is concerned). Fracking takes place across a large part of the lower 48, probably less than half politically, but way over half geographically (some of those western states are B-I-G!) Texas is the big boy of oil production, although it actually happens across even more states than fracking, albeit to a greater or lesser extent. Some states, oil production is on a very limited scale.
The main consideration in all this, as far as I can see, is how compliant the state legislatures are. You have to remember that American states have *enormously* greater powers than English counties (to take the closest parallel), and the Federal government is very limited in what it can do without one or more of the states immediately trying to drag it off to the Supreme Court for exceeding its rights. I know that New York (state) introduced a statewide ban on fracking. AFAIK, it's still in place, but news travels slowly out here in the wilds, so I don't guarantee that's correct.
If anyone is interested in some up-to-the-minute reporting on fracking in the USA, this comes from West Virginia, at the southern end of the Marcellus shale deposits that stretch from New York down to West Virginia.
https://projects.propublica.org/graphics/wvaI have no personal experience of what goes on in WV, but their rules about sub-surface rights overriding surface rights are the same as it was in Pennsylvania.
If anyone is interested in some up-to-the-minute reporting on fracking in the USA, this comes from West Virginia, at the southern end of the Marcellus shale deposits that stretch from New York down to West Virginia.
https://projects.propublica.org/graphics/wvaI have no personal experience of what goes on in WV, but their rules about sub-surface rights overriding surface rights are the same as it was in Pennsylvania.
This site is on the junction of Preachers Dream and the North Fork Road near Smithfield. Larry Barr owned the land, was approached by EQT to which he agreed its placement there and was presumably paid for it (unless he was foolish enough to offer it for free). EQT also offered to put him up in a hotel which he turned down.
It would appear that this site was one of the early locations as it existed before the main plant was built about 2km away and before the HB401 Act came into being. Other residents in the area weren't so lucky and didn't have as much choice in the matter.