PM Overrules Energy Regulator
By Paul Homewood
Finally a bit of common sense:
London, 9 March – Net Zero Watch has welcomed Boris Johnson’s last minute decision to overrule the energy regulator, preventing Britain’s shale gas wells being cemented over for good.
According to press reports, the Prime Minister has opened the door to the revival of the UK’s shale gas industry in the aftermath of the Government’s ban on imports of Russian oil.
According to the Daily Telegraph “the Prime Minister wants his ministers to look again at whether fracking, which has been under a moratorium for more than two years, can help diversify the country’s energy supply.”
Officials are said to be working on an “energy supply strategy”.
Meanwhile, the US administration is ratcheting up pressure on shale gas producers, telling them they should be doing “whatever it takes” to increase shale supplies and tame energy prices that have soared following Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
Even the EU’s newly released energy plan makes absolutely clear that the first and overriding priority is to obtain non-Russian natural gas to shore up security of supply.
Net Zero Watch director Benny Peiser said:
The Prime Minister needs to heed the desperate calls by US and EU officials for new, non-Russian gas supplies. It is vital that he overrules the obstructive anti-shale gas activism of Kwasi Kwarteng and the Department of Business and Energy.
BEIS, DEFRA, the Climate Change Committee, and even Ofgem are responsible for the current energy emergency and cannot be trusted with its resolution.
The lack of realism and the ideological dogmatism in BEIS underlines the need for the PM to take personal control of energy security. We think he should create a new Cabinet committee for ‘National Energy Security’, based in Number 10.”
Comments are closed.
NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT 
It is a puzzle to understand why we don’t want to use Russian oil to help alleviate our shortages. Putin has already paid for that oil and will be able to use it against the Ukraine if needed. What am I missing?
We haven’t yet forgotten that we need to pay for any oil that we receive, and that makes Russia richer and more able to finance anything they want to do.
If we produced our own oil, we could benefit instead.
Money paid to Putin allows us to use that oil. He can buy other things but cannot use it against the Ukraine. Of course, we need to produce our own. And that’s what the US was doing until Biden took over and made “climate change” the priority.
US was second biggest supplier of petroleum products to US ( after Canada) well before Biden took over. Russia essentially replaced Venezuela for imports when the US sanctioned them ( for not wanting to be in US sphere of influence or something). Its not a huge amount but its significant in some areas. They certainly have never been oil/gas independent in last 50 years
The US was beholden to the Saudis for a long time when it was dependent of their oil and was ‘gleam in the eye’ reason for invading Iraq. Oil and gas was the primary reason for Nato air and ground attacks in Libya during their civil war.
What you are missing Broadlands is that oil is not a fixed asset. In many countries, including Russia, oil can and is produced as required to meet their domestic demand as well as foreign demand. In the US we could do the same under President Trump’s policies but now cannot under President Biden’s.
Nope. Russia was still supplying US during Trumps time, maybe even Trump encouraged it as him and Putin were/are ‘admirers’
Better late than never! It’s been painfully obvious for years that we need shale gas. I don’t know why even those in favour, such as Cuadrilla, never show what a real shale gas bore hole looks like from 200m away once pumping has begun. Most people would be unaware it was there. But always the photos are of the drilling heads which is what really puts off those ignorant of what the real situation is.
hardly anyone notices the existing oil wells in beauty spots in Dorset and these are the nodding donkey style. Knowing the Lancashire site it is not the prettiest bit of countryside anyway and a small drilling well would enhance it .
The Wytch Farm oil well did a gas burn off recently, that has got some of the local green zombies stirring. The local media is trying to incite Apocalypse over a new oil well near Dorchester.
Kelland,
I agree and tried to post this on the now unavailable Matt Ridley Fracking Thread.
Here is the entrance to the Elswick Gas Field in the Lancashire Fylde.
The Elswick Field contained gas sourced from the Carboniferous Bowland Shale, reservoired in the Lower Permian Collyhurst Sandstone and sealed by the overlying Manchester Marls.
The tight sandstone reservoir was fracked prior to production and the gas was used on site at the well head to generate electricity.
