On 17 Aug 2013 at 1:49pm Deelite 2 wrote:
Here's a very simple-to-digest summary of the salient points about fracking. It gets rid of the noise and anyone on this forum should be able to understand it quite easily.
Fracking in the UK and Sussex is considerably different than fracking in the US. In the US they could put up with toxic chemicals leaking into the aquifer as there is a lot of space where no one lives. Here the drilling will always be too close to the inhabitants.
The drills go up to 2km down then 2km our radially. The bores are the injected with a "huge" amount of water, water into which has been added roughly 600 agents to "grease" the water and make it dissolve rock (including sulphuric acid and benzene). The water is basically rendered unfit for any other use and becomes "toxic waste". 70% of this water is then removed and has to be dumped somewhere close by. It is now also contains a minor radio active element gained from the underlying rock strata.
The remaining 30% is left in the ground. When work has finished the well is capped. Somewhere between 20% and 60% of these capped wells end up leaking (depending which figures you believe), with the result that the toxic residue can leak into the aquifer (in the densely populated UK, this usually ends up being our drinking water).
General bad things:
* Uses scarce water supplies
* It is expensive to extract and gets very quickly more expensive
* The mass shoving of toxic chemicals (even if, and especially if, diluted with lots of water) into the ground can never be a good thing.
* You need an awful lot of these wells to get the shale oil and gas out of the ground
* Fracturing the rock generally releases methane, a gas many more times damaging to the environment (climate change) than CO2
* The wells are ugly, with very loud drilling noise and floodlights 24 hours a day and a gas burn-off tower at a minimum height of 14 metres (if you've ever seen an oil refinery or Port Talbot you'll know what the flares look like)
* General environmental damage
Sussex bad things:
* If Cuadrilla's figures are right then Sussex will need 6000 wells.
* The infrastructure needed for these wells will be immense. The water and chemicals needs carting in and the gas out, 24 hours a day.
* The damage to the Sussex countryside and general amenity will be incalculable
* The EA have categorised the water supply in Sussex as "challenged". Where will Cuadrilla get the water it needs?
Balcombe bad things:
* The drill site is within 1.25km of Ardingly reservoir and the Sussex Ouse.
* These provide the drinking water for 35,000 people.
* The drill site is roughly 4km from the huge victorian Balcombe railway viaduct (Blackpool suffered minor earthquakes due to their bore holes).
* The drill site is close to the millennium seed bank.
Cuadrilla bad things:
* They have already proved themselves to be duplicitous liars and incompetent (they hid the problems at Blackpool and operated one of the mines outside of the regulations and past the term of their license)
Government bad things
* They have changed the planning laws specifically to make it much harder for local authorities to object to fracking within their jurisdiction
* They appear to have leant on the EA, ensuring that they do not object to planning applications for fracking. They have also forced the EA to water down reports warnings about the high risk of fracking in Sussex.
* They have ignored the safety recommendation of the Royal Society of Engineers (who have great concerns about fracking in the UK)
* They have cut the tax for frackers.
* George Osbourne's father in-law has financial interests in fracking companies
* Lord John Brown, Tory big wig and energy advisor to cabinet is an non-executive director of Cuadrilla and has a large interest in the venture capital company financing them.
* The planning permission for the test drilling in Balcombe was not even put to the parish council (who are supposed to review all planning applications within their jurisdiction).
* West Sussex Francis Maude arranged the fracking deal in Balcombe (and appointed Lord John Browne as energy advisor to Cabinet) and then sold his Balcombe property.
* Maude refused and still refuses to talk to his constituents about the fracking in the village
Media
* Very biased, extremely one-sided (although things do seem to be slowly changing)
* 85% of Balcomites support the protesters
* The protestors are a mixed bunch, many from Sussex and others from all over the country. Bacolmites are always in attendance.
General things
* Fracking is likely to get us 20 or 30 years more UK generated power, but at an expense which is not included in any Government calculations (cost of lack of water for the public, damage to environment, damage to people's amenity and lifestyle).
* This little bit of extra power for a few years will reduce the hugely needed emphasis we must put on research into sustainable energy and energy storage.
* Offgem and industry experts have stated that fracking is not likely to reduce our energy bills.
Conclusion:
Whoever it is benefiting from fracking it will not be the general public, especially not in the medium and long term
On 17 Aug 2013 at 3:45pm Yawn wrote:
Yet more unattributed pseudo-science, he we go again. When will the butters who've taken over this issue get it, no-one in the real world cares!
