As the government’s experts on renewable energy form a queue
at the exit, the gas specialists are moving in, counting the zeros on their
budgets. Dirty gas will get big tax breaks following George Osborne’s budget.
He wants big investment in “unconventional gas” to match the
big money British banks have already invested in Canadian tar sands. These are
huge deposits of bitumen, a tar-like substance that’s turned into oil through
energy-intensive processes.
Now a quarter of Scotland
has been earmarked for drilling for gas to replace declining stocks from the North Sea . Companies will be invited to apply for
licences next year. At the same time, the ban on fracking has been lifted.
The process involves drilling down and creating tiny
explosions to shatter and crack hard shale rocks to release the gas inside. Cuadrilla,
whose operations caused earthquakes in Blackpool ,
is back on site and ready to resume this dangerous dash for gas.
There is clear evidence from Australia
and the United States ,
about the dangers of fracking. Water supplies have been contaminated with toxic
chemicals that make people constantly ill, with the potential to cause cancer
and even to change people’s gender.
The most advanced proposition is coal-bed methane capture.
Australian corporation Dart Energy has already drilled 16 exploratory wells
around Falkirk and Stirling . They have agreed
a £300m deal to supply Scottish and Southern Electricity and plan to expand
rapidly with at least 20 more wells in short order.
Campaign group Frack Off has raised
serious questions about Dart’s operations. But the Scottish government led by
the SNP has nothing to say – they smell they money, not the methane. So much
for the promise that Scotland ’s
energy future lies in becoming the world leader in wind and tide!
Coal-bed methane extraction pumps water into the seam and
gas bubbles through. But nobody seems to have planned what to do with the
contaminated water. It’s the nuclear waste disposal story all over again.
The Scottish Environmental Protection Agency (SEPA) will
wait until companies apply to start work to examine the list of chemicals they
plan to use. But fracking licences have already been issued in the south-west
of Scotland
and companies can simply move from exploration to production without any
further discussion
Hundreds of objections from community groups and individuals
are pouring in to SEPA. Network Rail is worried that wells drilled near the
main line to the north might blow it up.
But these concerns are not high on the list of government
priorities. It’s as if some ruthless Victorian coal owner travelled forward in
time to take charge of the Department of Energy and Climate Change (causing
it). It’s all back to the fossil fuel future for capitalism’s energy policy.
Chancellor Osborne, told a meeting in New
York : "I see with admiration what has happened in the US in the way
your shale gas revolution has made a contribution to GDP.”
In the interests of short-term profits governments will
permit absolutely anything corporations propose. They know the dangers – they
know about climate change – but remain paralysed by the economic and social
changes needed to tackle it. And when a system can only move backwards, it is
in terminal crisis.
So it’s over to us – we call on all those who want to defend
the environment to form or join People’s Assemblies, popular forms of
alternative government that can challenge the power of the corporations to
befoul the land for profit and replace the governments, national or local, that
facilitate them.
Penny Cole
Environment editor
No comments:
Post a Comment