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I'm Iain Stewart and I'm
on the trail of what is perhaps

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00:00:12,240 --> 00:00:16,320
the most important geological
story right now.

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The quest for a new source of power
found deep beneath the earth...

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..which could change the lives
of us all.

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Its discovery has sparked
a rush for energy in America...

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..for a type of gas that appears
cheap and plentiful.

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And with just one way of getting
it out the ground -

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hydraulic fracturing,
or "fracking".

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What is this energy lifeline
that's shaping up to be

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the saviour of America?

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As a geologist I want to know what
it means for the planet, and for us.

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'I'm going to meet some of the
people who have become rich from

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'this new energy rush.'

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This one here looks like a vehicle
bought with gas money.

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We see something we want, we buy it.

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'And the communities
who are worried about the potential

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'risks of fracking.'

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Oh, gosh, look at that!

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Would I want to drink that
every day? Yeah.

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If I lived in this house,
absolutely not.

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'I've come to America to find out
what fracking is,

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'why it's a potential game-changer

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'and to see what we in Britain can
learn from the American experience.'

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MUSIC: "Ain't Wastin' Time No More"
by The Allman Brothers

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'I'm starting off in the eastern
state of Pennsylvania.

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'The people here have long looked
to the rocks that surround them

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'for new sources of power
and wealth.'

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What's wonderful about geology,
really, is this feeling

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that you can read the rocks,
read the landscape,

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every valley and hill tells
a story about the planet's past.

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And if you go back far enough,

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this region here was once
swampy forest.

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And that's left its legacy in the
thick coal deposits that underlie

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this area, that's made
Pennsylvania famous, made it rich.

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And that's the point, really,
is that the towns

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and cities that have flourished
here in the past,

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their success was down to the rocks
and the minerals beneath their feet.

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'The glory days of coal lie
in the past here,

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'but the people are now returning to
the earth for a new

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'and controversial source of power.

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'It too comes from deep
underground.'

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There it is.

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'And it's starting to make
the state rich once again.'

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Just glinting through
the trees there.

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That's what I've come to see,
a live drilling platform.

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There's something like a thousand
of these drilling sites

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scattered across Pennsylvania

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because this site is
the epicentre of an industrial

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renaissance in America, one that's
creating tens of thousands of jobs,

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because things like these are
looking for a new form of energy.

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For some, the great
hope of the future - shale gas.

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'It doesn't come out easily,
this shale gas,

53
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'but a new form of extraction,
a new technology has made it
possible to collect.

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'It's called hydraulic fracturing,
or "fracking."

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'And we're all going to be hearing
a lot more about it.'

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Let me try and convey to you what
hydraulic fracturing is.

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If you imagined that this here is
the ground surface, where we

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are standing now,
and that this is a drill.

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The drill goes down vertically
and it's going down ultimately about

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two miles but the point is that when
it gets down at depth, it can do

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something really clever, starts to
bend round and it goes horizontal.

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And then what happens is you
inject down millions of gallons

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of water, tonnes of sand, some
chemicals all the way down here,

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and that fractures open naturally
occurring cracks in the rock

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and you create these fracks,
and that allows gas that's been

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locked away in the rock to leak out
and then move back to the surface.

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'This tangle of high-pressure pipes
is the reason we're now able

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'to extract the gas.

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'Because drilling on its own
doesn't release the gas.

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'It's trapped in the rocks.

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'You need to pump water under very
high pressure deep underground.

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'That fractures the bedrock
and the gas can then be collected

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'and pumped to the surface.

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'It's a big engineering project
and it's only possible

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'because of millions
of gallons of water

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'and chemicals that are added
to keep the process lubricated.'

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What's really clever is you can
do that again and again.

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You can have another well
that comes down and does that,

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another one that comes across
this way, another one here.

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You could do 10, 20, whatever.

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And so it's this combination
of horizontal drilling

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and also this hydraulic fracturing
of rock that has created

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this gas revolution.

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'What all of this has
done is given us

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'access to vast reserves of gas
we previously could not reach,

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'and that has led to
a full-scale dash for gas.'

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This is a ten-well pad, we have
ten wells on this particular pad,

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six of which go out this way

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and four of which go out that way.

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So how far would they go?

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Would they go beyond that hill
there? Oh, much further.
Really? Yeah.

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Way, way beyond there.

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It's about a mile-and-a-half long
outward under the ground

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and about a mile-and-a-half deep.
Right.

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You know, it's the scale of it.

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I'm looking round,
I can just see stuff everywhere.

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I mean, huge amounts of water,
of sand,

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of material - of labour, as well,
going into these things.

99
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They are huge investments
aren't they?

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There is, there's a lot.

101
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There's great investment
that takes place.

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This frack spread probably cost
anywhere from $30 million to
$50 million

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to put on just for the capital.

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'But as a geologist,

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'I'm interested in how they've been
able to achieve all this.

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'And the technology that's made it
possible in the first place.'

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So what are we looking at?

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The top of the grey, that's
essentially the ground level, is it?

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The top of the grey is essentially
the ground level.

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And then that's the drill hole
coming down?

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'They can identify with pinpoint
accuracy the fracks that occurred

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'deep underground when high pressure
water is injected into the shale.'