Very many thanks Philip – that’s exactly what we need to see and to shut the protesters up!
Slightly off topic, but for a while I did gas sampling on a coal bed methane pilot project near Stirling. Quite a rural area but it was a nightmare actually finding it, you really had to be on top of the facility to know it was there. And it’s the same for most land based oil and gas production. Southern Chad for instance, hundreds of oil wells, each wellhead about a meter tall, all serviced by 3 or 4 quite modestly sized drilling rigs. And contrast this with 200m tall wind turbines
For Doris this a brave baby step – now he needs to take the big step and abolish net Zero and get Britain’s economy moving.
Better late than never 😀
IIUC the well concreting has only been postponed to June.
What happens then is anyone’s guess, although in the mean time there is bound to be a lot of wailing from certain sectors.
I know I must be missing something but were Cuadrilla proposing a decibel limit of 50 and actual readings were 20 & 25. A dishwasher is 46-60; road traffic 45-70 and inside a car 82. How is it that none of these seem to have caused earth tremors. I am probably really dim.
not sure how sound links to tremors but even so the size of the recorded tremors were equivalent to a sparrow farting and less than a wagon going past outside your house . The upper limit they were given was ridiculously low and unrealistic
But it is OK to drill in Cornwall, producing a quake 2.0 on Rickter Scale which 300 times greater than produced by the Bowland Shale.
mjr
The seismic limit for shale fracking was set to magnitude 0.5 Richter.
Compare this with the following table of quarry blasts which can produce seismic events in the range 0.7 to 1.2 Richter.
We had an earthquake here (Adelaide Hills South Australia) 3.8 Richter. Loud noise but no reports of damage.
” I am probably really dim.” Certainly not. If more people would exercise you questioning attitude in lieu of (misplaced) blind faith we would not be in the dire straits we are.
There’s been quite a sharp reversal in US Crude and Natural Gas prices today. It suggests the Russian supply can be, at least partially, replaced
It’s not being replaced its being re-sorted. Russia can sell its oil and gas to China, probably at a discount. China is not part of the boycott. The frees up oil and gas that China might have bid up the price on from non-Russian sources.
Recall that the Chinese used to buy huge amounts of coal and iron ore from Australia. When Australia started voice their concerns about Chinese treatment of Uighurs and the crackdown on democracy in Hong Kong, you’d think it would hurt the Aussies. It didn’t because China bought from other sources and the Aussies sold their natural resources to other customers.
The biggest issue for Europe will be natural gas (and electricity). Transporting LNG is by ship is at least 10% more expensive than by pipeline.
Urals-Brent difference is already 25%
It was 20% just a couple days ago
China and some other countries that remained neutral will keep buying it, but the ability of oil exports to prop up the dying Russian economy is only going to diminish as Russian oil gets cheaper and cheaper compared to the global prices
So basically, the current situation hurts Russia (massively, it’s heading to where Venezuela is today at full speed and will probably face a default in late-March to mid-April), benefits China (marginally, they still seem to prefer peaceful relations and trade to conflict), and the rest of the world don’t care as much because the final supply is still the same as China is buying less oil from non-Russian sources
Speaking of Uighurs, what do you think will happen to Ukrainians if Putin succeeds despite all odds, it’s going to be exactly the same thing
Officials are said to be working on an “energy supply strategy”.
Suggests they didn’t have one before 🤔 Better late then never, but hardly confidence-inspiring.
They’re still trying to find “strategy” in the dictionary.
As the crazy ex-Governor of Alaska said – Drill baby drill. We use oil in this country. We either import oil and gas from Putin and others or get it from beneath UK lands and waters. It’s not about Net Zero. We are going to use fossil fuels for the next 20-30 years. The more we ‘grow’ locally the less we import. This help our economy and balance of payments and help defund Russia. Ones hopes that Boris and other can see that.
“It’s not about Net Zero.”
It is, because so many think that it involves the elimination of the oil industry, as a first step:
Biden: The Oil Industry polutes, significantly … It has to be replaced by renewable industry, over time.
