Nigel Lawson bepleit exploitatie schaliegas

'Maar haar twee lelijke stiefzusjes willen niet dat Assepoester naar het bal gaat.'

Groot Brittannië zit op een gigantische gasbel. Exploitatie daarvan zou een enorm infuus voor de kwijnende Britse economie kunnen betekenen. Maar proefboringen en exploitatie worden op allerlei manieren getraineerd door de politiek, bureaucratie en de milieubeweging. Allerlei uitvluchten worden verzonnen om de zaak maar op te houden.

De voormalige Britse minister van financiën (onder Thatcher), Nigel Lawson, begint zo langzamerhand zijn geduld te verliezen. In een artikel in 'The Sun' neemt hij scherp stelling tegen de huidige gang van zaken.

Ex-Chancellor tells The Sun he's backing fracking

In recent weeks it has become clear that we are sitting on mind-boggling reserves of gas on a scale never before suspected. They are locked in black rock known as shale, from which the latest technology, developed and now widely in use in America, can extract the gas safely and cheaply.

According to the British Geological Survey, there is enough now known to lie under Lancashire and Yorkshire alone to satisfy all the UK’s needs at the present rate of consumption for between 50 and 100 years. And that is without taking into account not merely the rest of the UK, so far largely unexplored, where shale gas is known to exist, but also our offshore shale reserves, which the British Geological Survey reckons could be up to ten times the size of our onshore reserves. ...

So, with what seem to be the largest shale reserves in Europe – and maybe, who knows, in the world – we are a lucky people. Or so you might suppose.

But that is to reckon without the two ugly sisters who are determined that Cinderella shall not go to the ball. The first is an influential quango, the Environment Agency, headed by Labour peer Lord Smith, which (to some extent at the behest of the European Union) is busy inventing one phoney reason after another why the extraction of shale gas should not be given planning permission.

The second ugly sister is the Department of Energy and Climate Change, under its Liberal Democrat Secretary of State Ed Davey, and its Energy Bill now before Parliament. It would give Mr Davey the power to sign very long-term contracts with inefficient wind power operators to provide so much electricity at between twice and three times the current price that there will be no market left for the cheap electricity that could be generated using shale gas.

And they are backed by well-funded Green pressure groups, such as Friends of the Earth, who are preparing unending legal challenges for anyone seeking to provide us with cheap energy from shale. ...

At my age, it probably makes little practical difference whether fracking goes ahead in the UK or not. It will certainly go ahead elsewhere, as it does in the US to the great benefit of the American economy. But I do still care about the future of this country. I want my grandchildren to grow up in a country that is prosperous and confident, not one that is impoverished, fearful, and self-harming.

That is what is at stake.

Lees verder hier.

In het sprookje krijgt Assepoester haar glazen muiltje weer terug, plus een prins als bonus. Of het met de ontwikkeling van schaliegas ook zo zal gaan, moeten we afwachten. De lelijke zusters doen er ondertussen alles aan om spaken in het wiel te steken.

Voor mijn eerdere DDS–bijdragen, zie hier.