Academic "experts" agree to a policy of not providing information about EU funded SHEER fracking experiments in Poland and the UK to the public.
Professor Paul Younger is participating in an EU fracking trial known as SHEER (Shale Gas Exploration and Exploitation Induced Risks) and was previously a member of the "expert panel" which "was tasked with reviewing the existing scientific evidence on unconventional hydrocarbon development." for the Scottish Government.
Their report, published in July 2014 concluded
"The Panel found that there are no significant technological impediments to the development of an onshore unconventional hydrocarbon industry in Scotland and furthermore that the technology currently exists to extract such hydrocarbons safely."
The report went on to say
“Successful public engagement is undoubtedly going to be very important if an unconventional oil & gas industry is to be developed in Scotland. A robust regulatory regime would be an important element, if any such developments were to go ahead, in giving people confidence that the risks associated with unconventional oil & gas projects would be effectively managed.”
Professor Paul Younger, at that time, was on the board of an unconventional gas extraction company, Five Quarter, with licenses in Scotland to start burning coal underground to make synthetic gas, a process known as underground coal gasification (UCG).
When he was selected the Scottish Government said nothing of his vested interest, which when it came out he called a "typhoon in a teacup" while denying he was involved in a fracking company but still failing to mention he was on the board of UCG company Five Quarter, and the "expert" panel report, in July 2014, made no mention of the fact three UCG trials in Australia were reported to be causing serious environmental damage, not the only time Professor Younger was party to writing a report without declaring his vested interest.
In April this year the Queensland government announced an immediate ban on UCG, with laws to follow, as the "flagship" trial has just caused, what is said to be, the biggest environmental disaster in Queensland's history
This, despite the fact an independent scientific panel in Queensland claimed in 2012 the UCG trials should continue, with a commercial ban still in place as they thought
"'underground coal gasification could, in principle, be conducted in a manner that is acceptable socially and environmentally safe when compared to a wide range of other existing resource-using activities'. "
Despite the known, ongoing problems in Queensland UCG trials, UCG entrepeneur Professor Younger's company Five Quarter was adamant UCG was safe claiming opponents to UCG were being "alarmist".
Five Quarter went into administration earlier this year, after potential investors walked away - despite the UK government giving these academic experts company a £1billion taxpayer guarantee for investors - as events in Queensland became more widely known that contradicted what these academic "experts" were claiming regarding the safety of UCG.
Since then Glasgow University's Professor Younger has turned his attention to fracking and has been appointed, with other Glasgow University academics, to the collaborate in EU funded fracking experiments, in conjunction with American, English and EU universities, in a EU Horizon 2020 project known as SHEER (Shale Gas Exploration and Exploitation Induced Risks).
SHEER runs from May 2015 to April 2018 to develop monitoring methods for the induced seismicity, air pollution and groundwater contamination fracking is known to cause.
The EU has an "expert" panel on unconventional hydrocarbons too, which environmental consultant, Paul Mobbs, reported in April 2015
"has been almost entirely taken over by the fracking industry"
The EU funded SHEER project is conducting two fracking experiments, one in Poland and the other in the UK.
There is no record of where the UK fracking experiment is to take place but SHEER documents reveal the Poland experiment is now underway.
SHEER published their first "newsletter" in January 2016 stating
""Local communities have a keen interest in the on-going exploration and monitoring activities in the vicinity of their homes and it is vital that they should be kept informed of the operations. A key aspect of the SHEER project is to inform the community about the possible hazards and how these can be assessed and mitigated."
Yet at the first SHEER Advisory Board meeting, on 7th May 2015 in Poland, it was decided the project results are on a need to know basis - and the community affected by the SHEER fracking experiments don't need to know, as the report from the meeting states
"The Board also noted the value of transparency during the operational phases of the project and importance of sharing project data and information with the stakeholders, including the operating companies and local government. SHEER, however, should not communicate directly with the public.
