What the Brits are Learning from Our Approach to Fracking

October 9, 2015

On a sunny fall morning, Kevin Hollinrake stands with a group of parents across a road from a gas processing plant in Butler County. Trucks come and go as workers hustle to put together the Bluestone Processing Plant, which will prepare gas from locally drilled wells for market.

Hollinrake is a member of the British Parliament and a Conservative from a district in northern England. A company has applied to frack for natural gas in his district. Hollinrake has come to Pennsylvania—where more than 8,000 wells have been drilled since 2008—to see the fracking process firsthand.

The parents tell him about the smells they say emanate from the plant. They’re standing in the driveway of a suburban-style house that’s now right across the street from what is essentially a small refinery. (The plant is also near a landfill.) One parent, Amy Nassif, asks where he would put a plant like this in his country. “I have no idea," he says with a chuckle. "Not near my house.”

Hollinrake is the latest European to look to Pennsylvania as an example of what works and what doesn’t in hydraulic fracturing.

More than 40 countries around the world have shale gas deposits. But many countries, especially in Europe, are approaching hydraulic fracturing with ambivalence.

Right now, the United Kingdom is debating whether to allow fracking. Francis Egan, the CEO of the British energy company Cuadrilla, used Pennsylvania’s example as a reason for allowing fracking in the UK.

Seeing the 'worst' and 'best' of fracking

Hollinrake says he came to Pennsylvania to get a full-spectrum view of what it’s like to live in a fracking area.

“We've tried to see the worst of it, as well as hear the best of it,” he says.  “And I think in Pennsylvania, you've seen certainly the worst of it.”

He started his trip in Dimock, the town where a state investigation found more than a dozen water wells were contaminated from gas drilling.

On the final tour stop, Hollinrake visited a dairy farm where crews are installing a natural gas pipeline. Citizen groups worry about risks like pipelines ruptures. Photo: Reid Frazier

He also met with the Marcellus Shale Coalition, an industry group, and with the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection. He says state regulators he met with admit that in the early days of the shale gas boom, they were playing 'catch-up' with the industry.

“I think they certainly accepted things had gone wrong,” he says. “They were wet behind the ears when this all first started, and they've learned an awful lot. It was—it sounds—almost like the ‘Wild West’ here when fracking started in 2008.”

DEP spokesman Neil Shader said in response: “I would disagree with the 'things had gone wrong' part. There were certainly lessons learned, and DEP adjusted or is adjusting our regulations as a result."

Differences in regulation

Hollinrake says what has shocked him the most is that, in Pennsylvania, people generally don’t get much say in deciding whether companies can drill near their homes. He says in England, local planning boards are required to consider how new industries will impact people and neighborhoods.

“[We] look at factors about noise, light pollution, traffic. That doesn't seem to be forming part of the analysis about a permit [in Pennsylvania], which I find incredible,” he says.

Though its regulations may be different, Pennsylvania has grappled with some of these issues. Recently the state has tried to address noise in drilling, but the latest re-write of the state’s oil and gas law does not include a noise provision. The state Supreme Court also ruled that municipalities can enact zoning laws that can keep drilling out of some residential areas—and some have.

Hollinrake says his district in England is similar to Pennsylvania—a mix of agriculture, tourism and industry.

His wife, Nicky, says as parents, coming to Pennsylvania was important. “We're both parents of four children, so it's quite important we get a safety angle on this,” Nicky Hollinrake says.

Potential to take the economy 'forward'

On Hollinrake’s final tour stop, the parent group takes him to a dairy farm where crews are installing a pipeline. They want him to understand that once fracking starts, pipelines are the next step in creating a natural gas economy. They worry about risks like pipelines ruptures, but he says they aren’t unique to fracking. He’s sympathetic to these parents. But he also sees a benefit for his country in shale gas.

“In the past, we have undertaken large engineering projects—things that have taken our economies forward over the last hundreds of years. And if we had waited every time until we'd established there'd be no risk, we probably wouldn't have done anything.”

At the end of the tour, Hollinrake gets into his rental car. He has a flight to catch back to England—and a lot to think about.