On 17 Aug 2013 at 3:54pm Zzz.. wrote:
Can't see any psuedo science there? What do you mean?
On 17 Aug 2013 at 4:15pm Deelite 2 wrote:
Every point is verifiable with a search that will take you a matter of seconds. To put a link in for every point would have made the text unreadable (especially on this forum software).
On 17 Aug 2013 at 6:02pm drone wrote:
Have you ever managed to read a book that has no pictures in it, BBB? In fact, have you ever managed to read a book?
On 17 Aug 2013 at 8:31pm Deelite 2 wrote:
These are the chemicals that are to be injected near to our water supply:
Check it out here »
On 17 Aug 2013 at 9:38pm Kettle wrote:
It's quite simple, bbb. If it says 'fracking' in the title, don't read the thread.
On 18 Aug 2013 at 8:51am Bluntwit wrote:
Balcombe yesterday has opened my eyes to how vital taking action against these environmental vandals has become, they need our support Lewes!
On 18 Aug 2013 at 3:35pm queequeg wrote:
All very well D2 if you take no part in modern life, don't eat, drink, wear clothing, use any products because all of this is dependent on oil. The world cannot support the 7 Billion of us on it without the use of oil.
Is it OK for the exploration for oil to go on anywhere but here? OK for the oil to be taken from the ground in other parts of the world? OK for us to import oil from despoiled places miles away?
Or do we sensibly agree that it is an evil necessity and use our people power to insist on controls to make the process as safe and environmentally sound as possible. In the process accruing much needed employment, wealth and tax revenue to help heal our current economic weakness.
On 18 Aug 2013 at 8:27pm Dingo. wrote:
The world cannot support 7 billion of us if we carry on burning fossil fuels at the present rate.
Best estimate is that we need to leave 80% of all new fossil fuels in the ground to have a 50% chance of avoiding disastrous climate change.
If allowed to happen a chaotic and extreme climate will cause millions of deaths.Further dessication of the worlds driest regions, rising sea levels and increasing levels of salination in once productive land will bring about many thousands of climate change refugees desperate to avoid starvation banging ever harder on the doors of the few countries that can barely support their own populations.In order keep out these unfortunate people, rich countries will effectively become police states.
If you think am scaremongering think again.
It is pretty obvious to me, that we cannot afford NOT to end our reliance on oil and fossil fuels.
Ironically the very real prospect of catastrophic climate change makes fossill fuels the greatest threat to our burgeoning population and our prosperity ,not it's sustainer.
On 19 Aug 2013 at 12:55am Warming World wrote:
Climate change deniers and pro frackers please take note.
Time is running out.
Check it out here »
On 19 Aug 2013 at 1:15am D. Light wrote:
A quick summary?
On 19 Aug 2013 at 6:19pm what? wrote:
Short attention span?
On 19 Aug 2013 at 8:28pm Deelite 2 wrote:
Queequeg. Your either/or scenario is far too simplistic. There is not a choice between one or the other as you portray it.
On 20 Aug 2013 at 6:38pm queequeg wrote:
Deelite 2, It's a relatively simple calculation of the total energy requirement of all human activity compared with the possible sources of the energy. Nothing can compete with oil and gas.
We cannot make solar panels without burning oil, we cannot make huge quantities of cement for wind turbines without burning oil.
Were it not for the use of fossil fuels we would still be in the Middle Ages, you and Dingo seem determined to take us back to those times.
On 21 Aug 2013 at 9:15am Dingo wrote:
Your attitude reminds me of the alcoholic on being told by his doctor that he faces organ failure unless he stops drinking says"But Doc I really need to drink to get me through the day"
It strikes me that you either don't believe the climate scientists forecasts. Or you don't care about the future of humakind.I suspect the former you .In that case you are plainly burying your head in the sand.
On 21 Aug 2013 at 4:10pm Dingo wrote:
There is no shortage of energy.This a myth propagated by the oil and gas companies.In this country we have potentialy massive reserves of hydro wave and tidal energy. In addition we have.wind.and methane in the form of biomass generation, all relatively safe and renewable.The. world in addition is blessed with plentiful solar resources if we can import from Saudi then we could just as easily set up in collaboration with the Saharan countries a vast network of Solar farms harvesting sunlight and cabling the energy to Europe and beyond.
The main thing that is needed to get all these renewables off the ground is imagination, political will and finance
.Whilst we continue to Frack about. dredging up ever decreasing amounts of fossil fuels the potential of these renewables will remain unexploited.
Gobal warming and environmental considerations aside that is why fracking is such a bad idea at the moment.