The report goes on to say
"This is the role of government and the companies. This is another reason why the project would benefit from a clear statement of the goals of the communication program to avoid any confusion or missteps in the future. The SHEER project has the potential to make a significant socio-economic and political impact, and it is vital that you communicate in appropriate language and disseminate findings through channels that will reach all stakeholders""
So basically report nothing to the public via SHEER - instead let's wait and see what happens and let government's and fracking companies decide what local communities and the public should be told in case of "missteps" i.e. problems from the SHEER fracking experiments we don't want the public to know?
The January 2016 SHEER newsletter gives details of how the local community was softened up, in the SHEER fracking experiment area, as in June 2015 scientists from the Institute of Geophysics Polish Academy of Sciences (IGF PAS) held an open meeting with local people where they
"explained within the broader context of hazards related to any industrial activities. The community members had a chance to ask the scientists questions, all of which were answered to the best of knowledge based on the scientists expertise and experience".
Did any of these scientists have any expertise or experience in fracking or is it a case of only send in scientists with no experience so they can only answer to the "best of their knowledge"?
This was followed by a picnic in September 2015 with school children also being told their version of fracking potential hazards and how they were going to be monitored with the children doing scientific experiments and being told a "typical day in the life of a scientist" - everyone having fun.
But the SHEER newsletter also reveals their fracking experiment hit serious problems, at the very first stage, just to drill the initial boreholes, proving the SHEER team are not as expert as local people may believe as the experts got the geology and the aquifer predications all wrong, resulting in drilling and water problems, as the newsletter states
"The published geological cross-section for the area is apparently over-simplified as the succession logged during the drilling process is more variable than predicted. Rather than the tidy ‘layer cake’ succession indicated, it appears that the glacial till and sand/gravel units are variable in thickness, composition and lateral continuity.
A number of very thin clay bands were identified, notably in the upper part of GW2 and in the mid- to lower sections of GW1, 3 and 4 which are likely to be discontinuous. A thicker till unit clearly identified in GW1 is not present in GW4 and is also not indicated in the research borehole Otw. 20, which is located between GW1 and 4.
This suggests that this till unit pinches out southwards and that the two sand units in GW1 become a single sand unit further south.
The succession encountered in GW2 was almost the inverse of the expected strata – sand and gravel between 8.5 and 28 m bgl, with a thick till unit below, rather than the expected near surface sand unit, glacial till from 8-30 m and the target aquifer below.
The base of the till unit was not reached, as it continued to 75 m bgl where the borehole terminated. A further complication was caused by the water within GW2 being artesian, reaching 1.2 m above ground level shortly after well installation. As a result, this well has had a pressure cap installed to contain the flow. The target aquifer is either very deep in this borehole, or is not present"
With the newsletter going on to say
"The main conclusions drawn are that the geological succession is much more heterogeneous and complex than interpretations to date would suggest, and that the main sand and gravel units are likely to be at least partially interconnected. Further work on the interpretation is ongoing"
Was this known when they held the picnic and "educated" local children about the hazards or have SHEER and local authorities kept local people in the fracking experiment area completely in the dark?
This of course is just the first phase of the project - they have not even started fracking yet - and the SHEER team have proven they got the interpretations for the geology of the area completely wrong and could not find the expected underground aquifer either.
Was hydrology "expert" Professor Paul Younger, who has already been proven wrong on the safety of UCG, involved in any way with the predications regarding the aquifer?
