The Gas Is Greener

Britain’s shale gas can provide energy security and jobs, and it’s cheaper than offshore wind.

 

In late June, the British Geological Survey announced the world’s largest shale-gas field. The Bowland Shale, which lies beneath Lancashire and Yorkshire, contains 50 percent more gas than the combined reserves of two of the largest fields in the United States, the Barnett Shale and the Marcellus Shale.

The United Kingdom has been reluctant to join the fracking revolution. Yet tapping the Bowland Shale could reignite the U.K. economy and deliver huge cuts in CO₂ emissions.

At the same time, Parliament has approved stringent new measures to reduce carbon emissions by 2020, with the biggest CO₂ cuts by far to come from an increase of more than 800 percent in offshore wind power over the next seven years. But offshore wind power is so expensive that it will receive at least three times the traded cost of regular electricity in subsidies—more than even solar power, which was never at an advantage in the U.K. For minimal CO₂ reduction, the U.K. economy will pay dearly.

READ MORE:  http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/project_syndicate/2013/07/fracking_britain_should_tap_its_shale_gas_field.html