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They're the pops and the cracks
that occurred as we stimulated

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the reservoirs, so we had geophones
down the well bores listening

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to it so that we could then locate
where all this was happening.

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So you can hear the pops
seven thousand feet below you?

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That's incredible, isn't it?
Look at that.

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And it gives us an idea as to how
much of the rock we've stimulated

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so we can figure out just about
how much of an area we're

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going to drain with the natural gas
coming back through the well bore.

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What I find extraordinary is
this is you imaging things,

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tiny things going on, thousands
of feet beneath our kind of feet?

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Yeah, exactly, it's pretty cool.

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And it's actually
a kind of subterranean world that

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really no-one else sees.

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You're the only person,
people that really see this?

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The first time you see
the 3-D seismic is the first time

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anyone's actually ever seen
what the geology looks like
7,000, 8,000 feet under the earth.

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'The United States has been leading
the quest to extract shale gas.

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'You can quickly see why some might
find it attractive.

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'It's unlocked a new
source of power from the planet.

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'But shale gas is not unique
to America.

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'Other countries, including Britain,
are looking to follow.

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'And to better understand the nature
of shale, I've returned home...

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'..to the Peak District,
in Derbyshire.

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'As ever, we're drawing upon
pockets of energy laid down

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'millions of years ago, which
stretch right across the planet.'

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So, to explore the origins of shale,
I'm going underground.

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I love places like this.

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I think it's why I became
a geologist actually, the idea of

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exploring the nooks and crannies of
the planet, you know, kind of

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peeling back the skin
and just diving in,
understanding how things work.

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And also that feeling that
you're seeing a world,

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a hidden world, that very few other
people see or appreciate.

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You know, we're only
50 metres below the surface

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but we've gone back
350 million years.

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'All that time ago,
where I'm walking now,

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'in fact, the rocks beneath
what we call the Midlands,

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'was at the bottom
of a warm, tropical sea.

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'A sea crucial to the story
of shale gas,

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'and evidence for that ancient,
vanished water world is everywhere.'

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This is such a great place!

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Every so often, you get these
tantalising glimpses

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of how the rock used to be,
forensic clues, if you like.

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I mean, they're everywhere
and there's a really nice bit,

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actually, there's a cracker
just here.

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I'm going to get muddy now, but...
see if I can get up here.

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Look at this! Look at that!

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You can see this texture here
amid all this smearing

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and that is a huge, branching coral.

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Look at how it goes. That's huge.

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And lots and lots of debris,
shale debris around.

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In the modern seas, coral reefs are

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the centrepieces of
marine eco-systems

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and they were exactly the same
350 million years ago.

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This tells us that the carboniferous
seas were just teeming with life.

167
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'But it wasn't just the sea
that was rich with life.

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'The land was, too.

169
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'It was covered in
tropical rainforest,

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'with lush vegetation
and trees up to a hundred feet high.

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'Plant life which is equally
important to the story of shale.'

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The nearest coast was
over in that direction.

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There was lagoons and swamps

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and a huge delta that kind of swept
decaying tree and plant material

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down into this,
which would have been the ocean.

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I've got a sample of rock that
you would find here. Look at this.

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You can see all the plant
material, the leaves,

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the ferns, absolutely gorgeous.

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And so you've got all this decaying
plant material deposited

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alongside decaying sea creatures
like we saw in the cave

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and plankton and bacteria,
and they all become this

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kind of organic mush that ends up
embedded in this shale rock.

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So inside this shale rock
you've got

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these little pockets
of organic material

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that gets cooked up
and transformed into shale gas,

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and it's this shale gas
that's getting touted as
the saviour of the planet.

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'I want to see for myself
this ancient rock that contains

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'the shale gas.

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'So I'm off to visit
a fellow geologist

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'who really knows this rock.

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'In a series of warehouses,

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'the British Geological Survey
keeps 250 kilometres of core samples

193
00:16:00,560 --> 00:16:04,160
'from wells
and boreholes all over Britain.

194
00:16:04,160 --> 00:16:11,120
'Brought down from a dusty
top corner is the rock
we're all talking about.'

195
00:16:13,120 --> 00:16:15,280
So is this it,
this is the shale rock?

196
00:16:15,280 --> 00:16:17,640
Yeah. Oh, look at that.
It's pretty heavy.

197
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It IS heavy. So this has been taken
out of a drill hole

198
00:16:20,080 --> 00:16:22,240
going down what depth roughly
for this stuff?

199
00:16:22,240 --> 00:16:24,360
This one's down to about 500 metres,

200
00:16:24,360 --> 00:16:26,360
so about half a kilometre
below the surface.

201
00:16:26,360 --> 00:16:29,840
I guess that's why it's
so compact? The layers are kind of
squeezed in.

202
00:16:29,840 --> 00:16:33,280
Yes, it's been crushed by a whole
lot of rock, weighing down on it

203
00:16:33,280 --> 00:16:36,200
over a very long period of time, so
it's pretty hard and compact stuff.

204
00:16:36,200 --> 00:16:39,360
The thing is the rocks
that I normally associate with

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00:16:39,360 --> 00:16:42,440
having gas in them are kind of sands
and you can see the pores

206
00:16:42,440 --> 00:16:44,880
but here, completely different
thing, isn't it?

207
00:16:44,880 --> 00:16:47,440
Yeah, this is so compact, so fine.
You can't see anything.

