Fracking will give us energy security

Sir, – Imagine you are shivering in your cold home when you discover there is treasure buried in your garden and it’s all yours. You are overjoyed, at least until you discover bureaucrats won’t let you dig it up.

Well that is pretty much the position Britain finds itself in, with the Oil and Gas Authority ordering Cuadrilla to permanently seal the two test wells it has drilled into Bowland shale gas formation under northern England.

According to the British Geological Survey there are 37.6 trillion cubic metres of gas in this rock formation.

Just 10% of that gas would meet Britain’s gas needs for 50 years.

And the decision to forego the opportunity for cheap, plentiful, secure gas supplies wasn’t taken by the cabinet or debated in parliament, but in secret by faceless bureaucrats obsessed by the future warming of the planet and utterly indifferent to rising heating bills and soaring fuel poverty now.

Instead we will have to import this gas. More carbon dioxide will be produced shipping fracked gas to us from abroad.

Vladimir Putin’s ability to blackmail the West to ignore his warmongering and human rights abuses will be strengthened.

Our economy will be permanently weaker as we have to pay for all that foreign gas instead of using our own.

It is vital the UK Government overturns this lunatic decision by the Oil and Gas Authority. Otto Inglis. Ansonhill, Crossgates.