Bishop Hill A voluntary approach to shale gas
Feb 4, 2014 Climate: Parliament Energy: gas The Telegraph reckons that things are about to get heated on the shale gas front, with protestors threatening to sue anyone who tries to drill under their homes. Their hope is that the law of trespass will prove equal to the task, and it seems that David Cameron is sufficiently worried that he is considering a change to that law in order to ensure that the nascent shale gas revolution is not crushed before it gets going.
In some ways I sympathise with the homeowners who are objecting, however ephemeral any problems may may prove to be in practice. Drilling under someone's home seems like an imposition, even if it is thousands of feet down, and regardless of the letter of whatever law Mr Cameron gets put on the books.
But if, as was once said politics is "the art of looking for trouble, finding it whether it exists or not, diagnosing it incorrectly, and applying the wrong remedy" then Mr Cameron's approach is the archetype. Ramming shale gas down people's throats is not going to win any friends, let alone the wider PR battle.
A far better approach would be to repeal the Petroleum (Production) Act 1934, which nationalises ownership of onshore oil and gas resources. This would send out a signal to the country that shale gas development will take place on a voluntary basis. Landowners would be clamouring to be at the front of the queue to have their land drilled. Those who really objected could sit secure in the knowledge that they were in control of their own destinies.
Coincidentally, there have been mutterings in Parliament about a lack of bills put in front of the house - a function it seems of most decisions now being taken by bureaucrats in Brussels. What better use to put our MPs than to get them to bring about a voluntarist revolution.
Some months ago, I mentioned this idea to a BBC journalist, who was appalled at the suggestion that valuable assets might be put into private hands (even the private hands from which they had originally been taken by the state) and in reality I think these kinds of objections would probably be insurmountable. In public life, the taking of valuable assets from private people is permissible, or even to be desired. Giving them back is not.
So instead of adopting a policy of voluntarism, we will carry on down the spiral of coercion and outrage, more coercion and more outrage that characterises most aspects of the UK today.
Sad really.
Reader Comments (64)
Hydraulic fracturing, Johanna, can be used in any circumstance where you wish to increase the permeability of rock, including oil, geothermal and coal bed methane. It has been used at Wytch Farm:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/10233955/The-town-where-fracking-is-already-happening.html
I don't doubt that, Doc, but my point is that this is not the same as "drilling under people's property."
Johanna - the wells at Wytch Farm go right under the very expensive houses on Sandbanks. One of them ends up 11 kilometres away out in the English Channel, and there are several others that are quite extensive too.
http://www.southampton.ac.uk/~imw/jpg-Petroleum-Geology/11PGS-Wytch-Wells-Trajectories.jpg
On the same subject, also in the Telegraph Philip Johnston has an excoriating piece on the lack of strategic energy policy, a topic raised many time in this diocese:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/energy/fracking/10614840/Britains-energy-crisis-is-about-to-boil-over.html
By way of gossip about trespass, the history of English law development provides wonderful reading such as Ellis V. Loftus Iron Co, (1874) LR 10 CP 10.
To quote from a commentary in http://archive.org/stream/lawoftheair032273mbp/lawoftheair032273mbp_djvu.txt
"Trespassing Animals. Ellis v. Loftus Iron Co. 4 was a
case where the defendants' horse injured the plaintiff's
mare by biting and kicking it, the mare remaining on
and within the plaintiff's field and the horse biting and
kicking her through a wire fencing. The Court of Common Pleas
on appeal from the County Court held that
the defendants were liable in trespass, negligence or no
negligence.
" It seems to me sufficiently clear " (said Lord Coleridge,
C.J.), " that some portion of the defendants' horse's body must
have been over the boundary. That may be a very small
trespass, but it is a trespass in law." Keating, J., said :
" The horse, it is found, kicked and bit the mare through the
fence. I take it that the meaning of that must be that the
horse's mouth and feet protruded through the fence over the
plaintiff's land, and that would in my opinion amount in law
to a trespass."
As usual, the workings of ordinary life caused intelligent people to think; and it came about that there was established law about aerial trespass long before the first aeroplane.
I suspect that subterranean trespass law is equally interesting, but I have not had occasion to acquaint myself with it.
Be careful what you wish for when you throw loose thoughts around regarding ownership of minerals. International companies that could bring you much benefit are highly sensitive to Sovereign Risk. After a career in the game, my preferred loose thought is that the ownership of minerals be vested in the people in the right of the Crown; but that upon proof that an assemblage of minerals might form a viable mine, ownership should pass, for a negotiated fee, to the discoverer, whose prior expenditure has greatly improved the value of the host land. Unfortunately I am unaware of any Government that has been progressive enough to institute this sage advice.
This made me wonder how the Eden project's geothermal scheme is getting on.
There does'nt seem to be much actual progress but I did notice that the technique used to open up the rock to allow water to circulate is described as "hydraulic shearing".
