Is fracking the answer?

BRITAIN'S oil, coal and gas stocks are running out fast - and not enough is being done about it.

That is the warning from the Global Sustainability Institute, a body based at Anglia Ruskin University which claims the nation's fossil fuel reserves will last little more than five years.

Shortages will increase dependency on other countries such as on Norway, Qatar and Russia and will mean UK consumers are more vulnerable to rising energy prices, the institute says.

The figures are disputed by other experts who point out that even if they were accurate, the UK has a stable supply of imported energy.

But they also admit that increasing the UK's own energy supplies is a good idea. So what are the options?

The Government has already approved eight new nuclear power stations at sites around the country, including Hartlepool.

Last month, eight major renewable energy projects were also announced by ministers. The schemes include three new biomass plants in the region - Teesside, Selby in North Yorkshire and Ashington in Northumberland.

Further offshore wind farms are proposed for Scotland, Merseyside, Norfolk and the Irish Sea to add to the 20 sites already operational. Around the country numerous other renewable schemes exist, including onshore wind turbines, solar energy farms and hydroelectric plants.

All these add to the energy mix and help the UK meet its EU targets on carbon reduction, however the Government believes vast reserves of shale gas buried beneath areas including Yorkshire and Lancashire are an entirely different prospect. Indeed, some experts claims that gas extracted by controversial fracking could power the nation for the next fifty years.

They point to impressive reports from across the Atlantic which show that US natural gas production has risen 25 per cent in the last five years, driven primarily by shale gas production.

According to one study, shale gas currently accounts for about 37 per cent of total natural gas production in the US - compared with just two per cent in 2000.

Reading these figures it is perhaps understandable why shale gas gets the Government so excited.

In May, a Lords select committee demanded a “streamlining” of regulation to speed up drilling, with one lord suggesting that North Yorkshire leads the way on fracking.

But despite communities being offered compensation of £100,000 per exploration well and one per cent of the profits, fracking is proving extremely contentious with test drilling sparking violent protests elsewhere in the country.

In this region, the anger has so far been saved for thoughtless comments last year by Lord Howell who declared that there was plenty of space for fracking in "desolate" areas of the North-East.

Richard Davies, from Durham University, has examined the environmental consequences of fracking in detail.

He believes that while the fracking process is unlikely to contaminate water supplies, he says there is evidence from the US that a small percentage of wells leak.

Campaigners believe fracking may also cause earthquakes with test drilling near Blackpool though to have caused two tremors in the area.

Prof Davies said there was a risk it could cause small tremors, although the process was less of a risk than other human activities such as mining and waste water disposal.

While environmental concerns could hamper the introduction of fracking for shale gas, other factors may also limit the benefits of the process.

"Each well doesn't produce very much gas and you need a lot of wells," said the professor, who believes this could limit the success of the process in a country like the UK where space is at a premium.

Ultimately, a shortage of suitable sites could hamper the potential of fracking as much public distrust.

So what else is on the energy horizon? Earlier this year, Harry Bradbury, from Newcastle-based firm Five Quarter Energy unveiled a project to harvest green energy from vast coal reserves buried deep under a huge swathe of the North Sea.

From mobile drilling rigs sited along the North-East coast, it would use its breakthrough deep gas winning process to extract valuable gases from coal seams and surrounding shale buried between 250 metres and 2km below the sea, and as far as 10km offshore.

So how much potential does the new technology have?

"There is a minimum of three trillion tonnes of coal sitting under the North Sea," said Dr Bradbury.

"Just three billion tonnes of coal would give us more gas than was extracted from the North Sea since we began - if you take the whole package we have in the North Sea and Irish Sea we have enough reserves for centuries.

"That is why the Government sees our project to have significant strategic importance."

And Dr Bradbury stressed that the deep gas winning process would not just help keep the UK's lights on.

"We say what's the point of keeping the lights on at night if there are no jobs to go to in the day," said Dr Bradbury.

Technologies being utilised and adapted by Five Quarters - including cutting-edge fibre lasers which will be used to heat rocks under the sea to speed up the gas extraction process - will allow much more than just gas for the generation of electricity.

Other uses of the gases extracted from the wells could include clean fuels, materials for use by Teesside's petrochemical industry, products from carbon dioxide and products from hydrogen.

Furthermore, Dr Bradbury insists that the deep gas winning will be environmentally friendly with all the action taking place deep beneath the ocean floor.

If the ground-breaking process is as good as it sounds, it could put the UK's energy mix in a spin.