The second SHEER newsletter, published in May 2016 reveals representatives from the UK Health and Safety Executive and the Environment Agency visited Keele University along with representatives from Glasgow University and RSKW Ltd (UK) to learn about the SHEER project where
"the meeting ended with a lovely lunch and both agencies showing a very keen interest and asking to be kept informed of project developments"
The Polish part of the SHEER project is only at the phase of collecting baseline measurements and installing monitoring equipment with the interpretation of the initial baseline site visits not even finished yet
"So far, site visits have been successfully completed in December 2015, February, March and April 2016. These four sampling rounds will help to define the baseline i.e. the prevailing conditions before fracking. Interpretation of the site visits is ongoing and will be presented in a future newsletter."
with the UK fracking experiment phase of the project not even started yet.
in another SHEER document we discover it is not only induced seismicity, groundwater contamination and air pollution we have to worry about from fracking as the document states
"The severity of each of these hazards depends strongly on the nature and extent of any enhanced permeability if this spreads beyond the bounds expected as part of fracking processes. Under certain circumstances production fracking can interact with pre-existing faults or trigger the formation of larger fractures, located further from the horizontal production well"
Already, despite the attempts to keep us in the dark, it has been proven they don't know how to interpret the geology or how to find the expected water aquifer and have not even started perfecting monitoring methods for each of the major problems fracking is known to cause.
So why then has the Westminster Government authorised fracking to go ahead across England - when none of the "experts" has even figured out how to monitor the known risks and this EU Horizon 2020 funded EU fracking experiments project has not even conducted the UK phase of the project yet?
Especially as Professor Paul Younger stated on 14th December 2015, seven months after the SHEER project started, that he believed fracking and UCG is no longer viable in the UK, after the UK government cancelled the government funded carbon capture projects - he said making pursuing fracking and UCG pointless.
The Ferret report went on to reveal
"Asked if his views on fracking had changed, Professor Younger added: “My view is that the moratorium has killed any prospects for unconventional gas developments of any sort in Scotland for the foreseeable future (i.e a timescale of several years at least, even if the moratorium were lifted tomorrow), and nobody is likely to be planning any serious investment here in that emerging sector.”“The investment (and jobs) will go to England, Poland and other places. So my own views are irrelevant, as the sector has effectively been written off before it even started here.”
But once again Professor Younger keeps the public in the dark as he makes no mention when he made this statement that he was at that time participating in the SHEER Polish/UK fracking trials - why he thinks fracking will go to England and Poland instead?
Nor does he make any mention of the fact in this interview he and fellow academic Dr Rob Westway believe frackers should be allowed to cause earthquakes higher than 0.5 ml, the specified limit, with Westway saying
"“If regulations for other vibration-causing activities were similarly restrictive, you'd have to prevent buses from driving in built-up areas or outlaw slamming wooden doors”.
With the RT report going on to say
"Westaway calls the rules “ridiculous.”
“The present regulation is a deterrent to investment and will need to be changed before energy companies are willing to invest the large sums that will need to be spent to develop shale gas in the UK,” he added.
Professor Younger said the maximum threat from fracking “might be sufficient to cause minor damage on the surface such as cracked plaster,” but suggests a similar compensation system to the ones already in place for RAF fly-bys “would make sense.”
“For example, induced earthquakes of magnitude 3 from fracking activities 1.6 miles below the earth's surface will create surface vibrations similar to the limits allowable from quarry blasting,” he said. Magnitude 3 earthquakes would be 25 times greater than the current limit of 0.5. "
Yet Paul Younger is on the board of a geothermal company, Cluff Geothermal, and is currently busy with high-enthalpy geothermal system developments in East Africa and the British Geological Society states regarding fracking and earthquake hazards
"A magnitude of 0.5 ML is suggested as an appropriate threshold. Such a TRAFFIC LIGHT SYSTEM is based on extensive experience in Enhanced Geothermal Systems (EGS)."
I would say keeping the UK public in the dark regarding this project and events in Poland so far is SHEER fracking deception on the part of the UK government, UK Health and Safety Executive, UK Environment Agency and the academics at Keele and Glasgow universities where one the SHEER team, Paul Younger, was already used to tell us fracking is safe in Scotland.
All this SHEER fracking deception proving all fracking should be banned across the UK as none of them can be trusted when it comes to being honest about the risks fracking and underground coal gasification pose to our health, our environment and our entire economy and the lack of proven monitoring methods for the already authorised fracking operations across England.