208
00:16:47,440 --> 00:16:49,400
It's hard to believe
there's gas in it at all.

209
00:16:49,400 --> 00:16:51,360
It's incredible, isn't it?

210
00:16:53,200 --> 00:16:56,800
'There's only one way to see
what's trapped within the rock.

211
00:16:58,880 --> 00:17:03,560
'By scanning wafer-thin samples
with a focused beam of electrons,

212
00:17:03,560 --> 00:17:08,400
'images are produced
of the hidden world inside.'

213
00:17:10,840 --> 00:17:13,720
So we've got a scanning
electron-microscope image here,

214
00:17:13,720 --> 00:17:17,360
a live picture, in fact,
of a piece of shale.

215
00:17:17,360 --> 00:17:20,680
The darker things here are probably
plant material.

216
00:17:20,680 --> 00:17:24,080
This might be a spore, for example,
here, and what you're seeing here

217
00:17:24,080 --> 00:17:28,120
on these small, dark grey areas
are pores, or holes between
the particles,

218
00:17:28,120 --> 00:17:32,800
and it's in these holes or pores
that the gas actually collects.

219
00:17:32,800 --> 00:17:37,400
Tiniest little pinpricks of space
inside this really compact rock.

220
00:17:37,400 --> 00:17:39,720
Yeah, we're only
talking about a micron across

221
00:17:39,720 --> 00:17:42,280
so a thousandth of a millimetre
across. Very, very small.

222
00:17:44,360 --> 00:17:47,360
'This is the stuff that
drilling companies are after,

223
00:17:47,360 --> 00:17:51,480
'essentially natural gas,
but stuck in solid rock,

224
00:17:51,480 --> 00:17:54,480
'sometimes several kilometres
beneath the surface of the earth.

225
00:17:55,760 --> 00:17:59,960
'No wonder it takes all that
high-pressure water to get it out.

226
00:18:17,360 --> 00:18:21,040
'Shale gas isn't just found in
remote deserts or beneath the sea,

227
00:18:21,040 --> 00:18:24,560
'places far away from our homes.

228
00:18:24,560 --> 00:18:26,840
'It's found under our back yards.

229
00:18:26,840 --> 00:18:30,560
'So it's not only an issue for
the energy companies, it involves

230
00:18:30,560 --> 00:18:35,360
'whole communities and there seems
to be winners and losers.'

231
00:18:35,360 --> 00:18:37,720
# On the other side of Jordan

232
00:18:37,720 --> 00:18:41,200
# There's construction
on a mansion just for me... #

233
00:18:43,480 --> 00:18:46,960
Here in Louisiana,
in America's Deep South,

234
00:18:46,960 --> 00:18:49,160
some appear to have benefited.

235
00:18:54,160 --> 00:18:57,480
'It has at times transformed
the lives of ordinary farmers

236
00:18:57,480 --> 00:19:02,160
'because in the US, you can own
the gas that lies under your land.'

237
00:19:06,200 --> 00:19:10,560
This whole region is sitting
directly on top of the shale rock

238
00:19:10,560 --> 00:19:13,960
and it's the gas from that shale
that's made

239
00:19:13,960 --> 00:19:16,600
some of the farmers here
millionaires overnight,

240
00:19:16,600 --> 00:19:21,080
or as they're referred to here,
"shaleionaires."

241
00:19:26,560 --> 00:19:30,240
So what was the kind of sum,
then, that you got?

242
00:19:30,240 --> 00:19:32,440
Well, I've got a copy of this...

243
00:19:32,440 --> 00:19:35,640
You've got a copy of what...?
The cheque that they gave me!

244
00:19:35,640 --> 00:19:37,680
Let's have a look at that.

245
00:19:37,680 --> 00:19:41,840
And there it is,
well, it's like $434,000.

246
00:19:41,840 --> 00:19:44,400
$434,000.

247
00:19:44,400 --> 00:19:48,000
I don't think I've seen
a figure as much, as high as that.

248
00:19:48,000 --> 00:19:51,960
'CB Leatherwood has
made his fortune by selling

249
00:19:51,960 --> 00:19:54,000
'drilling rights on his farm.

250
00:19:56,200 --> 00:19:59,440
'And now the wells are producing,
that lump sum is topped up

251
00:19:59,440 --> 00:20:04,000
'by a steady stream of royalty
cheques popping into his mailbox.'

252
00:20:09,120 --> 00:20:10,840
And this right here is onions.

253
00:20:10,840 --> 00:20:13,840
Spring onions, I recognise those.
Oh, yeah.

254
00:20:13,840 --> 00:20:15,880
'He's given money to his children

255
00:20:15,880 --> 00:20:21,040
'and it allows CB to live the life
that he's always dreamed of.'

256
00:20:21,040 --> 00:20:24,600
I have about 30 mules
and, I believe, seven horses.

257
00:20:26,640 --> 00:20:28,240
Got one for every occasion.

258
00:20:28,240 --> 00:20:29,880
This is nice, isn't it?

259
00:20:29,880 --> 00:20:33,160
This one here looks like a vehicle
bought with gas money.

260
00:20:33,160 --> 00:20:35,600
Tell me, this one's beautiful.

261
00:20:35,600 --> 00:20:38,680
A Lincoln town car.
We see something we want, we buy it.

