More questions have been raised over the use of fracking in
the UK. After earthquakes in Blackpool, that were a direct result of fracking
all plants were suspended until a government investigation was completed.
But what are the dangers of fracking? In the USA, the only
place in which fracking is occurring on a commercial scale, has seen huge
problems. There has been gas leaking out of people’s taps, water supplies have
been poisoned and dozens of earthquakes near fracking stations where there are
no natural fault lines. The water used in fracking can be 10-90 times more
radioactive than the maximum that is safe for humans to be in contact with and approximately
half the water put into the ground due to fracking is simply lost and no-one
knows where it goes. It is therefore sensible to assume that some may end up in
drinking water, putting human lives at risk.
So why is the government even considering allowing fracking
to commence in the UK? After all other nations, including France, have already
decided it’s too dangerous. The reason is that there are huge amounts of gas
that could be retrieved by fracking. This would help to push prices down and
could be worth ten North Seas to the UK economy. One major difference between
the North Sea gas and gas on the mainland is that people don’t live on the sea,
but people do live on land. The UK is very densely populated and so any
complication could, potentially, put thousands, maybe even millions, of lives
at risk. This is something we do not want to happen.
I would oppose fracking due to the dangers it represents, I
believe that we should be paying more attention to green sources of energy. The
UK has a massive potential for the use of wind farms, huge ones taking up millions
of square kilometres of area could be built in the North Sea without public opposition.
This is what we need to be looking at, not projects that put lives at risk.
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