25th January – Christchurch City Council requests a moratorium on fracking

19th February – Anti-fracking pressure grows as Kaikoura District Council calls for a moratorium on fracking

20th February – Selwyn District Council decides to request fracking moratorium

23rd February – Heatley criticises the ‘misinformation’ being put out about fracking and praises the integrity of reports from Taranaki Regional Council

24th February – An extraordinarily biased and ill-thought out opinion piece from the Taranaki Daily News

27th February – Heatley rejects CCC call for moratorium on fracking

29th February – Heatley answers question re fracking moratorium in parliament (video)

3rd March – Opinion piece by Mike Yardley on CCC request for fracking moratorium

But in Bulgaria they’re a bit bolder.  The government has recently declared that US company Chevron cannot use fracking when exploring for shale gas.  There’s been a lot of public protest in Bulgaria over the last few weeks.  So perhaps sometimes governments do listen to the concerns of their citizens.  Good on the Bulgarians. 

Here’s a quick round up of other countries and regions that currently have moratoriums or bans on fracking.

France

Quebec

Donegal and Sligo (Ireland)

Karoo (South Africa)

New Jersey (USA)

Wherever they’re coming from, it’s exhausting and unsettling for us here in Canterbury.  And it serves to remind us of one thing, despite all the studies, we really don’t know that much about what’s happening beneath our feet. 

So it just amazes me that anyone could even contemplate fracking in Canterbury when there are so many unanswered questions about the practice and its connection with earthquakes.  Or “seismic activity” as the frackers prefer to call it. 

We already saw, earlier this year, that fracking caused two small tremors in an area of the UK where quakes are unheard of.  So the obvious question seems to be – what effects might it have in a seismically active area? 

Personally, I think the answer is that nobody really knows at the moment.  But let me leave you with a quote from an expert,  US geophysicist Michael Hasting.  Hasting works in the gas industry in the US and is in his own words someone who believes in fracking.  However, here’s an extract from the Water for Gas evening that was held at Canterbury University earlier this year:

Is it possible for fracking to cause larger earthquakes?

Michael Hasting: In my opinion yes it is.  If you’re injecting high pressure fluids into a fault or near a fault that’s active or near failure or stressed to a point where it’s near to go,  those fluids can lubricate the fault and cause it to slip.  There are many examples of this around the world.

So would it be okay for fracking to go ahead in Canterbury without first checking the earthquake safety of the region?

No, you shouldn’t do it.  It would be absolutely irresponsible to go out in an area like Canterbury which is a known area of tectonic fractures and start injecting fluids without understanding the reservoir, the system and where you’re injecting these fluids.  So you want to determine where these faults are and how close they are to failure before anything else is done

You can’t 100% guarantee that you won’t induce a large scale event in a tectonically active area like New Zealand.

All this doesn’t happen for free.  We’re happy to donate our time and group members have dug into their pockets to cover expenses.  But we want to do more, so we’re also asking for donations to help us pay for printing of information flyers. If you can give a couple of dollars to help raise awareness of fracking, please make donations to:

Account Name: Say No To Fracking -

Kiwi Bank – Account Number: 38 9012 0282042 00

If you’d like to sign the petition you can now find it in places all over Canterbury from Rangiora to Cust, Lyttleton to Rolleston.  There are also petitions available for signing at several locations in central Christchurch.  A big thank you to the business owners for letting the petitions take up counter space. 

So find out where you can sign the petition by clicking here. 

It was a really interesting evening and good to hear from some experts on the issue.  Check it out.

The evening kicked off with a short video presentation followed by the politician’s stating their parties’ line on fracking.  Eugenie Sage (Green) said that the Greens wanted a moratorium on fracking until their had been a full assessment of the environmental risks.  Brendon Burns (Labour) said that Labour also supported the call for an urgent indepent enquiry via the Parliamentary Commissioner or the EPA.  The representative reading out National’s pre-written responses from Nick Smith said  National feel fracking is ‘appropriately regulated in New Zealand’ and see no reason for a ban or moratorium of any kind. 

For me the really interesing bit was hearing from the experts.  Paul Siratovich, a geologist with experience in the energy industry and fracking in the US, was particularly candid.  Asked if there was any chance of aquifers being effected by fracking he said ‘it is possible, lots of things can go wrong during drilling…but with very rigurous engineering and due diligence it’s very likely you can protect them’. 

We also heard from a hydrologist who said that the ground water system in Canterbury is very dynamic and we’re talking about vast volumes of water.  Because of this he said any contaminants that did make their way into the water would disperse quickly – ‘like smoke from a smoke-stack’ was his analogy.  He was he said ‘pretty relaxed’ about fracking.

Next up was a recorded interview with Michael Hasting, a geophysicist who works in the energy industry studying the seismic effect of fracking operations.  He said that in his experience there is no doubt that fracking does cause earthquakes but stressed these are generally extremely small.  He went on to say however, that it can also trigger larger quakes – the fluid used in the frack process can lubricate existing faults causing them to slip.  It would be ‘irresponsible’ he said to frack in a seismically active area like Canterbury, without first having done a very thorough study of the geology and existing fault lines. 

If hearing from experts was the high point of the evening. Hearing Nick Smith’s pre-written answers was the low point.  A dirge like repetition of the fracking is ‘appropriately regulated in New Zealand’ line seemed to be the standard response to just about every question.  By the third time this line was trotted out it was greeted with laughter by the audience.  Why didn’t National send a live person who could get involved in the debate?  Sending in pre-written answers that can’t be challenged is a cop-out of the first degree. 

But overall a great evening.

If you want to hear the pros and cons of the fracking debate head along to ‘Water for Gas’.  This is a great Q and A event at Canterbury University.  They’ve got Brendon Burns from Labour, Eugenie Sage from Green and a representative reading some pre-written answers sent on behalf of Nick Smith from National.  There will also be a couple of fracking experts to answer questions.

It sounds like it’s going to be a hugely informative and interesting evening.  Don’t miss it.

Monday 21st November: 7pm to 8.30pm at the C1 Lecture Theatre at Canterbury University.