262
00:20:46,520 --> 00:20:50,360
So what do you put all this
good fortune down to?

263
00:20:50,360 --> 00:20:52,760
It was a gift from the good Lord.

264
00:20:52,760 --> 00:20:54,280
A gift from up above?

265
00:20:54,280 --> 00:20:56,640
Gift from up above.
Not from down below, not from...

266
00:20:56,640 --> 00:21:00,000
It was a gift from up above.
I'm a geologist, I would have it
as a gift from geology

267
00:21:00,000 --> 00:21:01,880
but you have it from up there,
upstairs.

268
00:21:01,880 --> 00:21:03,960
That's right,
that's who made it for me.

269
00:21:14,640 --> 00:21:17,960
# I have a source

270
00:21:17,960 --> 00:21:23,560
# Of strength when I am weak... #

271
00:21:23,560 --> 00:21:27,800
So, I can understand that
some people, if they've got
mineral rights,

272
00:21:27,800 --> 00:21:31,080
and they've got gas underneath
their land, they're benefiting.

273
00:21:31,080 --> 00:21:33,680
What about other people?
How do they benefit from it?

274
00:21:33,680 --> 00:21:39,000
Well, bringing work
into the country, communities.

275
00:21:39,000 --> 00:21:43,000
You've got...you bring the
drilling rigs in to drill the wells.

276
00:21:43,000 --> 00:21:44,160
It furnishes jobs.

277
00:21:45,680 --> 00:21:48,560
You bring the people in
to build the locations.

278
00:21:48,560 --> 00:21:53,600
Jobs were scarce, the economy wasn't
too good before this came around.

279
00:21:53,600 --> 00:21:55,760
I mean, it was awfully slow.

280
00:21:55,760 --> 00:21:59,880
So if we were to do a kind of a poll
of all the houses around here

281
00:21:59,880 --> 00:22:01,480
and all the people,

282
00:22:01,480 --> 00:22:04,560
what proportion do you think
would be for shale gas, be positive?

283
00:22:04,560 --> 00:22:06,520
I'd say 90% of them.

284
00:22:06,520 --> 00:22:08,600
Really, as high as that?

285
00:22:30,160 --> 00:22:32,440
It was great to speak to CB today.

286
00:22:32,440 --> 00:22:35,320
I know what he says you have
to take with a pinch of salt.

287
00:22:35,320 --> 00:22:38,480
He's made a lot of money on the back
of shale gas, but what I thought was

288
00:22:38,480 --> 00:22:41,200
interesting was the idea
the whole community had benefited,

289
00:22:41,200 --> 00:22:44,960
that the rewards had seeped through
right to the bottom level.

290
00:22:54,800 --> 00:22:59,560
'But not everyone in a community
sees cheques or jobs.

291
00:23:05,360 --> 00:23:09,480
'One of the objections has been
that all that machinery involved -

292
00:23:09,480 --> 00:23:15,240
'the pipes, the lorries, the rigs,
blights rural communities.

293
00:23:24,800 --> 00:23:28,320
'And fracking is now taking place
across the US,

294
00:23:28,320 --> 00:23:30,720
'from sea to shining sea.

295
00:23:35,360 --> 00:23:38,800
'It's startling how widely
it's already spread.'

296
00:23:43,920 --> 00:23:45,720
Take a look at this.

297
00:23:45,720 --> 00:23:49,680
You don't just find shale gas
in Louisiana or Pennsylvania.

298
00:23:49,680 --> 00:23:52,160
You find it right across America.

299
00:23:52,160 --> 00:23:56,200
Energy companies reckon that there's
more natural gas in America

300
00:23:56,200 --> 00:23:59,160
than there is oil in Saudi Arabia.

301
00:23:59,160 --> 00:24:00,760
I mean, look at it.

302
00:24:00,760 --> 00:24:04,480
It's estimated something like
a million fracking wells, a million!

303
00:24:04,480 --> 00:24:08,080
Production or exploration
in 30 states.

304
00:24:08,080 --> 00:24:11,920
Now, what all that means
is an energy renaissance,

305
00:24:11,920 --> 00:24:15,880
cheap abundant energy
right on their doorstep.

306
00:24:17,640 --> 00:24:21,520
'Geology may be a science,
but it seldom happens in isolation.

307
00:24:24,120 --> 00:24:28,600
'It's tied up with politics,
with economics

308
00:24:28,600 --> 00:24:32,520
'and you don't have to look far
to see how fracking is starting

309
00:24:32,520 --> 00:24:35,440
'to change the politics
and economics of this nation.'

310
00:25:02,120 --> 00:25:04,920
The thing is,
it's looking like a game-changer.

311
00:25:04,920 --> 00:25:07,840
I mean, the price of gas in the US
is something like a third

312
00:25:07,840 --> 00:25:10,720
of what it is in Britain,
and that should be

313
00:25:10,720 --> 00:25:14,440
good for the American consumer,
for American industry.

314
00:25:20,400 --> 00:25:23,840
But actually, there's already signs
that that's happened.

315
00:25:23,840 --> 00:25:27,760
Those energy-hungry users,
things like chemical plants,

316
00:25:27,760 --> 00:25:30,600
manufacturing firms,
they're already starting to

317
00:25:30,600 --> 00:25:33,200
re-shore their operations

318
00:25:33,200 --> 00:25:39,080
and that's because the cheap labour
in places like that is trumped by

319
00:25:39,080 --> 00:25:42,080
the cheap energy
in places like this.

