What the frack?
FOR years, the village of Doonbeg in Clare was the epicentre of a fractious environmental stand-off.
This saw the promoters of a Greg Norman-designed luxury golf complex clash with campaigners fighting to retain the area’s natural heritage.
The protracted dispute eventually boiled down to a deal to ensure access to a gloriously unspoiled beach and a designated sanctuary for protected 1.8mm snails.
If people thought that spat was unseemly they should keep an eye on the secrets which may be held in the logs of a long-abandoned wildcat exploration well a few miles from the sand dunes.
Analysis and tests of these records and follow-up sampling will, over the next 11 months, decide whether private investors would be willing to fund further digs for buried natural gas supplies.
The penultimate stage of this drive would see them blast water deep into the rock bed in a bid a dislodge pockets of fuel. In other parts of the world this extraction method has opened up series of seams that can pump gas for 20 years.
Both during the exploration stage and in the years that follow, isolated communities in the northern states of America and Canada have begun to benefit from a burgeoning bonanza as a result of similar drills.
But in some areas the effort to dislodge the pools of fuels have prompted reports of earthquakes, polluted drinking water supplies and damaged foundations.
The controversial technique at the heart of the gas hunt is called hydraulic fracturing. But around the world the battles that surround it have seen it branded “fracking”.
At present the fracking prospectors in Ireland are restricted to exploring samples no deeper than 200 metres below the surface.
This is well short of the 1,000 to 6,000 metre space where companies would expect to find the so- called shale gas. Instead they must return to the logs and tests taken 50 years ago.
These originated at the dawn of Ireland’s hopes of striking rich with fossil fuels when Ambassador Irish Oil, later called Marathon, drilled unsuccessfully for reserves in Cork, Clare, Meath and Cavan.
At present two of those areas are the subject of fracking studies to assess their potential. In addition, the area around a former well in Meelin, Cork, anchors the southern border of a so-far unlicensed potential exploration zone spanning north Kerry, west Limerick and north Cork.
Up to now the entire assessment exercise has been focused on areas in Leitrim, Roscommon and west Clare but only in the north- west has there been evidence of a popular public campaign to highlight the environmental dangers.
The current stage of exploration began with the granting of licences to three companies earlier this year.
They have been given permission to carry out what the Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources has classed as a “desktop” enquiry. It is envisaged that this would involve the samples gleaned in the early 1960s to investigate if the general geological patterns are typical of those which have yielded natural gas discoveries on the other side of the Atlantic.
Around Doonbeg this limited exercise, by a company called Enegi Oil, is the vanguard of an assessment project designed to guess if there are sufficient pockets of natural gas tucked below the west Clare peninsula to justify a larger scale exploration drive.
If this initial exercise in Doonbeg strikes on the same geological patterns which Enegi Oil has successfully identified on the opposite side of the ancient fault line in Canada, then the problems and the potential will really begin to take shape.
It all means that if gas prospects are identified by early 2013 the word “fracking” is likely to become every bit as contentious as famous standoffs involving Rossport, the Hill of Tara or Carrickmines. Based on experiences elsewhere, the long-settled golf club row will seem like a school-yard squabble compared with the war that is likely to kick off.
Despite the history of environmental difficulties in west Clare, which has also seen arguments over a planned explosives plant and the future of the Moneypoint power station, fracking has largely remained a non-issue.
Similarly, it has all-but failed to register in the three other Munster counties which have been designated for future fracking options.
It was only in late autumn that the local campaign in Clare really began to surface with published letters to the editors of both the Clare Champion and Clare People.
Among the leading activists is Susan Griffin, who came home from the south of France where consternation about the environmental impacts and the huge volumes of water required to blast the earth prompted the government there to intervene and ban exploration for the time being.
She said on her return to her native Ballyea in Clare this summer she was surprised that there was virtually no public awareness. “There was no knowledge of it generally and nobody really knew about it.”
She said at the moment the fledgling movement is a protest about a potential problem rather than an active one, because the scoping exercise is preliminary to a future application for a full exploration licence.
However Ms Griffin said the concern of herself and fellow campaigners in Clare, in Fracking Concerned, is that Enegi Oil will progress to the next stage and public knowledge will be too rudimentary to develop a proper counter-argument.
“There has been no public consultation and that is where we are at the moment,” she said.
The group fears the company will apply to step up its exploration effort with a public notice to begin consultation but a four-week window for people to register concerns would be too short to inform and activate a response.