The policy has been hurried because of Build Back Better, where the existing facilities are destroyed before conducting any credible analysis of what to put in its place.
Just look at the glee of Climate Activists when some coal-fired power stations were recently dismantled, well before any replacement, credible alternatives were built.
Tangoev,
You may have missed the zero after both 20 and 30 years?
Tangoev, I would expect you to get your quotes wrong in common with most of your posting on here. Check out Michael Steele the former Maryland Lieutenant Governor.
“Zac’s tall shale stories” (NetZero Watch) … total incompetence or downright lies?
Reminds me of a train journey, where a man was groaning and holding his elbow. When he got out, I sympathised with his pal, who said it was no problem really, just piles. Uh? Yes – he’s a civil servant, doesn’t know his a**e from his elbow. Not all are like that (I was one once), but Yes Minister/Prime Minister was 100% to type.
There is (a meagre?) chance we just might see a sea shift in attitudes.
Fortunately this website and several others are setting some of the ground for such a change. Let’s hope, otherwise “we’re all doomed”
I wonder if this thread will vanish like the last one did?
https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2022/03/06/frack-to-the-future-matt-ridley/
Whoa Philip, what the hell has happened to that piece? Anybody know? I definitely think we need an explanation!
Ray,
I am adding back here some of the points I made on the vanished thread.
Here is a link to Cuadrilla’s recent statement.
The comment elsewhere that the gas delivery rate is not economic does not account for the fact that this is flow from a well that was not fully perforated. Note also that this was not a dry gas, there was also some condensate.
Actually let’s see what happens…
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/17838228/britain-gas-gold-mine-putin-monopoly-fracking/
Hi again Phil,
https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:9h0VjBJxn5MJ:https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2022/03/06/frack-to-the-future-matt-ridley/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=uk&client=opera
Hope it works.
Hi Ray,
Good idea but the comments are not captured by your link.
I use The Wayback Machine http://www.archive.org but unfortunately there is no record there either.
Reblogged this on Tallbloke's Talkshop and commented:
Let’s hope this decision is not just a publicity stunt to be kicked around for the duration of the Ukraine disaster, with no end result.
Boris suggesting the wells won’t be capped sooner or later is as convincing as Putin saying he wouldn’t invade Ukraine. It’s just politically risky for Boris himself not to appear to be listening in the current circumstances.
I expect Putin saying he wouldn’t invade Ukraine was conditional on the West not escalating the tension, like Zelenskyy stating that he was going to get his own nuclear weapons, and no-one present at the NATO meeting expressing any reservations. Zelenskyy did this because although the West was “standing shoulder to shoulder with Ukraine” it wasn’t going to back it up with any military support. In addition, the Ukraine Army had increased its attacks on the Donbass militia, action that started in 2014 and has resulted in over 1400 deaths. And then there’s the US financed bio-labs, very similar to those in Wuhan, across Ukraine that have been targeted by the Russian air force. There’s so much more that is not being told in the legacy media.
Missed off a zero: it’s not 1400 deaths, it’s 14,000.
You think there is anything original there?
Regardless, Putin always intended to snatch at least a large slice of Ukraine.
The plans were long standing.
14,000 deaths, no doubt a figure supplied by the ever trustworthy Mr Putin. In any case it was Russia that got this nasty little war started, they have form here, just look at what they did to Georgia in the 1990’s.
Georgia itself started that war in 2008 by shelling across the demarcation line, the Russians bit back hard .
Its a fact of life in those Caucuses countries that ethnic splits are managed by enclaves and demarcations. Northern Ireland next level
You are simply repeating Putin’s propaganda.
Putin started the war in Donbass. Most of those fighting there on the separatist side were mercenaries from Russian private companies and volunteers (basically thugs) from Russia. And they all were supplied by Russian weapons. Putin also made any peaceful resolution of the conflict impossible, like when the UN tried to pass resolutions on peacekeeping forces in Donbass on multiple occasions, guess who vetoed them, Russia of course.