320
00:25:44,720 --> 00:25:47,520
'But there's another reason
why fracking is being

321
00:25:47,520 --> 00:25:51,800
'talked of as a game-changer
right across the world.

322
00:25:51,800 --> 00:25:56,880
'It's about how safe
our energy supplies are,
about energy security.'

323
00:26:02,640 --> 00:26:05,280
'To give you an idea
why that matters, I'm going

324
00:26:05,280 --> 00:26:08,080
'to leave rocks and geology
behind for a moment.

325
00:26:10,160 --> 00:26:13,400
'I've come back to Britain,
to the nerve centre

326
00:26:13,400 --> 00:26:16,760
'of its National Grid, to get
a sense of the bigger picture.

327
00:26:16,760 --> 00:26:20,520
'These are the people who have to
ensure there's enough power -

328
00:26:20,520 --> 00:26:23,000
'from nuclear, coal,
gas, renewables -

329
00:26:23,000 --> 00:26:25,440
to meet our energy needs,

330
00:26:25,440 --> 00:26:29,720
'and I've chosen a rather special
moment to visit,

331
00:26:29,720 --> 00:26:33,520
'because tonight
they're under pressure.'

332
00:26:33,520 --> 00:26:36,160
CHEERING

333
00:26:44,240 --> 00:26:46,920
'When Strictly Come Dancing ends,

334
00:26:46,920 --> 00:26:49,560
'millions of us
will put the kettle on.'

335
00:26:51,040 --> 00:26:52,640
Ten!

336
00:26:54,840 --> 00:26:59,320
'And these guys need to bring on
more power at that precise moment.'

337
00:26:59,320 --> 00:27:01,120
Eight.

338
00:27:03,160 --> 00:27:07,040
'What really fascinates me
is how they choose to deliver it.

339
00:27:08,680 --> 00:27:11,840
'Hydro, water power.'

340
00:27:13,520 --> 00:27:17,080
What we have is a top lake and
a bottom lake, so during the night,

341
00:27:17,080 --> 00:27:20,000
when electricity prices are cheap,
we pump water up to the top lake

342
00:27:20,000 --> 00:27:22,960
and during the day, we just let
the water come down again

343
00:27:22,960 --> 00:27:26,520
through the turbines to create
electricity very quickly
and flexibly.

344
00:27:26,520 --> 00:27:29,320
So, basically, as soon as
electricity demand starts to rise,

345
00:27:29,320 --> 00:27:32,480
you throw water at it?
We throw water at it, yes.

346
00:27:32,480 --> 00:27:36,080
Right, I'm going to ring
the BBC controller now, Bernard,

347
00:27:36,080 --> 00:27:38,680
to see whether he's got an update
on the Strictly end time.

348
00:27:38,680 --> 00:27:40,320
CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

349
00:27:40,320 --> 00:27:43,360
Hello, Jonathan, it's Neil Wise
at National Grid.

350
00:27:47,800 --> 00:27:49,960
Thank you.

351
00:27:56,640 --> 00:28:00,240
'The closing minutes
of Strictly are tense.'

352
00:28:03,040 --> 00:28:06,920
This looks like the end. OK.

353
00:28:09,360 --> 00:28:12,840
'They have to time
the release of water precisely,

354
00:28:12,840 --> 00:28:16,480
'to match the sudden surge in demand
for electricity.'

355
00:28:18,280 --> 00:28:22,720
Two seconds under, OK. Bye, now.

356
00:28:22,720 --> 00:28:23,960
CHEERING

357
00:28:26,200 --> 00:28:28,240
I think we're in business.

358
00:28:30,720 --> 00:28:34,960
'When the moment comes,
Bernard opens the flood gates.

359
00:28:34,960 --> 00:28:36,360
I'll send the Foyers now...

360
00:28:39,440 --> 00:28:41,760
..and Cruachan as well.

361
00:28:45,080 --> 00:28:51,720
I think, probably do
the Ffestiniog as well, there we go.

362
00:29:00,160 --> 00:29:04,200
'Demand begins to level off.
They've made it.

363
00:29:21,880 --> 00:29:24,520
That was pretty impressive.

364
00:29:24,520 --> 00:29:27,120
I mean, watching those guys operate,
watching them

365
00:29:27,120 --> 00:29:30,800
judge the moment-by-moment
changes in demand and then match

366
00:29:30,800 --> 00:29:34,680
that against electricity generation
from coal and from nuclear,

367
00:29:34,680 --> 00:29:39,720
from wind, and those injections
of water - that's pretty special.

368
00:29:47,480 --> 00:29:52,480
The thing is, for decades
that energy mix is what's kept

369
00:29:52,480 --> 00:29:55,760
the lights on in Britain,
but things are changing.

370
00:29:59,880 --> 00:30:04,000
'If we want to continue to have
this level of control in the future,

371
00:30:04,000 --> 00:30:07,400
'we're going to have to make sure
we have the right energy mix

372
00:30:07,400 --> 00:30:10,400
'at the right price
and at the right time.

