"Boring Rock" - Prospects for Shale Gas in Britain

Shale gas: nailing two birds with one “boring rock”

Shale is a “boring rock”, according to Prof. Mike Stephenson, Head of Science, Energy at the British Geological Survey, the UK’s national institute for geological data.

But producing natural gas from that boring rock may be an easy way to meet global energy demand and climate change mandates.

At the start of his talk at the Global Shale Gas Forum in Berlin, Germany, addressing “Prospects for Shale Gas in Britain", Professor Stephenson showed forecasts of how global gas consumption could be up to 50% higher in 2030.

He cited India (and the developing world in general) where they are building huge power stations powered by gas. “Gas power stations produce 50% less CO2 than coal, so gas powered stations will become more popular than coal,” stated Stephenson.

Local sources of natural gas, like that from shale present an obvious solution to bridging the gap; Stephenson said 70% of the world’s surface rocks are sedimentary and 50% of those were shale.

Still, he raised the questions, “Can US technology be applied in Europe? Do all of the things developed there work in our shales? And what shales are best for shale gas?”

“In the longer term what we have to realize is where we are with shale is where we were 30 years with conventional, for example like sandstone. After a while you had to start thinking about sandstones, put more science into it and got more oil out of it.”

As for prospects for shale gas in Britain, Stephenson bluntly admitted, “We don’t have commercial shale gas yet, although Blackpool may have begun exploratory drilling last Wednesday.”

Cuadrilla Resources is preparing to drill the UK’s first shale gas well shale gas a few miles from Blackpool in Lancashire, targeting gas trapped 10,000 feet below the surface in the Bowland shale, which runs from Pendle Hill near Preston to the Irish Sea.

Stephenson set out to explain why development of shale gas could indeed become important for the UK.

“The UK has a number of commitments, which could be looked at as a bit of a bind,” he said, explaining, “15% of country’s energy is mandated to come from renewables by 2020 – this was a promise made by Tony Blair, who almost immediately left from the government after making it,” quipped Prof. Stephenson.

“There’s scepticism as to whether it can happen,” he added. “Were an energy-intensive country.”

Stephenson showed the audience a graph depicting the problems with renewables – intermittency – revealing different times of day and how/when people use more electricity.

“This is a future model with much higher level of renewables: 40 GW of wind, 9 GW hydro, 10 GW nuclear and 50 fossil burning.” He explained that even on a winter day with spring tides, fossil fuels would still fill in the energy gaps of meeting UK power demand; on calmer winter days, with low wind and neap tides, fossil fuels end up providing most of the energy supply.

He said he believed the UK’s Department of Energy and Climate Change was looking at carbon capture and storage with coal linked to renewables, and were considering nuclear.

“I would argue that nuclear is faltering. If you go to meetings they say CCS is too expensive, and risky,” said Stephenson, adding that there were no senior investors at a recent conference he had attended.

In contrast, he said, “It only takes us two years to build a gas plant. It might start looking more gassy, and if we can solve the problem of imported gas (from Norway, LNG from Qatar), if we can get our own shale gas, we can solve the problem with half the emissions of a conventional coal power station. If it’s UK shale gas, it’s very good security of supply. But we have to find it, something which is not that easy.”

Stephenson said he didn’t think the government was thinking about it enough.

He described potential UK shale gas reservoirs: 90-300 feet thick, sorbed gas content greater than10 square meters/tonne, high amounts of free gas, permeability in nano-microdarcy range, among others.

Cuadrilla hopes that within a few years, shale gas from Lancashire and other parts of Britain could contribute between five to 10 per cent of the country's gas needs.

Stephenson spoke about some of the things that make for a good shale: less than 2% total organic carbon, greater than 30 meter thickness, etc.

There were also non-geologic factors in the UK, he said, that needed to be considered: like onshore concerns, pipelines, and avoiding urban areas.

Stephenson spoke about “nimby” sentiments: i.e. “not in my backyard.”

“People are worried about what goes on under their feet, he explained, offering the example of gas storage facilities being built in the UK. “We must convince public how safe it is, negligible, safer than the surface, yet the public doesn’t like it; we must engage them in a much more open way.”

He said it was a matter of unfamiliarity on the part of the consumer. “Let’s face it, the general public doesn’t know geology very well. We don’t talk about the lights going out often enough, but we do talk about negative problems associated with energy. There’s a mistrust of industry, like the failure of British development of GM crops.”

Stephenson continued, “The scientific/industrial communities must address the public concerns and communicate the value of the technology. We are a government body employed to do this. I go to big events and talk about carbon capture and storage, I talk about shale gas to Greenpeace, discussing the problems and the advantages.”

He said that the key to successful communication is all in how to portray things, giving an example of presenting a carbons storage facility to citizens in the UK: “We all thought this diagram was great, but when we showed it to the public, they went nuts. What are you doing pumping CO2 under my house? So you have to be thoughtful about how you talk about things.”

Stephenson reported that British Geological Survey was completing much research on shale gas including a pre-competitive survey. As for where UK shale is located, he said a map will be published this year.

“We have a GIS prospectivity map online now. The best prospects are lower carboniferous; the Kimmeridge Clay we know less about.”

Copyright Natural Gas for Europe. You are most welcome to reproduce this  article or portions thereof with proper attribution and linking to NGFE.