Amazing. You wouldn’t know that in the whole country, all we have are just 4 exploration wells, only one of which has been partially fracked and all of them have been suspended from activity for over 18 months because of 2 tiny tremors that didn’t break a single teacup. Compare that to the USA where roughly, around 35,000 shale gas wells were drilled in the last 10 years and around 105,000 fracks were made.  So let’s not get ahead of ourselves – we wouldn’t need to do anything like that much.

People seem to be focussed on the making of a shale gas well which can be noisy and disruptive for a few weeks and completely ignorant of the total silence thereafter for up to 40 years while it is producing gas straight to the national gas network. Personally, I’d much rather live next to a shale gas well than a wind turbine !

Nevertheless, nearly everyone is very taken with the potential and the safety issues. And having looked at them closely in this paper for the IoD, I was more than convinced that shale gas is not only safe but an economic, environmental and energy security gain too.

Not everyone’s convinced though (and not just Gazprom and President Putin!) – here is a shot from me debating with Caroline Lucas MP of the Green Party on the Daily Politics yesterday on a freezing December afternoon – still on iplayer here about 45 minutes in.