BBC: Will shale gas give East Midlands an energy boost?

Mention Melton Mowbray, and what springs to mind?

It's the Leicestershire town that gave the world the expression: to paint the town red.

It's also home of the traditional pork pie, its designation now protected by the European Union.

Yet its residents may want protection from the ingredients, a mile underground.

BBC One's Sunday Politics programme for the East Midlands has revealed the area is sitting on one of the biggest reserves of shale gas in the UK.

From pies to power

From the tranquility of the Vale of Belvoir to the Derbyshire Peak District, the East Midlands is potentially very rich in gas deposits.

Ed Hough is a geologist, based at the British Geological Survey HQ at Keyworth in Nottinghamshire.

He showed me box 14189. It contained rock drilled at Duffield, just north of Derby.

"This rock is over 325 million years," he told me.

"But any black mark on the rock indicates there was plant life of some kind.

"That's the tell-tale sign that this shale could produce gas."  MORE