And now they try to pretend they care about the people in those regions, and their ethnic self-determination. Bah, as if they cared about those things when they were leveling Grozny to the ground during the Chechen wars, or imprisoning and assassinating anyone expressing nationalist or separatist views within Russia. Putin only needed Donbass as a pretext to a full scale invasion of Ukraine. Which he thought could succeed at no cost to Russia, after all the international response to him starting an insurgency in a sovereign country and even annexing a piece of land was pretty weak.
Putin was always going to invade, the only question is what took him so long. Perhaps he was waiting exactly for something like the disastrous Biden presidency and the mistakes like Afghan withdrawal.
i think the way we see how serious he is about the fracking question is whether he tells the appropriate authority not to fill the Cuadrilla holes at Preston Road with concrete this weekend as they intend to do. So we should know by next week
Actions speak louder than words. Bozo is good at talking, but the government is useless at actually doing something sensible.
Looks like a temporary reprieve only for the two test wells.
Insiders said they could be used for research instead, and are expected to give them until June to concrete them over.
But today fracking firm Cuadrilla said they hadn’t yet been told about any change of policy.
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/politics/17894828/all-options-fracking-ban-in-place/
Boris reminds me of the Nixon joke, “how do you know when Nixon is lying? His lips are moving.”
As Paul reported recently, there are no new CCGT power stations planned (nobody wants to pay to build something that this government is likely to shut down at any time) and the existing stations are close to their sell by date.
Colin, my favourite about Nixon was during the Watergate scandal while he was still trying to save his job. The late Johnny Carson said, on his late night show, that Nixon said that he’d gone to visit his sick mother and she had told him: ‘Richard, don’t you ever give up!’
Carson suggested that the exclamation mark should have been a question mark, which changes the whole meaning somewhat (you have to say it out loud). 🙂
Thank kerriste for that, at last! Has someone finally found the missing brain-cell? Re-starting fracking is simply wonderful, NOW re-open some/all of OUR coal-mines, and cancel the coal order from, was it Columbia?
Rentamob will be dusting off their ponchos and filling the VW van ready to blockade the well sites. I wonder whether “every bit of gas from these wells is a dent in Russian revenue in pursuing the occupation of The Ukraine”
Has anybody noticed that Biden having rejected the Keystione Pipeline to bring good quaality crude from Canada ids nioe woptoinfg to bytring poor quality crude from (sancioned) Venezuela. The world ghas gone mad.
I have tried my best not to respond to the ill-informed nonsense on here and on the MSM about fracking for shale gas but I can’t resist any more – looking forward to the condemnation from the usual suspects. The facts are that Cuadrilla fracked their second well to 2.7 magnitude and although the test was stopped and was only partially complete, the well only flowed less than 300 MCFD. Under historical pricing the break even for a shale well was 600 MCFD but at today’s prices maybe a flow of under 300 MCFD will return a profit to the developer but it won’t help our national gas shortage one iota. To deliver ten percent of our demand will need thousands of wells. Good luck.
Vernon
Don’t you ever give up with the lies?
This blog is one of the few places where you do NOT get ill-informed nonsense ^.^
Dung: Nice to hear from you as usual. Would you like to explain precisely which bit of my post(s) is a lie?
To others, sorry about the un-edited first paragraph but hope the intent is clear (i.e. where is the sense in POTUS abandoning the Keystone Pipeline to bring good crude from Canada but proposing to buy poor crude from Venezuela?).
Except from trolls like you of course.
“Keystione”, “quaality “, “ids nioe woptoinfg to bytring”, “(sancioned)”, “ghas”
Not even a troll could be that incoherent.
” ids nioe woptoinfg to bytring” – ever thought of taking a bit more water with it?
You are partly right. The well tests were very disappointing but perhaps with a longer horizontal section they might have got enough gas out. What is totally unknown is the decline rate. Fracked wells often decline at 50-70% a year. The tests were way too short to establish the all important decline rate.
VE, the report said that the fracking was stopped after just a few zones. Many wells are designed with dozens of fracks. This means that only a small portion of the productive zone was open to flow. This results in only a fraction of the potential gas rate being measured. While 300 mscfd is not commercial it may only be 10% of the potential, a figure that would likely render the project affordable.
