MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 31st October, 2018) Francis Egan, chief executive of UK-based Cuadrilla company, engaged in exploring and developing shale gas in the country, called on the UK government on Wednesday to ease the operating rules that made Cuadrilla suspend its work several times after its activities triggered seismic activity at a fracking site in the north of England.
In mid-October, Cuadrilla resumed fracking at its Preston New Road site in Lancashire after having suspended it for seven years in 2011. Since then, it had to suspend its fracking operations there three times due to detection of seismic activity in the area. While 31 tremors were registered, the magnitude of three of them ranged from 0.4 to 1.1 on the Richter magnitude scale. The decisions to halt fracking activities were in compliance with the requirements of the UK Oil and Gas Authority that forces companies to stop fracking in case of any seismic activity above 0.5 on the Richter magnitude scale, while seismic activity below 0.5 requires them to proceed with caution.
"It certainly looks like it would be � I can't say impossible � but I could say very difficult to make this a commercial venture if you had to continue operating within a 0.5 red line ... We're at the point now where we're saying you've drawn the noose so tight we're just about to choke ... If you want to get a proper test of the shale industry and shale's potential you need to relook at this," Egan said, as quoted by the Financial Times newspaper.
He called on the government to allow Cuadrilla maintain its operations amid tremors reaching up to 2.0 on the Richter scale, specifying that in a number of countries, including Canada and the United States, fracking activity was allowed amid seismic activity with a magnitude even higher that 2.0 on the Richter scale.
According to Egan, the current regulations do not let Cuadrilla follow the technical plans signed by its business department.
"If we want to do this in the current operating window, this needs to be decided in weeks," he said.
Egan added that a change in the regulations would help fracking become UK major industry amid its reliance on gas imports, qualifying the rules as some of the "most frustrating" "hurdles" that the fracking industry had ever faced.
UK Energy Minister Claire Perry said earlier in October that she was not considering easing the existing rules, while the UK government's Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy confirmed on Tuesday that this position remained unchanged.
