The UK Energy Research Centre warns that hopes for a shale gas bonanza in the UK may be overoptimistic.
Gas will play an essential short-term role as the UK moves towards a low carbon economy but domestic shale gas production is unlikely to have a much of an impact, a new report has warned.
According to the research, which has been published by the UK Energy Research Centre, gas will be an important “bridging fuel” over the next decade, but its use will have to be curtailed in order to prevent global temperatures rising above 2°C.
The report goes on to claim that whilst shale gas has been widely touted as a solution to domestic security of supply concerns, it’s unlikely that an industry which is still in its infancy will achieve sufficient scale over the next decade, the key time-period where gas could act as a transition fuel.
Instead of banking on shale, UKERC recommends rapidly expanding investment in alternative low-carbon energy sources and investing in more gas storage, which would help protect consumers against short-term supply disruption and price rises. Industry unwillingness to invest in additional storage is symptomatic of the high level of uncertainty surrounding future gas demand in the UK.
The report calls on government to develop a policy of ‘gas by design’ that plans now for the changing role of gas in the UK energy mix; ensuring future UK gas security and a smooth transition to a low-carbon economy.
Extracting shale gas in the UK is a lot more expensive than in the US. The fragmented geological situation just doesn’t lend itself to efficient extraction.
With the oil price currently below $80 a barrel even in the US a lot of the wells are starting to struggle and a recent survey found that nearly half the wells in the US are becoming uneconomic. Enough said.
Most of the cost of fracking is in drilling the well. Once done the price of oil/gas is much less significant. In any case, the US Government will want to retain its home energy resources in order to maintain independence from the Middle East.
Beware: the UK Energy Research Centre is full of dismal, ‘global warming’-type academics, living on large salaries and secure pensions – and not objective on energy matters of any kind
Oil and gas are finite resources which will inevitably rise in price in the future, but OPEC is currently responding to falling US imports (halved since 2005) by cutting their prices. If prices fall much below $80 the main loser will be Russia.
And here I was in the 90s and early 2000s assisting clients to calculate the effect of the possibility of $60 per barrel oil (a previously unheard of price as then it was under $40!) on synthetic fibre manufacture and textiles. A casual glance down the High street and at my fellow citizens confirms that clothes are still being sold and worn in vast quantities. mankind, bless, has always managed to find a way around whatever ails it!