First shale gas flows in Britain since 2011

london — Energy company Cuadrilla said on Friday it has extracted shale gas in Britain for the first time since resuming fracking operations it halted in 2011 over environmental concerns.

The 11-year-old British private firm has borne the brunt of protests for trying to test whether fracking — a process in which water and chemicals are used to blast apart rock formations — can unlock natural gas deposits in Britain. The method has transformed the global energy market but is developing slowly in Europe.

“The volumes of gas returning to surface at this stage are small,” Cuadrilla chief executive Francis Egan said of the fracking site in northwestern England.

“However it provides early encouragement that the Bowland Shale can provide a significant source of natural gas to heat Lancashire and UK homes and offices and reduce our ever growing reliance on expensive foreign imports,” he said in a statement.

The British Geological Survey estimates that the site Cuadrilla is exploring holds up to 2,300 trillion cubic feet (90 trillion cubic metres) of shale gas.

The amount could theoretically fill Britain’s natural gas needs for more than a thousand years.

Cuadrilla is trying to find out how much of that potential reserve can be reached and produced at commercially viable levels.

Government data show natural gas being used to meet about 40 per cent of Britain’s power and nearly 90 per cent of its heating needs.

The Bowland Shale can provide a significant source of natural gas to heat Lancashire and UK homes offices

Francis Egan, CEO, Cuadrilla