People will always be concerned with industrialization of the countryside, and indeed during the drilling and completion the coming and going of large trucks/lorries will seem off putting. Compensating the locals with free gas for the duration of the well life would probably suffice. The post drilling is very benign.
Nice to read a couple of well-informed contributions on this tiresome topic. Crickshaw, you are postulating a well flow of 3MMCFD. I have nowhere read of such a delivery but from shale that has given such a disappointing start I have to doubt it. You are one of few to mention the rapid decline rate and the complexities of frequent re-fracking paricularly when we are considering access to thousands of wells. As I have frequently said, I am all in favour of having another go but I wouldn’t bet the farm on the outcome. A reminder that Poland also promised to develope an export industry of shale gas but all attempts have since been abandoned – not a single cubic meter of useable shale gas.
According to Guido, Cuadrilla haven’t had the BEIS memo to stop the concreting process. As things stand those wells are still due to be plugged.
I despair of our government. Is it really too ‘conspiracy theory’ to ask if the UK is being deliberately targeted by TPTB, with endless directives that our thick as mince politico’s rush to apply without hesitation?
There’s just an endless production line of stupid, obviously damaging rules.
This may be all well and good, however there is speculation that planning regulations surrounding onshore wind in England will be relaxed. If so, this will further compound the situation by adding more unreliable and intermittent energy to the grid. It will also remove local people from the decision making process but I suppose that is what the eco loons want.
Its seems that UK wants Freedom from Putins Oil , but NOT immediately
no word on Russian LNG but only NOT in Russian ships
‘The UK will phase out imports of Russian oil in response to Vladimir Putin’s illegal invasion of Ukraine* by the end of the year*, the Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng has confirmed today (Tuesday 8 March).
The phasing out of imports will not be immediate, but instead allows the UK more than enough time to adjust supply chains, ”
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-to-phase-out-russian-oil-imports
From Scottish Government:
Results updated 3 Oct 2017
‘The future of unconventional oil and gas in Scotland has proven both complex and controversial, and deeply held, sincere views have emerged on all sides of the debate.
The Scottish Government’s position is to take a cautious, evidence led approach while we gather and consider evidence. In January 2015, the Scottish Government put in place a moratorium on unconventional oil and gas development in Scotland, which prevents hydraulic fracturing for shale oil and gas, and coal bed methane extraction taking place while the Scottish Government investigates evidence on potential impacts.
To support this consultation, the Scottish Government has compiled a comprehensive evidence-base. This has included commissioning a report by an Independent Expert Scientific Panel, and commissioning a series of research projects to explore certain issues in more detail.’
https://consult.gov.scot/energy-and-climate-change-directorate/fracking-unconventional-oil-and-gas/
Well, thare youv gotiit in a nut-shel: an ‘Indepedent Expert Panel’ being ‘cautious’.
Is the panel independent in the same way as the CCC is independent?
Shale gas may or may not be commercial in England, we just don’t know yet. To me the major obstacle is the number and size of heavy truck movements that are needed to drill a pad of 10 or more wells that would be averaging 20 heavy trucks a day on country roads for several years. While Johnson may find this acceptable in Lancashire, the best fracking prospect in the UK is the Weald Basin of Kent and Sussex and the Kons will never allow it there.
Aiui most of those truck movements will be taking water to the site and removing the returned fluid. For a full-scale site those could be replaced by mains supply and drainage connections. Some years ago one of the water companies was asked about this (might have been NorthWest) and they confirmed that it wouldn’t be a problem unless the site was pretty remote – the volumes involved are not huge by their standards.
Being a small, congested island can have advantages: shale sites may well be close to mains water & drainage, the gas grid and electricity supplies.
‘Officials are said to be working on an “energy supply strategy”.’
They endeavor to persevere.
The “energy supply strategy” is to replace fossil fuels and nuclear power with renewables. Anything different this year will be a temporary expediency, not a change in strategy.
‘Meanwhile, the US administration is ratcheting up pressure on shale gas producers, telling them they should be doing “whatever it takes” to increase shale supplies’
Pressure? Producers won’t even answer the administration’s calls.