We're fracking George Osborne's village green!

Posted by kcumming — 4 March 2013 at 12:50pm - Comments

Under the guise of newly-formed fracking company Frack & Go, we've arrived en masse in the picturesque town of Knutsford in George Osborne’s Tatton constituency, to give local people a taste of what might happen if George gets his dash for gas and fracking goes ahead locally.

'Frack off!' flashes a road sign on the village green, before flicking over to, 'Osborne: Driving Tatton to frack and ruin'. A giant drilling rig towers overhead, drilling sounds pierce the air and surveyors in high-vis vests calculate where to drill next. 

Meanwhile, climbers are installing a giant company sign - Frack & Go – on the balcony of Osborne’s constituency office, a delightful heritage building overlooking the green.

Hold onto your hard hats - fracking has come to Tatton!

Fracking is how you get shale gas out of the ground. You drill holes, then inject water and chemicals at high pressure in order to fracture shale rock and force out the gas.

Osborne is pitching it as the answer to the UK’s energy woes and a reason not to invest in renewable energy. It’s a key plank of his dash for gas.

But energy experts disagree, saying it’s hard to know how much UK shale there is, and no matter how much is found, it won’t bring down bills.

So for communities like Tatton - where licences have already been issued for exploratory drilling - fracking could end up being a lot of pain for very little gain. And if the Chancellor thinks his gas plans are going to be all ‘plain shale-ing’, he’s got another thing coming.

Most local people don’t want it. A poll out today reveals that the majority of Tatton residents oppose fracking, and have serious concerns about noise, disruption, traffic and house prices.

The poll also found that 12% of people who voted Conservative in the last election are unlikely to vote Tory again if fracking goes ahead locally.

Tatton is just one of hundreds of constituencies up and down the country where licenses have been issued for exploratory drilling as part of Osborne’s disastrous energy strategy. The strategy would bust UK climate targets and leave us dangerously dependent on polluting gas – mostly imports from places like Qatar.

Instead, just like hundreds of investors, business leaders, UK companies and civil society groups, we want to see carbon-free electricity by 2030, which will be cleaner, safer and cheaper over time.

Osborne has fought to keep a goal of carbon-free energy by 2030 out of the Energy Bill. But his own colleague - Conservative MP Tim Yeo - has tabled an amendment that would see it included. In an extraordinary show of support for clean energy, 21,000 people have emailed their local MP to ask them to vote for Yeo’s amendment.

The Chancellor should stop trying to play Britain’s JR Ewing and concentrate instead on clean energy and proven growth industries.

What else can we expect after  15 years of failed UK Government.Is it a surprise that they are in a panic and are now flailing around for energy? The current lot have to do yet another volte-face and subsidise EDF nuclear energy or give up on it.   

Follow Greenpeace UK