In reply to johang:
> There are two fairly significant points to be made within this discussion, and apologies to DC, this is not directed at him.
> 1. The UK should be moving away from carbon-based electricity generation, as mentioned multiple times previously within this thread. The technologies are out there, and it may be surprising how much electricity is generated by photovoltaics, even on an overcast winter's day. There's also wind generation (which I know is intermittent), and hydro-generation and storage -- hydro can take on many guises, and to limit one's view purely to huge damns would be a little restrictive.
Renewables are a continuing success in the UK but it is impossible for them to be the only solution because they cannot provide electricity at all times, the gap must be filled by other sources. Pump storage is nice but even a scheme the size of Dinorwic can only work on marginal peaks, eg brewing up during the ad break in Coronation Street. Batteries cannot store enough electricity to make a difference, simply due to the laws of physics and chemistry. The cleanest way to fill the gap is gas fired power stations , which emit half the CO2 of coal fired generation for the same electrical output. If you invest in expensive nuclear you may as well leave it on full output all the time as it costs just the same to sit idle (unlike a gas station). In summary RENEWABLE ELECTRICTY GENERTION CAN ONLY WORK WITH THE SUPPORT OF GAS.
We also use gas for all sorts of things, like heating homes with ultra efficient condensing boilers, maybe we should convert all the heating to wood burners? Lots of lorries on the roads, replace the UK's food crops with biomass forests and get all our food from imports?
As the North sea runs out of gas we can import it of course - US fracking (not our problem and who cares if the US regulations and monitoring is far slacker than in the UK?) Tankered in from the middle east oil states, supporting those wonderfully democratic and liberal regimes?
> My step mother has done a lot of work (read - has a PhD in) micro-hydroelectrical generation, which, with the large number of rivers/brooks within this country, seems like a no-brainer. Of course, there will be environmental impacts associated, just to cut the pedants off before they get started, but it brings something to the mix.
Except this has been looked at by many people and does not stand up economically, even with the subsidies available (that make wind power economical)
> It would also be silly to discount tidal generation - we live on a island - but the funding for research toward these technologies has recently been cut. Plus advances within the PV industry and energy storage, blah blah blah.
Again needs gas to fill the gaps
> 2.
http://www.solid-earth-discuss.net/se-2015-134/ gives interesting reading. The main point is that the Bowland Basin has not been geologically surveyed with sufficient detail, and therefore fracking is currently a risky idea. It also states that the earthquake in Lancashire WAS caused by drilling directly through a small, but not insignificant, fault line.
Maybe you should broaden your net when researching to get a more objective view? By Earthquake maybe you mean minor tremor, like the many I experienced in Lancashire before fracking . Maybe you haven't read of the extensive seismic monitoring that will be part of the current fracking proposals?
> Anyway TL;DR - fracking in Lancashire is a bad idea, and should not be happening.
> Oh, and local electricity generation is also a good idea, but I'm not a power engineer so I can't profess any expertise in the subject...
So that would be a lesser impact on local communities than a fracking well?