In Kilkee the group has already organised a viewing of the American movie, Gasland, which documented the environmental issues raised by fracking. Throughout January similar events will take place in Kilrush, Lissycasey and Ennis.
The big issue with fracking is not what it discovers but the disruption it causes in order to make that discovery.
Unlike traditional drilling it is not designed to siphon off oil or gas from sealed underground reservoirs.
Instead, prospectors seek to shake up large areas of rock to dislodge many small pockets of gas. An enormous volume of water will have to be shipped to the rigs within a six-week period. This will be mixed with sand and a small amount of chemicals and it will be blasted into the well which has been dug one kilometre deep and then turns to stretch up to three kilometres horizontally under and away from the rig.
During that blasting period, the volumes of water will pile pressure on the buried rocks and rupture gas pockets sealed through millennia of seismic settlement.
Then the fluids will be sucked back out. The sand will remain, in order to keep the newly-ruptured pockets open.
When all the water is extracted the ideal outcome will see the so-called unconventional, or shale, gas seep into the pipes and provide fuel for at least 20 years.
Doonbeg and the parishes from right around the Gaelic football heartland of county Clare are the first of three areas in the country to be the subject of assessment.
According to Enegi Oil’s investors information this is because of the “suite” of data available from Ambassador’s 11-month drill in 1962 and the fact it shares many of the geological features as the company’s other exploration well in Canada.
For this reason the company is optimistic:
“Analysis of the Doonbeg well logs indicates an abundance of organic carbon in the Clare Shale from a depth of 792m to 1052m. The analysis also indicates the presence of an organic-rich potential hot shale interval of approximately 150m in thickness. “Characteristics observed in the well logs.... are almost identical to those observed from known producing gas shale wells,” it said.
Enegi Oil has until early 2013 to review all the academic material and carry out its surface level studies to decide if there is enough underground potential to apply to begin fracking.
However in an investors’ statement at the beginning of December it said it was moving onto phase two of its work with laboratory testing and site visits to examine patches of rock in the north of the area.
This will take place by the end of this month before moving to areas flanking the Shannon estuary.
Company chief executive Alan Minty said prospects were good to have a positive options report with the department by December of 2012.
“Whilst this is still a very early stage, we believe that the Clare Basin area has great potential and are looking forward to seeing the results from our work programme, which we hope will confirm this,” Mr Minty told investors.
Unlike Clare, where the awareness campaign is at the embryonic stage, public demonstrations and meetings have already taken off in the north west.
Here, two companies, the Lough Allen Natural Gas Company (Langco) and Australian-based Tamboran Resources, have been granted restricted exploration licenses and are performing feasibility studies to determine the viability of fracking in the region.
And, because the geological conditions span both sides of the border the arguments are even more vocal in the North’s jurisdiction.
In the South, protesters have brought banners and placards to the door of Leinster House and public representatives have begun to take notice.
Already the members of Roscommon County Council have voted to register its disapproval of fracking. This requested the Natural Resources Minister Pat Rabbitte to follow the lead of other jurisdictions and ban fracking before it begins. Clare County Council will also debate the issue and Green Party councillor Brian Meaney believes the economics of the ultimate extraction will lead the prospectors to the same view as those who looked for oil and gas in the 1960s, that it is too costly to drill for the quantities available, particularly if companies have to factor in the impact on agriculture, tourism and particularly the environment.
“If the true environmental impact of gas extraction from shale rock, throughout fracking, is costed into the final price to consumer then it would never be economical to proceed,” he said.
For all the controversy around the world, the possibility of fracking rupturing gas pockets under the Irish countryside has barely registered.
In a Freedom of Information request from the Irish Examiner the Department of Communications, Energy and Natural Resources was asked to release documents on how this issue was discussed either before or after the decision was made to grant options to the three exploration companies.
The department said there was “no internal correspondence or minutes of meetings for or by officials/ministers which discussed or dealt with potential dangers from hydraulic fracturing”.
Similarly there was no record of any briefing material prepared for ministers or the secretary general of the department on the impact or potential of hydraulic fracturing. And there were no records of any briefings given to the minister or senior staff on the benefits or potential benefits of the technique.
There was a mention of the process in a briefing note prepared for Minister Pat Rabbitte ahead of his appearance on Primetime on July 28 to discuss the issues around the Corrib Gas pipeline and exploration.
