Industry urging governments and business to reject renewables in favour of 'green' shale gas
• Is shale gas as green as the companies say?
Fiona Harvey, environment correspondent guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 20 April 2011 17.24 BST
Senior executives in the fossil fuel industry have launched an all-out assault on renewable energy, lobbying governments and business groups to reject wind and solar power in favour of gas, in a move that could choke the fledgling green energy industry.
Multinational companies including Shell, GDF Suez and Statoil are promoting gas as an alternative "green" fuel. These companies are among dozens around the world investing in new technologies to exploit shale gas, a controversial form of the fuel that has rejuvenated the gas industry because it is plentiful in supply and newly accessible due to technical advances in gas extraction known as "fracking".
The expansion of shale gas holds out the promise of a glut in gas that is driving down prices and creating a bonanza for the fossil fuel industry. Burning gas in power stations releases about half the carbon emissions of coal, allowing gas companies to claim it is a "green" source of fuel.
Central to the lobbying effort is a report claiming that the EU could meet its 2050 carbon targets €900bn more cheaply by using gas than by investing in renewables. But the Guardian has established that the analysis is based on a previous report that came to the opposite conclusion – that renewables should play a much larger role. The report being pushed by the fossil fuel industry has been disowned by its original authors who referred to it as "biased" in favour of gas.
For the last two months, company lobbyists have been besieging government officials in Europe, the US and elsewhere to push the report. Their efforts are being boosted through alliances with energy-intensive industries, which are joining in the pressure on government in the hope of securing cheap energy.
As the problems with the Fukushima plant in Japan have cast a pall over nuclear power, gas companies sense the chance to brand themselves as the main "green" source of energy. James Smith, outgoing UK chairman of Royal Dutch Shell, one of the leaders in the lobbying effort, said switching to gas would offer the world "a breathing space" in the battle against climate change.
This view was challenged by Prof David Mackay, chief scientific adviser to the UK's Department of Energy and Climate Change. He told the Guardian: "You can't reach the [climate] targets like this - there is no way that switching to gas would solve the problem. I don't think it's really credible that gas is the only future."
The lobbying effort by fossil fuel companies has been intense. At a high level meeting on Wednesday, the president of the European parliament hosted a lunch for the gas industry with VIP guests including the EU's energy chief, Günther Oettinger.
It is the latest in a long round of meetings in recent months between gas lobbyists and senior officials in Brussels, including other EU commissioners and prominent MEPs, as part of the industry's charm offensive. Oettinger alone has held at least two other major meetings with gas representatives this year.
At most of these meetings, and at many other formal and informal meetings to discuss EU energy and climate change, officials have been presented with a report commissioned by the European Gas Advocacy Forum (EGAF), an industry lobbying group, based in part on an analysis by consultancy firm McKinsey and called Making the Green Journey Work. This report appears to show the EU could meet its 2050 climate targets €900bn more cheaply using gas than by investing in renewables. A copy of the report has also been presented to the office of José Manuel Barroso, the EU president, who has taken a close interest in EU gas supply with visits to the Ukraine, Turkmenistan and Azerbaijan this year.
Apart from coming to different conclusions about renewable energy, the report also relies on questionable assumptions about the future price of technology to capture and store carbon.
The team at the European Climate Foundation that produced the original report described the EGAF version as "biased to one preferential outcome in support of gas advocacy". They warn that adopting its conclusions would reduce energy security and expose the European economy to the volatile gas price.
A spokesperson for McKinsey said: "It is our long-standing policy not to discuss our clients or the work we do for them."
David Rimmer, Shell's general managed for global gas said, "Shell sees renewables as a major part of the future energy mix but this analysis has shown that increased reliance on gas in the near term saves money and jobs, delivers on climate targets and allows new technologies to be improved before large scale deployment."
Further doubt has been thrown on the industry's claims by a newly released academic study from Cornell University which found that generating electricity from shale gas – because of the difficulty in extracting it from rocks – produces at least as much carbon dioxide as coal-fired power, and perhaps more.