373
00:30:20,960 --> 00:30:24,440
'You probably won't have heard of
the Isle of Grain gas depot

374
00:30:24,440 --> 00:30:28,080
'in Kent, but the chances are
you may have used

375
00:30:28,080 --> 00:30:30,240
'some of its gas
to keep your house warm.

376
00:30:32,680 --> 00:30:38,400
'It's a good place to see why
energy security is so important.'

377
00:30:42,360 --> 00:30:46,880
This is the biggest above-ground
gas storage tank in Europe.

378
00:30:48,040 --> 00:30:55,520
Look at that! It's absolutely
humungous. Let's get up there.

379
00:30:58,160 --> 00:31:00,440
Don't know
if this is a good idea actually.

380
00:31:02,640 --> 00:31:05,320
'And it's not the only
giant container here.'

381
00:31:08,240 --> 00:31:09,720
Ha!

382
00:31:13,880 --> 00:31:18,440
'In total, there are around
a million cubic metres of gas.'

383
00:31:20,480 --> 00:31:22,360
More steps!

384
00:31:22,360 --> 00:31:27,040
'That may sound a lot,
but we're an energy-hungry nation

385
00:31:27,040 --> 00:31:30,360
'and across Britain,
we store only enough

386
00:31:30,360 --> 00:31:33,240
'for around two weeks of supplies.'

387
00:31:42,040 --> 00:31:45,640
Something like 40%
of the electricity we get

388
00:31:45,640 --> 00:31:47,720
comes from burning gas,

389
00:31:47,720 --> 00:31:51,000
and in future years that's
going to dramatically increase.

390
00:31:51,000 --> 00:31:54,200
But the thing is, you see the gas
that's in there and in there

391
00:31:54,200 --> 00:31:57,240
and in there, it's not our gas.

392
00:31:57,240 --> 00:31:58,440
Let me show you.

393
00:31:58,440 --> 00:32:02,240
It comes from far, far away,
brought in by ships like that.

394
00:32:06,240 --> 00:32:08,840
'And this is not just any old ship.

395
00:32:10,240 --> 00:32:11,760
'It helps keep Britain afloat.

396
00:32:15,160 --> 00:32:18,200
'More than half of
our gas is imported,

397
00:32:22,160 --> 00:32:25,880
'a lot of it from one tiny country.'

398
00:32:27,640 --> 00:32:30,360
It's just like a massive
wall of steel.

399
00:32:32,600 --> 00:32:36,280
Apparently, it's a quarter
of a mile long from, bloody hell,

400
00:32:36,280 --> 00:32:39,320
from there all the way across
right to the far end there.

401
00:32:41,080 --> 00:32:43,800
And this monster has come
7,000 miles.

402
00:32:43,800 --> 00:32:47,400
This is from Qatar, in the Middle
East, right beside Iraq, to here.

403
00:32:48,840 --> 00:32:52,320
You can see the gas just getting
taken off through these
unloading pipes.

404
00:32:54,520 --> 00:32:59,240
There's enough gas in there
to power 70,000 homes for a year.

405
00:33:09,400 --> 00:33:12,600
'We get our natural gas
from countries in the Middle East,

406
00:33:12,600 --> 00:33:15,520
'from Africa and from Russia,

407
00:33:17,680 --> 00:33:20,320
'so the political uncertainties
are obvious.

408
00:33:28,760 --> 00:33:31,880
'And we're also subject
to the vagaries of the market.'

409
00:33:35,480 --> 00:33:39,440
Those beasts seem so slow
and lumbering

410
00:33:39,440 --> 00:33:43,320
but they operate in this
fast-paced environment.

411
00:33:43,320 --> 00:33:46,320
I mean, for a start, there's
no guarantee that ship will

412
00:33:46,320 --> 00:33:49,120
ever reach its intended destination.

413
00:33:49,120 --> 00:33:53,040
It might get diverted, mid-ocean,
from Europe to Asia, just

414
00:33:53,040 --> 00:33:56,360
because there's someone there that
will pay a higher price for gas.

415
00:33:58,120 --> 00:34:01,080
And that's
the nub of the problem, really.

416
00:34:01,080 --> 00:34:06,040
There is no absolute energy security
with ships like that.

417
00:34:10,120 --> 00:34:15,360
'That's what we, and all countries,
mean by energy security -

418
00:34:15,360 --> 00:34:20,600
'the ability to have certain
supplies of gas at a price
they can control and afford.

419
00:34:22,400 --> 00:34:27,160
'And that's the other attraction
of fracking. It's home-grown energy.

420
00:34:37,360 --> 00:34:41,400
'Many here in America have become
almost heady with the potential

421
00:34:41,400 --> 00:34:45,960
'of fracking, for its economic
benefits and energy security.'

422
00:34:47,720 --> 00:34:51,080
As a geologist, you're only
too aware that the planet

423
00:34:51,080 --> 00:34:56,040
can change our world either for the
better or for the worse, and there's

424
00:34:56,040 --> 00:35:00,120
something in these hills that...
a niggling thought that something's

425
00:35:00,120 --> 00:35:03,520
not quite right, that there's
more to this than meets the eye.

426
00:35:05,800 --> 00:35:09,560
'There's a lot of questions
being asked about fracking.

