Rishi Sunak To Reimpose Fracking Ban
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on The Telegraph.
This is the first paragraph.
The new PM made the commitment during his first session of PMQs on Wednesday, reversing Liz Truss’s controversial decision to overturn it.
I think it is the right call.
Here’s why!
Cerulean Winds Massive Decarbonisation Project
Consider.
- At present ten percent of our gas is used to power the oil and gas rigs in the seas around our coasts. The gas is fed into gas-turbines to generate electricity.
- One simple way to increase gas production by this ten percent, would be to decarbonise the rigs by powering them from nearby wind farms with green electricity and green hydrogen as the Norwegians are proposing to do.
- A British company; Cerulean Winds has proposed under the Crown Estate INTOG program to decarbonise a significant part of the oil and gas rigs, by building four 1.5 GW wind farms amongst the rigs.
- The majority of the energy will be sold to the rig owners and any spare electricity and hydrogen will be brought ashore for industrial and domestic users.
- This massive project will be a privately-funded £30 billion project.
- And when the oil and gas is no longer needed, the UK will get another 6 GW of offshore wind.
We need more of this type of engineering boldness.
This page on the Cerulean Winds web site gives more details.
INTOG
This document on the Crown Estate web site outlines INTOG.
Other Projects
Decarbonisation has also attracted the attention of other developers.
I can see Rishi Sunak being offered several projects, that will increase our oil and gas security, by some of the world’s best engineers and most successful oil companies.
Rishi Sunak’s ban on fracking will only increase the rate of project development.
We live in extremely interesting times.
The Anonymous Widower 
I suspect not quite. More likely it will be left to local authorities.
Once the good citizens of the Fylde peninsula have become cold enough this winter and seen their sky high energy bills they might just change their minds.
Comment by R. Mark Clayton | October 26, 2022 |
I read all the press releases of SSE and National Grid and there doesn’t appear to be too much alarm.
My software was used in the 1970s, to plan water distribution in the UK by the Water Resources Board. Given, that we don’t have large shortages of water in much of the UK, I am of the opinion that the engineers involved in those days did a good job in their placement of reservoirs and long-distance mains. I wasn’t involved by my software solved the differential equations.
I must admit, that water companies have problems, but most seem to be with sewage and leaks, which were outside of the scope of the 1970s study.
I believe that the engineers of the electricity companies have used modelling software to check out scenarios and how to avoid blackouts.
I suspect that the results have not been that bad, otherwise, there would have been a leak of the truth to a newspaper of the left.
As a Graduate Control Engineer, I suspect that we will do the following.
Use the minimum amount of gas we can in power stations and substitute wind.
Store any spare wind electricity in Ulla Forre using the North Sea Link.
Keep Drax and the old nuclear stations running flat out.
Get as much wind power going.
I suspect the engineers have a strategy to make it.
Comment by AnonW | October 26, 2022 |
How much Gas is used to produce ‘electricity’ in power stations et al [I’m sure i read somewhere that it was as much as 45% of UK consumption]? While gas is still a necessity for many households would a similar focus on re-distribution of the gas used for this purpose be sensible, viable, achieveable?
Comment by PJS | October 27, 2022 |
Gas power stations can be throttled, so can adjust to the energy needed. So if you have a gas-fired station like Carrington, which is near the Liverpool Bay wind farms, it could be throttled back to save gas, when the wind farms are on song. Carrington will soon have a co-located battery, from Highview Power, which could be used to boost and smooth the electricity.
I suspect, we’ll see more big batteries on gas-fired power station sites.
Comment by AnonW | October 27, 2022 |
Thanks for the reply AW, you have a great knowledge of this very important topic. T
I do caution folk, that while this drive to renewable energy is very welcome, it does not guarantee cheap energy for households, and it certainly wont be ‘free’ for the end user.
Comment by PJS | October 27, 2022 |
I agree James – fracking needs to be banned because as well as there being other sournces of energy, fracking risks damages the environment becoming land slippage and other issues in the areas being fracked. Your understand of energy is much greater than mine, and probably your knowledge of earth science is too. but I remember when I did the earth science module an my OU course, the tutor mentioned something about the dangers of trying to get oil and gas from under land in or close to habitations.
Comment by nosnikrapzil | October 27, 2022 |