Jenny Banks, climate and energy policy officer at WWF-UK, called on the British government to halt shale gas exploration. "It would be ridiculous to encourage shale gas when in reality its greenhouse gas footprint could be as bad as or worse than coal. We need to reject this source of gas, and have a clear plan to move away from our dependency on fossil fuels and harness the full potential of renewable technologies."
Some in the gas industry are careful to argue that its fuel is complementary to renewables, as it can be relatively easily turned on and off to provide flexible back-up power when the wind is not blowing.
This argument is accepted by Oettinger, who insists that both gas and renewable energy will be needed for flexible low-carbon power generation, and some other senior figures. Nobuo Tanaka, the executive director of the International Energy Agency, said: "Gas is potentially a game changer. But it is complementary to renewables, as it can be turned on and off quickly. It could be baseload power and we could turn off coal."
But renewable energy generators are wary, as they fear that cash-strapped governments will ease off on subsidies for clean power, in favour of licensing gas-fired power stations.
A new gas-fired power station would be expected to have a useful life of about 25 to 40 years. So although switching from coal to gas would help countries meet their short term emissions targets, in the longer term they would be left with fleets of redundant, high-emitting fossil fuel power stations – unless they were fitted with expensive technology to capture and store the carbon dioxide underground. However, this technology is still unproven and it is likely to be decades before it can be widely used. The economics of the technology are highly uncertain, and renewable companies argue that the assumptions used by EGAF to show that the fossil fuel is cheaper than renewables do not stand up to scrutiny.
Shale gas is controversial because it requires large amounts of water to release it from rocks, and the use of potentially dangerous chemicals that could leach into the water supply. Numerous cases in the US, which has led the way in releasing gas from shale rocks using fracking technology, have shown evidence of contamination and dangerous leaks of methane.
Prof Robert Howarth, lead author of the Cornell study, said: "My strong belief is that shale gas has been promoted far beyond the objective evidence of what it can and cannot do. It is time to step back, and objectively analyse whether this is a reasonable energy technology for our future. It is also time to analyse how environmental issues associated with the technology might be reduced, and at what cost."
Thursday, 21 April 2011
'Gasland changed everything' – fracking firm battles to woo English villagers
Cuadrilla Resources has arrived in northern England to exploit the gas reserves, but it must win over the worried locals who have seen controversial US shale gas documentary, Gasland
Fiona Harvey in Singleton guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 20 April 2011 17.41 BST
It is also unnervingly quiet. On a bright spring morning, in the lane just a few yards from the gate, the silence is unbroken except by birdsong.
The entire site is lined with tough plastic several feet underground so that the surface rainwater cannot permeate. "Nothing can escape," says Mark Miller, chief executive of Cuadrilla Resources, the UK-based shale gas company that is hoping to exploit gas reserves in the north of England.
Within a few months, not even this will be visible. If gas is found, and the fracking process begins, then the drilling equipment will be moved to another site, the wellhead will be capped with extraction equipment about six feet in height, and a tall hedge will hide it from view. No one should know it is there.
Miller is here to speak to a group of local people invited to discuss their concerns about the site. He wants to show off the many safety features of the site, the lack of dust and noise, and most of all distance himself from the many recent horror stories from the US on shale gas "fracking" – short for hydraulic fracturing.
"Gasland [the US feature documentary about shale gas] really changed everything," says Paul Kelly, communications adviser to Cuadrilla. "Before that, shale gas was not seen as routinely controversial." The film showed terrifying examples of what can go wrong when shale gas drilling and fracking takes place – leaks of methane from under the ground, contamination of the water supply and the soil, the danger of explosions. Hundreds of people in the US are reported to have been affected by pollution, have had their health ruined, and lost their houses or jobs as a result of the problems there. Scenes that show residents able to set fire to their water supply because of methane contamination are the new face of shale gas exploration.
A couple of the locals mention that they have seen Gaslands and are concerned that the problems it demonstrates will be replicated here in Singleton, an English village so picturesque it has been made a conservation area. A quaint half-timbered old building, bearing the legend "Fire Engine", greets the visitor at the entrance, with quiet lanes and leafy gardens surrounding a mixture of cottages and converted barns, with a sprinkling of more modern housing. The drilling site is well within view of the houses, just a few hundred yards from the village church and primary school.
