back to article Britain'll look like rural Albania without fracking – House of Lords report

The UK needs to get a move on and exploit its rich shale gas resources to avoid losing its energy intensive industries, the House of Lords' economics committee has reported. So far only tentative exploratory work to research the quality of the shale formations has taken place in the UK – and commercial exploitation appears to …

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    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Society is only three square meals from anarchy & revolution

      Two tier in the future? Where have you been? GB has got one of the widest wealth gaps in Europe and widening. The future is here.

  1. a_mu

    sad

    Sad the reason we HAVE to go for the fraking is because we have not invested over the decades in new generation capacity, and the only thing that can now be built in time is gas fired turbines !

    30 years ago we were predicting in the 2020's we'd run out of electricity

    now its happened, whats the answer !

    just sad, and what have we learnt from this ?

    dont trust commercial companies to invest in our future only the bottom line for them !

    1. codejunky Silver badge

      Re: sad

      @ a_mu

      Unfortunately it isnt the companies. Wanna build wind/solar/other useless icons? Need to fleece tax payers to afford it. Wanna build nuclear? Nononono the nutters will come out and hump your leg or something just as nasty. Wanna build Coal? Oops Tony Blair scuppered that by agreeing to cripple the country with such false reasoning I am not willing to explain it all.

      Years of sitting on hands and pandering to noisy nutters has left us paying over the odds and producing less.

  2. a_mu

    We all know this , but

    2 years ago http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-19842401

    5 years ago http://www.economist.com/node/14167834

    11 years ago on oil http://www.theinsider.org/news/article.asp?id=0423

  3. Palf

    The sun uses nuclear fusion and puts out 10^26 watts continuously. Just a hint.

    1. ChilliKwok

      @Paif. Yeah - just need to solve the pesky problem of sunset and cloudy days. I'm sure Ed's Davey, Balls & Miliband will come up with a solution: How about a giant new tax on nighttime and clouds. Yeah - That should fix it.

  4. briesmith

    Where Could the Power Come From?

    When the jocks fuck off with their bat and ball there'll be the problem of what to with all the more than slightly warm nuclear hulks slowly bobbing up and down in the waters of the Clyde.

    Can't leave them there, the Scots will probably start worshipping them or something; we'll have to repatriate them.

    So I suggest a bidding process where coastal towns in England, Wales and Northern Ireland have to say in no more than 500 words why their town should get one to plug into their local grid.

    And Caroline bloody Lucas can't enter.

  5. Brian Allan 1

    "In the UK, however, the media has rarely mentioned this, focussing instead on small anti-fracking protests – particularly favoured by BBC news editors."

    Ignore the environmental fringe! Done right, fracking is no more dangerous/damaging than any other aspect of oil & gas development!

  6. Wanting more

    But...

    Linux is still better than Microsoft Windows...

    Bravo on the quality of comments on this article!

  7. MrBilious

    I always thought that fracked gas and offshore wind were a great energy mix. Wind would offset and slow down our usage of fracked gas making supplies last decades, if not longer, also you can turn a gas powered station up and down in minutes accounting for variations in wind speed. Just wish they'd hurry up with the gas. I'm sure we'll be able to wring out more energy from our environment as time goes by too, from tidal, biomass, solar etc. Seems like it would all work quite well to me and im no greenie.

    1. John Smith 19 Gold badge

      "..and offshore wind were a great energy mix. "

      That would be the offshore wind that is designed to run hopefully for 30% of the time?

  8. Zot

    If only our cities could turn some bloody lights off at night!

    Not to mention all those people that come home and turn on every light in the house, and kids walking out of rooms leaving everything switched on. *grrrr* :)

    Anyway, there are reports from America that the gas is unprofitable, but they keep pumping until the end of their leases.

    Also, the purposefully created independent companies declare bankruptcy and leave whole rigs in the ground to be cleaned up by the tax payers. Of course the legislation in Britain will prevent that from happening, won't it?...

  9. John Smith 19 Gold badge
    Unhappy

    The UK has some *major* resources

    It's just the problem is f**king huge.

    56-60GW total.

    >= 20% of it from nuclear stations due to be retired.

    1GW in micro hydro. Potentially 1/2MW per hole (dry or not) in the North Sea. Maybe 50% of all UK gas demands perhaps met by anaerobic digestion. Fracking and (in a pinch) 200 years of coal.

    And the EDF truly horrible PWR technology as well.

    But it's all a bit complex isn't it. Not got the touchy feely nature that "Call-me-Dave" so loves to look wistfully at on posters (I wonder are people ever ceased with an irrational desire to just punch him in the face?)

    Guess what will be chosen?

  10. All names Taken
    Paris Hilton

    Bottom line dudes

    The answers are always best assessed by looking at the bottom line.

    What kind of profit level is being returned on what kind of turnover level?

    Is it good? If so buy shares, if not why not?

    Rip off Britain mate?

    In the US by the people, for the people does mean something however enfeebled and entrenched in US present embracement of Fascism?

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Monster hands

    Back in the last UK serious blackouts (70's) my sister and I dropped wax from the candles on to our hands to build up monstrous looking claws, not sure I'll do that this time but as a social experiment I think it would be fascinating to see how some of the youf deal with it.

    It's hard to truly value something until it has been gone for, I don't know, twenty minutes...

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