427
00:35:09,560 --> 00:35:13,480
'Some are about whether
we should be investing in another

428
00:35:13,480 --> 00:35:15,360
'carbon-based form of energy at all,

429
00:35:15,360 --> 00:35:20,320
'and over the next few years, this
charged debate is going to unfold.

430
00:35:20,320 --> 00:35:25,240
'But what I want to look at now are
some of the more immediate risks.

431
00:35:39,520 --> 00:35:45,440
'I'm back in Pennsylvania, in the
foothills of the Endless Mountains.

432
00:35:45,440 --> 00:35:48,240
'It's a good place to get to grips
with one of the concerns

433
00:35:48,240 --> 00:35:50,840
'I'm most interested
in trying to understand.

434
00:35:57,120 --> 00:36:00,680
'The risks that gas
and contaminated water

435
00:36:00,680 --> 00:36:03,840
'might be leaking out of the wells
into the surrounding land.'

436
00:36:07,240 --> 00:36:10,480
For months now, I've been reading
solidly about fracking, just about

437
00:36:10,480 --> 00:36:13,600
everything I can find,
especially on the internet,

438
00:36:13,600 --> 00:36:15,560
and if you go onto the internet,

439
00:36:15,560 --> 00:36:19,080
what you find a lot of the stuff
is about, you know,

440
00:36:19,080 --> 00:36:23,520
people falling ill and the health
effects of it and you can't really

441
00:36:23,520 --> 00:36:27,680
find very much in the scientific
literature about this, so what

442
00:36:27,680 --> 00:36:31,520
I'm really interested in is finding
a bit more about this, and actually,

443
00:36:31,520 --> 00:36:35,880
it's been surprisingly difficult
to find someone to talk about it.

444
00:36:38,200 --> 00:36:41,440
'That's because I've heard that
some people who have fallen ill

445
00:36:41,440 --> 00:36:46,120
'have received compensation and
aren't allowed to talk about it.'

446
00:36:46,120 --> 00:36:50,280
But I'm hoping today, up in
these hills we're going to find

447
00:36:50,280 --> 00:36:53,440
a couple who are very happy
to talk about it

448
00:36:53,440 --> 00:36:56,760
because they're in a bad way,
apparently.

449
00:37:21,840 --> 00:37:22,880
Hello?

450
00:37:25,920 --> 00:37:29,240
Hi, are you Janet? Yeah.

451
00:37:29,240 --> 00:37:32,800
I'm a very wet Iain.
Hiya, how are you?
Welcome, come in. Thank you.

452
00:37:34,280 --> 00:37:37,400
When did you first hear
that word, "fracking"?

453
00:37:37,400 --> 00:37:39,280
How many years ago was it?

454
00:37:39,280 --> 00:37:42,160
Two, at least
two and a half years ago.

455
00:37:42,160 --> 00:37:44,520
Just as recently as that -
two or three years ago? Yeah.

456
00:37:44,520 --> 00:37:47,240
I didn't really pay attention,
you know,

457
00:37:47,240 --> 00:37:49,920
until we got affected,

458
00:37:49,920 --> 00:37:54,120
and then once we got affected,
then you begin to wonder why.

459
00:37:55,680 --> 00:37:58,800
That's when I actually
looked at the word "fracking."

460
00:37:58,800 --> 00:38:00,240
Right. You know what I mean?

461
00:38:00,240 --> 00:38:03,040
Like, how could this
have happened to us?

462
00:38:03,040 --> 00:38:09,240
'Janet and Fred McIntyre live in
a remote area of rural Pennsylvania.

463
00:38:09,240 --> 00:38:13,720
'Two years ago, the energy companies
arrived and began to frack for gas.

464
00:38:15,880 --> 00:38:20,600
'Shortly afterward, the McIntyres
and some of their neighbours
fell ill.

465
00:38:25,400 --> 00:38:29,320
'They fear that it might be
connected to fracking,

466
00:38:29,320 --> 00:38:33,360
'that somehow chemicals might have
leaked into their drinking water.

467
00:38:35,720 --> 00:38:40,480
'And they're now struggling
to understand what is happening
to them and their community.'

468
00:38:41,720 --> 00:38:46,640
We got the flu, well, what we thought
was the flu, got horribly ill,

469
00:38:46,640 --> 00:38:51,640
violently ill
and we were like that for a week.

470
00:38:55,480 --> 00:38:58,200
'Because of their concerns,

471
00:38:58,200 --> 00:39:02,120
'the McIntyres only use
bottled water now,

472
00:39:02,120 --> 00:39:04,640
'for drinking, washing and cooking.

473
00:39:06,720 --> 00:39:09,720
'The US Department
of Environmental Protection

474
00:39:09,720 --> 00:39:14,000
'and the energy companies themselves
tested their drinking water

475
00:39:14,000 --> 00:39:18,440
'and they gave it
a clean bill of health.

476
00:39:18,440 --> 00:39:20,480
'But the McIntyres are unconvinced.

477
00:39:22,720 --> 00:39:25,400
'It's a confusing picture.

478
00:39:25,400 --> 00:39:28,800
'We simply don't have the scientific
evidence that separates out

479
00:39:28,800 --> 00:39:32,320
'coincidence from a direct cause.'

480
00:39:33,720 --> 00:39:40,240
Since they began drilling here,
I suffer from seizures

481
00:39:40,240 --> 00:39:47,760
and through all this, right before
our water turned purple,

482
00:39:47,760 --> 00:39:50,280
I went into renal failure.

