Politics Home: Debate: Is fracking the answer on energy security?

From security of supply to environmental damage, the case for fracking has not been made, writes Norman Baker 

“We’re going all out for shale.” So said the Prime Minister. And so the Government has recently pushed through, with the tacit support of Labour, a policy to maximise the exploitation of fossil fuel reserves. It’s a long way from the shots of the Prime Minister in the Arctic, huskies in tow, worrying about climate change.

The aims of energy policy are uncontroversial: to secure security of supply, ideally indigenous supply, in order not to be held hostage by other countries; to help to meet our climate change targets; and to use the energy supply to create jobs and, ideally, to keep prices down. Sadly, the Government’s policy on fracking does not achieve those objectives.

On security of supply, the Chancellor has said that there is “huge potential” from fracking; the Treasury that the potential is “too big to ignore”. Yet the recent report from the UK Energy Research Centre disagrees. Professor Jim Watson, UKERC research director, said: “It is very frustrating to keep hearing that shale gas is going to solve our energy problems—there’s no evidence for that whatsoever...it’s hype… Shale gas has been completely oversold. Where ministers got this rhetoric from I have absolutely no idea. It’s very misleading for the public.”

Read the full article and the Conservative party rebuttal HERE