But Miller is quick to play down the experiences reported from the US. He goes into detail on the sorts of safety measures to be included, including three layers of pipe casing between the 3,000 feet drill shaft and the aquifer it passes through (which is saline, so not used for drinking water in any case), and a gas-sensing and shut-off system to prevent leaks.
Only three chemicals – a polyacrylamide lubricant that is commonly found in cosmetics; hydrochloric acid; and a biocide used to purify drinking water – will be used here, he pledges, unlike the hundreds that can be used in the US. In the course of its life, this site is likely to require about five Olympic swimming pools of water, about a quarter of which will be returned to the surface quickly, cleaned and recycled. The rest will seep up gradually – and safely - over about five or six decades, he says.
The equipment here is also superior to that used by what he calls the "bad apple companies" in the US whom Miller blames for poisoning the public image of shale gas. "It has added about 20% to our costs, but we wanted to be able to show people that we are doing this properly and responsibly," he says.
Something that did shake local people's faith in the plant was an earthquake on 1 April. The tremors were centred remarkably close to the village, and woke many people in the night with a bang.
Miller is unfazed, reassuring people that the minor degree of drilling at the site - where fracking has not started yet - could not have caused the quake. Most people seem satisfied with his explanation.
Cuadrilla has two operational drilling sites with permission for another four. If gas is found, it may expand to six to eight per square mile over the area it has licensed for exploration. The company is being closely watched by the government, green campaigners and other companies that want to exploit the UK's potential shale reserves, which are concentrated in the Lancashire region.
It is certainly the case that the company, which is UK-owned and headquartered (although Miller is American), is coming under much tighter regulation than prevails in many US states. The UK's Environment Agency is monitoring the chemicals used and the processes at every step, as is the local council. In the UK the underlying rocks belong to the queen, meaning the crown estate must get involved, too.
For the cash-strapped local council, Cuadrilla's development offers the chance of new jobs and a new source of income. The company employs about 70 people directly at present, but its activities also have a knock-on stimulus effect on the depressed local economy.
The villagers seem broadly impressed with Miller's explanations. "They offered us a lot of reassurance – I do feel happier about the safety side now," says Geoffrey Pilkington, a local property owner.
"To some degree, they have allayed my fears," adds John Ashcroft, who is retired. "And we have to be careful not to be hypocritical – we all have gas central heating."
In fact, the main concern among villagers appears to be not the safety but the development on what they thought was greenbelt land. "The first we knew was when it started going up," says Caroline Murphy, an artist and designer. "We live here because it's a beautiful village with beautiful countryside, and now it looks like an industrial estate has sprung up."
Others are concerned about house prices. "It's an eyesore," says Wendy Jones, who is moving to another village. She points to a nearby property for sale that she believes has fallen in price in recent months.
For a few, the site is viewed positively. Toni Wood, who works in the local pub, says: "I know some people are not happy, but I am not worried about it. But then, they have brought us a lot of business, so I suppose we see more of the benefits."
Fiona Harvey in Singleton guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 20 April 2011 17.41 BST
It is also unnervingly quiet. On a bright spring morning, in the lane just a few yards from the gate, the silence is unbroken except by birdsong.
The entire site is lined with tough plastic several feet underground so that the surface rainwater cannot permeate. "Nothing can escape," says Mark Miller, chief executive of Cuadrilla Resources, the UK-based shale gas company that is hoping to exploit gas reserves in the north of England.
Within a few months, not even this will be visible. If gas is found, and the fracking process begins, then the drilling equipment will be moved to another site, the wellhead will be capped with extraction equipment about six feet in height, and a tall hedge will hide it from view. No one should know it is there.
Miller is here to speak to a group of local people invited to discuss their concerns about the site. He wants to show off the many safety features of the site, the lack of dust and noise, and most of all distance himself from the many recent horror stories from the US on shale gas "fracking" – short for hydraulic fracturing.
