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An Irish shale gas entrepreneur is planning
a venture to frack offshore in the UK, the BBC has reported. If
successful, it would be a global first.
Dr Chris Cornelius of Nebula Resources
believes there are large volumes of offshore shale gas that could be
extracted. The company has three licenses in the Irish Sea and hopes to
begin exploration in the near future.
Cornelius' new firm Nebula Resources was
awarded three licences in the Irish Sea last month by the Department for
Energy and Climate Change and hopes to begin exploration soon.
The area covered by the Nebula licenses
stretches west from Blackpool into Morecambe Bay, and is not far from
the site where Cornelius’ former company Cuadrilla could drill and
fracture two new onshore gas wells.
Based on existing geological data,
Cornelius the offshore area could contain up to 250 trillion cubic feet,
more than Cuadrilla's estimates for its onshore resources.
Fracking has been done offshore on
conventional reserves, but at the scale needed to extract the offshore
shale gas that Cornelius anticipates.
According to the British Geological
Society, the north of England has 1300 trillion cubic feet of shale gas.
This is twice as high as a recent estimate from the US's Energy
Information Administration for the whole country and doesn’t include
offshore shale gas resources which the society suggests may be larger.
David Cameron, the UK prime minister,
recently announced that the government was going "all out" for shale
gas, but the decision is controversial, with other cabinet members
believing it would be at least 10 years before the country saw benefits.
Post to be found at:
http://www.maritime-executive.com/article/World-First-Offshore-Shale-Gas-Project-Planned-2014-02-13/
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