The Telegraph: Claims of North Sea fracking boom a 'gross exaggeration', says leading geology professor

David Macdonald, Professor of Petroleum Geology at Aberdeen University, urges voters not to take seriously latest report by N-56 think tank. Claims that North Sea fracking could help bring Scotland £600 billion of oil revenues are a "gross exaggeration" and should not be taken seriously by voters, one of the country's leading geologists has said.

David Macdonald, Professor of Petroleum Geology at Aberdeen University, told the Daily Telegraph a report from the think tank N-56 heralding the future of underwater fracking was "largely nonsense".

Prof Macdonald said the analysis by N-56 – founded by Dan Macdonald, SNP donor and Yes Scotland advisory board member – underplays the extortionate cost of removing oil via fracking from the sea bed.

The think-tank's claim that Scotland would see a "new black gold bonanza" was also dismissed by a second academic, Dr Gordon Hughes, Prof of Economics at the University of Edinburgh, who called it "pure guesswork".
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