the frack thread

[Ralph]

For the geologically inclined here's a good description of what's underneath Balcombe:

http://www.southampton.ac.uk/~imw/Petro ... -Weald.htm

and what it contains of interest....

http://www.bgs.ac.uk/shalegas/#ad-image-0

[biffvernon]

For the geologically inclined here's a good description of what's underneath Balcombe:

http://www.southampton.ac.uk/~imw/Petro ... -Weald.htm

and what it contains of interest....

http://www.bgs.ac.uk/shalegas/#ad-image-0

Er, sorry Ralph, but your link is to the report on the Bowland Shale. This is a Carboniferous formation underlying large parts of northern England but Balcombe is in Sussex and the rocks in question there are Jurassic.

[woodburner]

Er, sorry Ralph, but your link is to the report on the Bowland Shale. This is a Carboniferous formation underlying large parts of northern England but Balcombe is in Sussex and the rocks in question there are Jurassic.

Great, that means it will be desolate countryside, so we can frack till the cows come home. Or is it till the chickens come home to roost? As they surely will.

[Ralph]

For the geologically inclined here's a good description of what's underneath Balcombe:

http://www.southampton.ac.uk/~imw/Petro ... -Weald.htm

and what it contains of interest....

http://www.bgs.ac.uk/shalegas/#ad-image-0

Er, sorry Ralph, but your link is to the report on the Bowland Shale. This is a Carboniferous formation underlying large parts of northern England but Balcombe is in Sussex and the rocks in question there are Jurassic.

Oh please...one shale looks just like another...and apparently they contain thousands of TCF of natural gas. The hoopla over this stuff is quite extensive, and unless the Jurassic shales are lacustrine or never reached a thermal maturity window, it is just a matter of time before they are awarded their own TCFs of resource which will then be fought over just like all the rest.

[biffvernon]

one shale looks just like another...and apparently they contain thousands of TCF of natural gas.

To you maybe! Of the order of one thousand according to the BGS.

Meanwhile, here's an interesting view. Put this into Google Maps:
46°19'1.81"N 124°50'53.32"E
to see what a bit of the Chinese countryside looks like.

[Tarrel]

Is that a fracked area?

[biffvernon]

Yep, that's what fracking looks like.

[Little John]

Yep, that's what fracking looks like.

That's a bit disingenuous.

I dare say you could look any industrial process carried out in the West and then compare it to the same process carried out in China and find that the Chinese example looked appalling by comparison. But that may well be simply because because it's China, not because of the industrial process itself.

I'm not defending fracking by the way. I'm simply saying that arguments attacking it should be based on reason and not emotionally charged visual hyperbole.

[clv101]

It looks the same in the US and the US is about as 'west' as you get. If the UK isn't able to employ high density drilling like this, and in the US, then a lot of the other comparisons like production, cost etc aren't straight forward.

[Little John]

It looks the same in the US and the US is about as 'west' as you get. If the UK isn't able to employ high density drilling like this, and in the US, then a lot of the other comparisons like production, cost etc aren't straight forward.

Well, I'd agree about the UK. As for the US, I'd need to see a picture to compare it to the Chinese one.

[clv101]

See page six of this thread for some photos from the US.

[Little John]

See page six of this thread for some photos from the US.

It certainly doesn't look good. However, I would want to know the scales use in the Chinese one versus the yank one. If they are widely differing scales, then they are not as comparable as they might appear.

I guess the point I am getting at is that all industrial process screw the environment up and some scarring of the land surface as seen from the air does not tell me this is any more damaging than any other previous industrial process. The fact is, however, I know full well how locally environmentally damaging fracking can be. I am aware of how it will pollute water supplies. In the long run, though, those things will mend. It might take many decades, but they will. This is of far less concern to me to the far more serious issue of how fracking allows us, at the global level, to keep pumping bloody CO2 into the atmosphere. That issue is global and its consequences will be with all of life for centuries, if not millennia.

However, as I so often find, the environmentalist tack is to show all the nasty pictures and how they are making all the pretty things look ugly. I couldn't give a toss it some land is temporarily scarred. It'll recover. I give a mighty toss, however, if my descendants and the rest of life have to live in a world several degrees hotter than today.

[Tarrel]

But if the ugly pictures turn Joe Public's opinion against fracking, then surely it's "job done", even if the real threat has been the deciding factor.

We're seeing the negative aspect of that up here with wind turbines. A lot of the discussion over the merits and de-merits centres around what they look like, the impact on tourism and what they bring to the local community in the form of grants, cash-injections, etc. very little debate about the part they might play in overall energy security or carbon emission reduction by comparison.

[clv101]

It is an interesting debate. I think the real threat associated with fracking is the additional CO2 emissions associated with adding more fossil fuel resource to the ledger of recoverable reserves.

I'm not actually all that worried about the local issues, issues which I believe can largely be mitigated/controlled, as well as any other industrial process anyway.

However - it's certainly clear that the threat of additional CO2 won't bring middle England out in protest! The issues that motivate regular folk are local noise, local pollution etc. If the activists had focused on the CO2, they wouldn't have anywhere near as much public support as they have now. Sadly, the (frankly ridiculous) threat of earthquakes has proved to be a more powerful motivator than additional CO2 emissions.

[Little John]

It is an interesting debate. I think the real threat associated with fracking is the additional CO2 emissions associated with adding more fossil fuel resource to the ledger of recoverable reserves.

I'm not actually all that worried about the local issues, issues which I believe can largely be mitigated/controlled, as well as any other industrial process anyway.

However - it's certainly clear that the threat of additional CO2 won't bring middle England out in protest! The issues that motivate regular folk are local noise, local pollution etc. If the activists had focused on the CO2, they wouldn't have anywhere near as much public support as they have now. Sadly, the (frankly ridiculous) threat of earthquakes has proved to be a more powerful motivator than additional CO2 emissions.

I understand the approach taken. But, the problem with it is that, in the end, those localised issues end up being proven to be unfounded (or far less severe) as the industry marches forward, This, in turn, discredits the critics who employed those localised concerns as the public focus of their critique. Then, we end up with a situation where no-one is prepared to listen to any critique.

I just wonder if, in the rest of Europe, the public debate is as puerile as it so often is here or if it is a largely UK (and perhaps US) phenomenon? In other words, as a society becomes more laissez-fair, free-market oriented, does that then require than any public debate has to be more framed within the context of short-sighted, short-term, self-interest rather than within the context of long-sighted, long-term common-interest?