This informed Mr Rabbitte that it had been the subject of some controversy internationally surrounding environmental concerns and the volumes of water required to rupture the rock.
The short document referred to France’s decision to ban the activity and New York State’s vote to lift a moratorium on it.
It also referenced Britain’s Committee on Energy and Climate Change, which was published in May and felt that hydraulic fracturing posed no risk to underground water reserves.
The minister has since asked the Environmental Protection Agency to assess the issues.
However, the lack of formal or documented consideration of either the promise or danger of fracking prior to the options being licensed suggests this country is once again prepared to follow the lead of other countries without studying what is right for Ireland.
Meanwhile, the public has been keeping the minister and the department aware of local concerns. Letters have been received which express fears for the unspoilt nature of the Irish landscape if the department allowed fracking to move to the next stage.
In response, the department has prepared a standard letter from the minister to concerned parties which lays out the current position as far as Ireland is concerned.
This says: The options granted to the three exploration companies in the Republic do not allow drilling.
Before future drilling is allowed, companies would have to complete a licensing process with the department.
The initial exploration work should be completed by February 2013.
Any drilling licence, no matter how intrusive, would have to be subject to an Environmental Impact Assessment, which would involve local groups.
If gas is found it would have to be extracted under a strict regulatory framework involving An Bord Pleanála and the Environmental Protection Agency.
Despite the relative ambivalence to fracking so far, there is concern in the exploration industry about Ireland’s track record in dealing with rig operations.
This has stemmed from the attention generated by the Rossport Port protest and the expense Shell had taken on in order to secure its building sites.
Elizabeth Muldowney is the principal consultant at KFV and founder of the Irish Trust National Energy Forum.
At a recent shale gas environmental summit in London she said that a lot of Ireland’s problems are due to the fact that the various interest groups do not talk about issues until they have reached a point of no return and positions are already entrenched. And given the experience of the Corrib standoff, the chances of fracking ever taking place in Ireland are bleak unless all the disparate groups begin to air their problems.
“The business sector has never sat down with the environmental sector for example. And the communities have never sat down with regulators.
“In answer to this, we have established the National Energy Forum in an attempt to make sure that people will sit down around the table and engage in dialogue,” she said.
So far engagement has been scarce. And those concerned with fracking in Clare are already bemoaning the lack of information on Enegi’s work.
This is heightening suspicions in west Clare as more testers and surveyors are spotted across the land.
Enegi did not provide a spokesman to discuss its work. However, its investors’ statement said it will be upping its investigations this month.
Views on the issue will become more entrenched before another wild cat well is established in Doonbeg or elsewhere.
IRELAND is a decade behind other countries with the same geological traits when it comes to exploiting or even considering the harvesting of natural gas through fracking.
The experience of others has proved it to be a bonanza for businesses and gas companies. But it has also been an environmental concern and considerable controversy has dogged the search for the next wave of fossil fuels.
PAVILLION, WYOMING
The residents of Pavillion, Wyoming reported headaches, nausea and itchy skin and blamed the work to find shale natural gas. Following protests and anger the American environmental protection agency eventually decided to investigate and in recent weeks published its report.
This said the gases and chemicals from fracking had seeped into the natural water supply and poisoned it. The agency said the problems in Wyoming were exacerbated by the particularly shallow drill and the fact it took place below drinking water reserves.
However, it also noted that there was still such a difference in techniques and standards in fracking in America that the problems in Wyoming could not be used to judge other locations.
LANCASHIRE, ENGLAND
England, like Ireland, is not a renowned trouble spot for earthquakes.
So in early 2011 when tremors, the largest measuring 2.3 on the Richter Scale, began shaking the grounds around Lancashire, people asked what was happening.
Immediately, suspicion centred on the fracking activity of Cuadrilla Resources Ltd which was midway through the development phase which involved blasting water and sand into the rock core.
The company suspended operations and in November the Geomechanical Study of Bowland Shale Seismicity decided the earthquakes were most likely the result of the exploration activity.
The study said in the relatively recent history of the extraction method, most tremors barely registered above zero on the Richter Scale. However, it said two large events in Lancashire and 48 smaller ones at a time when the process was in train, were impossible to dismiss.
It explained that when water is concentrated on a fault line it can cause unexpected seismic activity.
FRANCE
Until mid-2011 France had issued 64 fracking permits to three companies.
However, in May a surge in protests saw activists highlight issues regarding water pollution and the waste of scarce drinking supplies to blast the rock core.
