But in a written statement to MPs on Thursday, Mr Rees-Mogg suggested that the risk of further earthquakes was worth taking, and that more data could be collected when drilling resumes. “While HM Government will always try to limit disturbance to those living and working near to sites, tolerating a higher degree of risk and disturbance appears to us to be in the national interest given the circumstances described above,” he said.
All of life is a series of trade offs. Given that the external circumstances have changed, so perhaps has the optimal trade off.
Limit for geothermal / mining = R 2.
Limit for fracking = R 0.5
Can someone please explain how a magnitude 2 earthquake is acceptable when it’s caused by geothermal or normal mining, but 0.5 is incredibly dangerous and to be avoided at all costs when it’s caused by fracking.
Over 2 million wells fracked in the US with no significant deleterious effects………..
Seismic events would be more accurate than earthquakes. A lot of the seismic events associated with fracking are only detectable by a seismograph, many others are akin to the vibrations from a passing truck. Very rarely do they cause any damage.
“Given that the external circumstances have changed, so perhaps has the optimal trade off.”
Possibly. But the optimal trade off was always so obviously in favour of fracking that the morons who couldn’t already see that won’t be swayed by that argument. The general public think fracking is dangerous and the screechers are still going to screech that the frackers are evil.
Having JRM as your cheerleader isn’t going to be a strong counter to such screechers.
Good move by Truss…
Now she has to make sure the first batch of EcoProtestors that turn up get a damn good shoeing, pour encourager les autres…
The Pedant – General
Begin cutting off the power to XR/ IB/JSO protestors and start freezing their bank accounts as well.
No more kid gloves with these extreme leftists.
Unicorn fart farms have more openings for chief diversity officers, that is why they want more unicorn fart farms than fracking.
Van_Patten,
It’d be great if we could confine the coming energy crisis here in the glorious Fourth Reich to everyone who voted for any of the last 18 years’ governments. Cut them off first. Actions have consequences.
BITFR
I’m certainly coming to the conclusion that we need an end to the secret ballot. That will enable the implementation of a ‘Socialist’ tax to be levied on anyone voting for the ‘Conservatives’, Labour, Libdems, Green, SNP or Plaid (and various other fringe nutjobs which are basically pro North Korean)
And 0.5 is so incredibly dangerous yet they still allow buses to drive past my house.
It’d be great if we could confine the coming energy crisis here in the glorious Fourth Reich to everyone who voted for any of the last 18 years’ governments.
But wishes aren’t horses, they’re unicorns. There is a political opportunity to state the truth and blame the crisis on the Greens, and every time they try to deflect blame onto Putin, point out that it was Putin backing the Greenery. But it’s going to take real political persuasion work, not ranting in comments sections.
The way to move a mass of people away from the course they’re on is not to tell them they’re a bunch of stupid twats who deserve their misery, it’s to tell them they’ve been lied to by a conspiracy that needs punishing – and that another course leads to warm homes and sunlit uplands.
You’re not in the Fourth Reich, you’re in the second Weimar.
But, but, fracking makes flames come out of your water tap. I’ve seen it on the interwebs, so it must be true.
[Parody of course, but what proportion of the population actually believe it?]
PJF,
What we need is good evidence, widely publicised, that Putin and Xi are funding and directing a lot of the green and sexually deviant bullcrap across the west.
I don’t doubt they are. Is anyone brave enough to try and prove it?
There’s the former Danish prime minister and secretary-general of NATO, as reported in the grauniad via Guido: https://order-order.com/2022/09/22/fact-check-rees-mogg-right-to-say-putin-backed-anti-fracking-campaigns/
I never follow a grauniad link, so I’ve no idea if he gives any details or references any evidence.
BitFR, I’ve always inclined to the opinion that the Arab oil states are also staunch opponents of fracking. And no doubt coal and nukes. In the West that is.
And of course when you look at the advantage renewables give to the gas industry as backup power, one inevitably suspects that they also support green attacks on coal and nukes. The self-interest is obvious.
But I’m naturally paranoid. Though even paranoids have enemies, as we always say.
Big oil / the Seven Sisters sponsored a lot of the antinuclear nonsense in the 60’s and 70’s. It would surprise me not at all that the nuclear industry – somewhat at risk from earthquakes, as we saw in Japan – wants to divert attention to the risk of earthquakes in hydraulic fracturing and pays real money to hype the risk from fracking.
“The move means that fracking can resume in areas where extraction companies can secure planning and environmental permission.”
Thus it won’t happen, it’s words
Truss must give an EUA that bypasses planning etc – licence given: start drilling
it is fine to talk about risk, as long as you talk about risk. The greenies will moan about earthquakes, but the risk is actually small, and the risk is of minor tremors so small as to be unnoticeable. So a small risk of something no one will notice!