UK shale gas reserves ‘five times less than thought’ study suggests

THE potential to extract shale gas from UK fracking might be significantly lower than thought, a study suggested.

Previous estimates from 2013 for the size of the resource in the Bowland shale in northern England, which used data from shale in the US, found it could potentially provide up to 50 years of current gas demand.

However, new estimates based on lab analysis of UK shale rock by the University of Nottingham and the British Geological Survey (BGS) suggest there may be less than 10 years.

Fracking for shale gas, in which liquid is pumped at high pressure deep underground to fracture the rock and release gas, has proved controversial as attempts have been made to get the industry running in the UK.

Backers, including the Government, claim exploiting the fossil fuel could reduce reliance on imports, secure supplies, help cut carbon emissions and create jobs. But opponents of the process say it can cause earthquakes, damage the countryside and keep the UK hooked on fossil fuels instead of focusing on renewables to help tackle climate change.

The latest study used a high-pressure water technique that simulates oil and gas generation in deep reservoirs and applied it to shale to evaluate in the lab how much gas could be extracted.

It analysed shale rock from two locations, and extrapolated the findings to the whole of the Bowland shale to conclude that the maximum gas there was equated to “potentially economically recoverable reserves of less than 10 years of current UK gas consumption”.

Prof Colin Snape, report co-author, said: “We have made great strides in developing a laboratory test procedure to determine shale gas potential.

“This can only serve to improve people’s understanding and government decisions around the future of what contribution shale gas can make to the UK energy’s demand as we move to being carbon neutral by 2050.” Another author of the study, Christopher Vane of the BGS, said the research “transforms our view of UK shale gas reserves” by showing that “shales within the Bowland Formation could potentially contain less recoverable gas than previously thought”.

But Prof Mike Stephenson, a BGS scientist who was not involved in the study, cautioned that the data used only a small number of rock samples from two locations. The BGS also said that shale gas reserves would vary across the area.

The study’s findings were dismissed by energy firm Cuadrilla, which resumed fracking at the UK’S only operating shale exploration site in Preston New Road, Lancashire, last week.

Francis Egan, Cuadrilla chief executive, said the firm was “getting on with determining the capacity of UK shale reserves by the only means possible which is to drill, hydraulically fracture and test the flow rate of gas from realworld wells drilled into the shale rock... our early results are very encouraging.”