The French government had commissioned a report which suggested a few sample wells should be sunk in Europe to assess its impact and potential.
The government has since revoked the exploration licences and put in force an effective ban on fracking.
PHYSICALLY and metaphorically there is an issue festering under the surface in rural Ireland. And this is just waiting to erupt.
On one hand it is a technique which could potentially prop up our vulnerable energy security issues and invigorate our ailing economy.
But, on the other, it has been believed to cause earthquakes and poison reservoirs. It has also been criticised for wasting millions of gallons of valuable drinking water.
In many developed countries it has become the most pressing environmental dilemma.
The process has excited and aggravated communities, businesses and politicians almost in equal measure.
Yet in recent years two large swathes of Ireland were identified as areas for exploration and sections were offered to companies for investigation with comparatively little fuss or protest.
Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, involves sending wells more than 1,000 metres under the soil before they turn and travel a further 2-3km horizontally.
A pipe is sent down which is perforated along the horizontal section. Through this, millions of gallons of water are blasted down and out of the holes deep below the surface.
The water pressure breaks apart the rocks to loosen many small pockets of gas.
Sand and chemicals which are mixed with the water keep the newly opened pores in the rock open after the liquid is sucked back out. If successful the gas follows the water out of the pipes to provide a fuel source for decades.
There are more than 30 enormous shale basins underneath the lower 48 states of America. And many are based in the populated area of New England which has reached the peak of its production of coal.
In 10 years the US’s shale gas production, brought about by fracking, has exploded, accounting for a quarter of natural gas produced in the world’s largest economy. In 20 years it is expected the development of the current 1,600 wells will account for half the US’s annual gas demand.
Because of environmental concerns and a fundamental difference in ownership rights to subterranean resources the European development of fracking has been slower to take off.
Drilling for oil by the Ambassador Irish Oil Co at Meelin in north Cork in 1963. Picture: Irish Examiner archive
THE current quest to unleash the future potential of Ireland’s natural resources has more than an element of history repeating itself.
Before the Kinsale and Corrib fields were ever on the radar of prospectors’ the focus for Ireland’s early oil and gas exploration centred on a handful of wildcat testing wells.
These were drilled between 1962 and 1965 by Ambassador Irish Oil, a Texan company given a 20-year licence to find fossil fuels in Ireland’s territory.
Amid considerable optimism surveyors assessed the 26 counties with extensive helicopter and aeroplane flyovers of the countryside.
The search teams also used speed boats to scan the regions alongside the Shannon River and the canals.
The results of the £300,000 study isolated the geological areas most likely to result in buried resources.
Two subcontracting companies were taken on to bore eight onshore wells under the lands around Meelin, Cork; Doonbeg, Clare; Trim, Meath and Macnean, Cavan.
They delved thousands of feet under the ground taking samples of rock. There were gas flows detected in Cavan and Meath. But the Clare and Cork sites were branded “dry holes”.
The positive tests in the north east and west were not enough to justify establishing a rig although four further drills (in 1984 and 2001) found more substantial gas
But while the firm arrived expecting to find black gold the drill teams left empty handed. Ambassador Irish Oil and turned its attention to more promising options off shore.
Further drills have been carried out since and the results from the initial testing is now informing the work of those interested in beginning fracking for gas in Ireland.
THE west Clare portion of the current investigation into Ireland’s fracking potential has been given to a London-based company Enegi Oil.
The reasons why Clare has whet Enegi’s appetite is that it shares the same traits as its more established centre of operations in eastern Canada. The Clare option also has the potential to benefit from the proposed, and controversial, Liquid Natural Gas facility which is promised for the opposite side of the Shannon Estuary. As a standard charge Enegi had to pay the state €29 for each of the 495 square kilometres is was granted under the licensing option.
However, this €4,355 is a small portion of the €500,000 it expects to spend on its Clare operations before the two-year period expires in February 2013. This is when it must either apply for an exploration licence or walk away. In an investors’ statement at the beginning of December Enegi said optimism had grown since the Clare study took off.
It said the first phase of analysis will be completed in the first half of 2012, once it has hired laboratories to parse over the sample. Thereafter it will be ready to move onto the more invasive second stage of exploration.
By the end of December it will have completed a further onsite examination. This will look at areas of particular interest in land to the north of the peninsula. This will be followed up by another search of rock patterns along the Shannon estuary in early 2012.
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