WSJ: Tories Against Fracking

Since lifting a moratorium on hydraulic fracturing in December, the government has issued more than 300 licenses for onshore exploration and development. That seemed all well and good with Mr. Cameron's party, at least so long as U.K. shale exploration was mostly confined to Labour strongholds in northern England—or "large, uninhabited and desolate areas," as one Tory peer approvingly put it this summer.

This year, however, the industry began focusing on southern England—Tory territory, for the most part—where the U.S. Energy Information Agency estimates 700 million barrels of recoverable shale oil lie beneath the so-called "stockbroker belt" in Surrey and Sussex.

So now the Tories have their own anti-fracking faction. In comments to the Financial Times this week, Tory MP Mark Pritchard warns of "fracking replacing wind farms as the new energy issue that antagonizes Tory grassroots." The tony enclave of Balcombe, 30 miles south of London, has attracted eco-warriors from around the country since U.K. energy firm Cuadrilla began test drilling there earlier this month.  MORE