"Gasland [the US feature documentary about shale gas] really changed everything," says Paul Kelly, communications adviser to Cuadrilla. "Before that, shale gas was not seen as routinely controversial." The film showed terrifying examples of what can go wrong when shale gas drilling and fracking takes place – leaks of methane from under the ground, contamination of the water supply and the soil, the danger of explosions. Hundreds of people in the US are reported to have been affected by pollution, have had their health ruined, and lost their houses or jobs as a result of the problems there. Scenes that show residents able to set fire to their water supply because of methane contamination are the new face of shale gas exploration.
A couple of the locals mention that they have seen Gaslands and are concerned that the problems it demonstrates will be replicated here in Singleton, an English village so picturesque it has been made a conservation area. A quaint half-timbered old building, bearing the legend "Fire Engine", greets the visitor at the entrance, with quiet lanes and leafy gardens surrounding a mixture of cottages and converted barns, with a sprinkling of more modern housing. The drilling site is well within view of the houses, just a few hundred yards from the village church and primary school.
But Miller is quick to play down the experiences reported from the US. He goes into detail on the sorts of safety measures to be included, including three layers of pipe casing between the 3,000 feet drill shaft and the aquifer it passes through (which is saline, so not used for drinking water in any case), and a gas-sensing and shut-off system to prevent leaks.
Only three chemicals – a polyacrylamide lubricant that is commonly found in cosmetics; hydrochloric acid; and a biocide used to purify drinking water – will be used here, he pledges, unlike the hundreds that can be used in the US. In the course of its life, this site is likely to require about five Olympic swimming pools of water, about a quarter of which will be returned to the surface quickly, cleaned and recycled. The rest will seep up gradually – and safely - over about five or six decades, he says.
The equipment here is also superior to that used by what he calls the "bad apple companies" in the US whom Miller blames for poisoning the public image of shale gas. "It has added about 20% to our costs, but we wanted to be able to show people that we are doing this properly and responsibly," he says.
Something that did shake local people's faith in the plant was an earthquake on 1 April. The tremors were centred remarkably close to the village, and woke many people in the night with a bang.
Miller is unfazed, reassuring people that the minor degree of drilling at the site - where fracking has not started yet - could not have caused the quake. Most people seem satisfied with his explanation.
Cuadrilla has two operational drilling sites with permission for another four. If gas is found, it may expand to six to eight per square mile over the area it has licensed for exploration. The company is being closely watched by the government, green campaigners and other companies that want to exploit the UK's potential shale reserves, which are concentrated in the Lancashire region.
It is certainly the case that the company, which is UK-owned and headquartered (although Miller is American), is coming under much tighter regulation than prevails in many US states. The UK's Environment Agency is monitoring the chemicals used and the processes at every step, as is the local council. In the UK the underlying rocks belong to the queen, meaning the crown estate must get involved, too.
For the cash-strapped local council, Cuadrilla's development offers the chance of new jobs and a new source of income. The company employs about 70 people directly at present, but its activities also have a knock-on stimulus effect on the depressed local economy.
The villagers seem broadly impressed with Miller's explanations. "They offered us a lot of reassurance – I do feel happier about the safety side now," says Geoffrey Pilkington, a local property owner.
"To some degree, they have allayed my fears," adds John Ashcroft, who is retired. "And we have to be careful not to be hypocritical – we all have gas central heating."
In fact, the main concern among villagers appears to be not the safety but the development on what they thought was greenbelt land. "The first we knew was when it started going up," says Caroline Murphy, an artist and designer. "We live here because it's a beautiful village with beautiful countryside, and now it looks like an industrial estate has sprung up."
Others are concerned about house prices. "It's an eyesore," says Wendy Jones, who is moving to another village. She points to a nearby property for sale that she believes has fallen in price in recent months.
For a few, the site is viewed positively. Toni Wood, who works in the local pub, says: "I know some people are not happy, but I am not worried about it. But then, they have brought us a lot of business, so I suppose we see more of the benefits."
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