Has fracking ceased again in Blackpool?

Blackpool geological faults and the existing danger from fracking

A total of 37 tremors have been recorded since fracking began on 15 October, but none since 4 November. The last tremor was over the accepted government seismic red line level as well, meaning that fracking was expected to halt.

The fracking firm requested that the government should reduce its traffic light system protocols that necessitate companies to halt operations if a 0.5 magnitude tremor is registered. Nevertheless, ministers roundly rejected that idea. Anti-fracking campaigners nearby the site have claimed the place resembled a ghost town over the past fortnight.

Nevertheless, 37 seismic events have been recorded at Blackpool yet apparently no damage has been logged. Moreover, fracking supporters are quick to point this out and some, with little understanding of the situation, even seek to dismiss the fact that important geological faults lines are indeed present and partially recorded in the Fylde region.

In geology, a fault is a planar fracture or discontinuity in a volume of rock, across which there has been substantial displacement as a consequence of rock-mass movement. Punching holes into areas near where faults exist is always a gamble.

The trouble with faults 

Both Thistleton and Woodsfold faults meander through the Fylde area and scientists have expressed grave concerns regarding potential long-term water contamination, via fracking.

Fracking can create drinking water contamination, meaning that toxic chemicals may reach human lips in a worst-case scenario. This may not, however, occur overnight yet may transmogrify into a long-term problem for future generations. 

Seemingly trivial microearthquakes are typically much too small to be apparent to the population, even when they are very close to fracking activity. Nevertheless, the stress changes and the changes in groundwater pressure and circulation can enable new movements on pre-existing, ancient, faults with the generation of greater seismic events. 

An aquifer is an underground layer of water-bearing permeable rock, rock fractures or unconsolidated materials (gravel, sand, or silt).  Fracking can pollute the watercourse. 

Professor David Smythe, Emeritus Professor of Geophysics, University of Glasgow previously wrote: 

“The Environment Agency's decision document regarding Roseacre Wood is, like its earlier decision on Preston New Road, inconsistent on the question of whether or not the Woodsfold Fault is transmissive to fluids. This fault separates the zone planned for shale gas development below the Fylde from the important sandstone Principal Aquifer to the east between Preston and Garstang.”

Professor Smythe has also pointed out that under certain circumstances of hydraulic fracturing the relevant aquifer could be contaminated in about “100 years” by fracking fluid. He furthermore highlighted the fact that due to the geological nature of the area “important faults in the thick Bowland Shale are very hard to identify.”

How fracking stimulated fault line activity 'before' with 52 tremors prior to 2.3 magnitude earthquake 

Just like the recent 30 plus minor tremors, this has happened before at Blackpool.  

2011. Fracking carried out in Preese Hall – 52 seismic events

Professor Emeritus Peter Styles FGS CGeol., FRAS CSci., FIMMM. Keele University stated: 

“ Although the first frack stage was completed without incident, a sequence of 52 seismic events occurred after the second frack stage and the first earthquake to be noticed was a 2.3 ML event on 1st April 2011. Later analysis of regional seismometers showed that there had been very small (c 0.2 ML) precursory events before this which might have been detected and used as a precautionary The ongoing warnings are not being heeded by the government, making it quite clear that certain priorities are questionable."

The message to be learned from Preese Hall and Cuadrilla's consequent explanation of the faulting is that faults in thick shale basins are enormously hard to determine.

Experts and politicians for all parties continue to protest yet the current Tory regime in power keeps its head firmly buried in the sand. 

Because of the currently inadequate data on existing geological faults in the area and the difficulty in identifying them properly, fracking is more than just a risky business, it’s dangerously irresponsible.  Blasting away with fracking gear in geologically unsound regions is playing Russian roulette with public health (today and in the long term) and geological stability. By overruling Lancashire Council’s wise decision NOT to permit fracking the cash-driven UK government is in effect using the people as guinea pigs for this ongoing and deeply controversial Caudrilla experiment.