And they do acknowledge that the granite rocks contain radionuclides which may wash out but it will not be a problem.
Indeed, I can think of a case where certain clan groups with good lawyers in NZ demanded to see a planned well trajectory in case it should intersect with the domain of any "earth spirits" . They weren't prepared to say where the earth spirits were until they saw the well path, to which they inevitably objected - once they'd seen it. So eventually they were pinned down to nominate exactly where this spirit resided. The well path was changed to swerve around it, causing all sorts of technical problems, which some service companies made a lot of money from. I'd assume the cost of the swerve was reckoned to be cheaper than the usual outcome of paying off the complainants.
But really, these objections tend only to arise when the hole being drilled is for some form of hydrocarbon. It's not like residents of Alpine towns get a say in what tunnels go under their mountain.
One of Cuadrilla's directors (sorry, I didn't note name or specific function) was on Geoff Randall Live on Sky yesterday evening.
Frankly, he didn't do a great job of explaining the process or defending it - being of rather diffident demeanor - depite Geoff leading him to give positive responses. He also talked about 'tcm' - which is of course trillions of cubic metres - but didn't explain that - and I noticed that the summary ticker below him was actually ahead of what he was saying.
The chief executive (again, didn't get his name - I really must pay more attention) was interviewed on BBC Breakfast this morning by Steph McGovern (she of the dreadful 'Hooll' accent) - he did a slightly better job, but NEITHER took the opportunity to point out that 'the contraversial technique known as fracking' has been in use for decades, both in the USA and here. However, the BBC being the BBC will continue to refer to it as above presumably for evermore...
I just wonder how history would have been different if Greenp*ss, Fiends of the Earth etc had been around when coal was being mined in quantities to fuel the Industrial Revolution...
You mean "the controversial process known as 'coal mining' ... " ?
How things used to be handled:
The British Army clashed with the Luddites on several occasions. At one time, more British soldiers were fighting the Luddites than were fighting Napoleon on the Iberian Peninsula.[16][e] Three Luddites, led by George Mellor, ambushed and assassinated a mill owner named William Horsfall from Ottiwells Mill at Crosland Moor in Marsden, West Yorkshire. Horsfall had remarked that he would "Ride up to his saddle in Luddite blood." Mellor fired the fatal shot to Horsfall's groin, and all three men were arrested.
The British government sought to suppress the Luddite movement with a mass trial at York in January 1813. The government charged over sixty men, including Mellor and his companions, with various crimes in connection with Luddite activities. While some of those charged were actual Luddites, many had no connection to the movement. These trials were not legitimate judicial reckonings of each defendant's guilt, but show trials intended to deter other Luddites from continuing their activities. By meting out harsh consequences, including, in many cases, execution and penal transportation, the trials quickly ended the movement.[17]
Parliament subsequently made "machine breaking" (i.e. industrial sabotage) a capital crime with the Frame Breaking Act[18] and the Malicious Damage Act.[19] Lord Byron opposed this legislation, becoming one of the few prominent defenders of the Luddites after the treatment of the defendants at the York trials.
Wikipedia on Luddites
These big oil companies they pay off the local;tribal Militias or the Local Drug Warlords in foreign hotspots not to get Al Quida ish and start beheading Oil Workers .Plenty of money for private Security in Iraq and Saudi Arabia etc
Don't see why the oil companies shouldn't pay of a few local farmers in Cumbria or Surrey Commuter Belt Yuppies just to drill for gas 3 miles under their back gardens
A big bundle of pound notes could be so persuasive.
Not exactly Beverly Hills but a nice cheque for 300 pound "compensation" every week just not to say nothing and put with a few rattly Tea Cup Earthquakes and try and set their Tap Water alight.
Sure there' are plenty of fake version on Youtube.
Strange how its the people not making any money from Shale are the ones complaining
Greens are arrogant enough not to expect someone to buy off the locals.
Any Bishophillbillies been in touch with the local estate agents in Balcombe and Barton Moss
StewGreen yawned .. If I wanted aggression and namecalling I'd go to an alarmist websites where that is normal, but I prefer it here where the discussion is on topic and sensible.
Quick point
Erin Brochavitch as played by actress Julia Roberts
In the film she is portrayed as a Great Legendary Crusading Environmental Campaigner
In real life unfortunately it was actually a "No Win No Fee" firm of solicitors that won the court case and made themselves a few Millions that was a nice handsome payout from the polluting Chemical Company.
Public supply boreholes abstract groundwater from a wide area , far in excess of the boundary of the pumping station.
I do not hear people complaining that a public water supply involves taking water from beneath their property. Below is groundwater protection zone from beneath an area close to Balcombe.
http://maps.environment-agency.gov.uk/wiyby/wiybyController?x=531500.0&y=130500.0&topic=groundwater&ep=map&scale=9&location=Balcombe,%20West%20Sussex&lang=_e&layerGroups=default&distance=&textonly=off#x=529304&y=131109&lg=1,&scale=9