The first problem is there simply isn’t enough gas. For fracking to become a large-scale viable *business in the UK, a very large geological resource of shale gas is essential. The enthusiasm for shale gas trials in the UK between 2011 and 2019 was founded on government-commissioned reports from the British Geological Survey (BGS), which predicted that many tens of years worth of gas supply may exist beneath central and northern England, south-east England and central Scotland.*
*But such reports are explicitly speculative, and always calculate the maximum possible resource. Usually, after more detailed work, the commercially viable reserves are no more than 10% of the original estimate.*
This has already been shown to be the case. The fact [reports like this](https://www.lse.ac.uk/granthaminstitute/explainers/what-potential-reserves-of-shale-gas-are-there-in-the-uk/) aren’t *immediately* brought to attention when we discuss fracking in the UK is crazy. Estimates are already reduced down to a fraction of what they were when the issue was first mooted in 2013/14 yet we keep acting as though there is some major untapped reserve right below our feet.
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Alternatives 9 times cheaper and quicker.
The first problem is there simply isn’t enough gas. For fracking to become a large-scale viable *business in the UK, a very large geological resource of shale gas is essential. The enthusiasm for shale gas trials in the UK between 2011 and 2019 was founded on government-commissioned reports from the British Geological Survey (BGS), which predicted that many tens of years worth of gas supply may exist beneath central and northern England, south-east England and central Scotland.*
*But such reports are explicitly speculative, and always calculate the maximum possible resource. Usually, after more detailed work, the commercially viable reserves are no more than 10% of the original estimate.*
This has already been shown to be the case. The fact [reports like this](https://www.lse.ac.uk/granthaminstitute/explainers/what-potential-reserves-of-shale-gas-are-there-in-the-uk/) aren’t *immediately* brought to attention when we discuss fracking in the UK is crazy. Estimates are already reduced down to a fraction of what they were when the issue was first mooted in 2013/14 yet we keep acting as though there is some major untapped reserve right below our feet.