Signs of government panic over media fracking reports?

Natascha Engel MP wrote to the media recently to criticise what she called  “alarming” coverage of the minor earthquakes near Blackpool. Former Labour MP Natascha Engel is the UK's first Commissioner for Fracking. In the role, she acts as a conduit between local communities, the shale gas industry and regulators. 

She stated that the traffic light system relating to fracking, which was applied to the sector after tremors were recorded off Blackpool in 2011, set an extremely strict standard so that if a tremor of 0.5 is detected, work has to pause. “It was never intended to stop the industry but rather to reassure people,” she said. 

Is this hollow political double talk an attempt to censor the press or even public freedom of opinion? After the numerous serious warnings by expert scientists about fracking close to geological faults are the public not permitted to have deep concerns? Are people just expected to take Natascha Engel's word that everything is fine?

Natascha Engel branded as a Fracking Traitor 

Ms Engel initially opposed fracking when Ineos announced plans to explore for shale gas in the village of Marsh Lane in her North East Derbyshire constituency in January 2017.

David Kesteven, of Eckington Against Fracking, explained Ms Engle's U-turn:

“I would have thought they could have found someone with technical knowledge or scientific background, rather than a failed politician. But Natascha Engel doesn’t have the technical knowledge of fracking. She has destroyed the Labour Party locally. She has betrayed her constituents by going against Labour policy on shale gas. It seems as if they have got Natascha Engel because they could not get anyone else. It beggars belief that they could have chosen her.”

https://labourheartlands.com/shes-a-fracking-traitor-former-labour-mp-natashia-engles/ 

Energy spokesperson for the Liberal Democrats, Ed Davey, said:

 “We have to operate on the basis of evidence and the regulations and traffic light system I introduced to halt fracking when there are earth tremors was based on a major study and recommendations from eminent scientists and engineers. It’s not surprising that the government’s new cheerleader for fracking doesn’t appear to like those tough regulations, but nothing has changed since they were first introduced and the need for a cautious approach hasn’t changed.”

http://www.cityam.com/269140/government-shale-gas-commissioner-slams-emotional-narrative 

Natascha Engel’s emotive letter, in which she apparently seeks to stifle fracking dissenters about increasing seismic activity, is featured on this link.

https://www.thecanary.co/discovery/2018/11/14/a-government-tsar-is-trying-to-manipulate-the-media-over-fracking/ 

Contaminated Flowback: Do we really want to pollute the water source for future generations? 

Professor Smythe explains in conclusion why fracking on the Fylde is so hazardous

“The Environment Agency and Cuadrilla have got it wrong; the fact that the Sherwood Sandstone aquifer in the Fylde is highly saline does NOT mean that it is safe to frack the shales below. There are many connections and pathways for contaminated ‘flowback’ fluid (directly from the fracking process), or for ‘produced’ water (from gas production) to reach the Sherwood aquifer east of the Woodsfold Fault. Such contamination may not happen overnight after fracking or subsequent shale gas production – it may take several years before it is observed. But once the fresh water aquifer has been polluted it can never be flushed clean again. Even minute quantities of benzene and other fracking by-products, to say nothing of NORM (naturally occurring radioactive material) are enough to render the aquifer permanently unsafe and undrinkable. Fracking in faulted areas in Germany fracking is banned as a precautionary principle to avoid possible contamination; in the USA, the faults sometimes found at depth are avoided on economic grounds, because they reduce the efficiency of the fracking process. In France and Bulgaria, and in several states of the USA, fracking is simply banned altogether because of the environmental risks.”

Only arrogant fools, or those movers with hidden agendas, ignore clear warnings that may negatively impact upon communities and the fragile ecosystem for years to come. 

Pat Regan  © 

http://pat-regan.blogspot.com/ 

See also:

https://www.otsnews.co.uk/mps-call-fracking-halt-36-seismic-events-two-weeks/ 

https://www.otsnews.co.uk/sir-ron-seftons-friend-frackers/