483
00:39:50,280 --> 00:39:53,600
So it's quite a lot of completely
different things, it's not just...

484
00:39:53,600 --> 00:39:57,280
Yeah, it seems to affect
the very old, the very young and

485
00:39:57,280 --> 00:40:03,560
if you have like a low immune system
or you're sick, you really get sick.

486
00:40:03,560 --> 00:40:06,200
These things have happened to me.

487
00:40:06,200 --> 00:40:08,600
You can't prove it
scientifically, that...

488
00:40:08,600 --> 00:40:12,280
But you're convinced, are you?

489
00:40:12,280 --> 00:40:13,720
It just seems weird.

490
00:40:25,000 --> 00:40:28,560
'Around 50 people
in their community now only use

491
00:40:28,560 --> 00:40:32,000
'water from bottles,
and paid for by charity,

492
00:40:32,000 --> 00:40:36,040
'which Janet helps to deliver to
isolated friends and neighbours.'

493
00:40:37,160 --> 00:40:40,480
Hiya, how are you? Hi. Hi, there.
What's your name? Iain.

494
00:40:40,480 --> 00:40:41,840
Iain, OK.

495
00:40:41,840 --> 00:40:44,600
All the way from Scotland,
to deliver your water.

496
00:40:44,600 --> 00:40:46,400
Oh, bless you!

497
00:40:46,400 --> 00:40:47,800
Six of these?

498
00:40:47,800 --> 00:40:49,480
HE GROANS

499
00:40:49,480 --> 00:40:52,960
We've good water
but it's contaminated now.

500
00:41:03,120 --> 00:41:07,920
I've lived here since eight years
old and now they're ruining it.

501
00:41:07,920 --> 00:41:10,000
Where do you want it?

502
00:41:10,000 --> 00:41:12,600
The water stinks.
The animals won't drink it.

503
00:41:12,600 --> 00:41:14,440
I don't drink the water any more,

504
00:41:16,520 --> 00:41:22,760
and I have a hard time swallowing and
breathing, and there's nothing they
can do.

505
00:41:30,040 --> 00:41:33,600
So do you know anyone around here,
any of these houses,

506
00:41:33,600 --> 00:41:37,040
that actually have decent
water from their boreholes?

507
00:41:37,040 --> 00:41:41,080
They used to
but they're all on the water run.

508
00:41:41,080 --> 00:41:43,320
They go to the water bank or...

509
00:41:43,320 --> 00:41:45,360
They're all going
to your water bank?

510
00:41:45,360 --> 00:41:48,360
Yeah. That one, that one,
that one, that one.

511
00:41:49,960 --> 00:41:54,280
That one, that one, this one,

512
00:41:54,280 --> 00:41:58,120
that one, myself over there,
beside me.

513
00:41:58,120 --> 00:42:00,120
They're all...

514
00:42:00,120 --> 00:42:01,640
Everyone, basically. Yeah.

515
00:42:05,440 --> 00:42:10,200
'What I've found here is a community
that's become afraid of fracking.

516
00:42:18,640 --> 00:42:21,560
'But what I think it is that
feeds their fear is that it's

517
00:42:21,560 --> 00:42:25,720
'easier to ask questions
than to get hard answers.'

518
00:42:33,480 --> 00:42:38,120
You know, a number of people have
said that fracking has ruined their

519
00:42:38,120 --> 00:42:41,640
water but the trouble is that good,
solid, scientific evidence is pretty

520
00:42:41,640 --> 00:42:45,640
thin on the ground, and what makes
it even more complicated is that

521
00:42:45,640 --> 00:42:50,760
gases like methane, for example, can
occur naturally in drinking water.

522
00:42:50,760 --> 00:42:54,720
What mining bosses say is that
incidents of contamination

523
00:42:54,720 --> 00:42:58,760
are few and far between and the
result of accidental chemical

524
00:42:58,760 --> 00:43:03,520
spillage on the surface or not quite
casing the drill holes properly.

525
00:43:03,520 --> 00:43:06,800
In other words, that they're
the result of shoddy practice,

526
00:43:06,800 --> 00:43:08,960
not fracking.

527
00:43:14,720 --> 00:43:17,360
'Although there are no
national figures,

528
00:43:17,360 --> 00:43:22,040
'here in Pennsylvania some
6-7% of wells have reported what's

529
00:43:22,040 --> 00:43:26,040
'termed "well failures" in each
of the past three years.

530
00:43:28,040 --> 00:43:29,720
'But what we don't know is

531
00:43:29,720 --> 00:43:33,440
'if those problems have led to
ground water contamination.

532
00:43:33,440 --> 00:43:37,880
'To make things even more
complicated, US fracking companies

533
00:43:37,880 --> 00:43:41,880
'have been reluctant to disclose
exactly what chemicals they use.'

534
00:43:43,760 --> 00:43:45,920
You know, the thing
about the fracking chemicals is

535
00:43:45,920 --> 00:43:48,200
that, in America,
they're proprietary,

536
00:43:48,200 --> 00:43:50,080
so that they're a closely
guarded secret,

537
00:43:50,080 --> 00:43:52,160
each company
with their own particular mix

538
00:43:52,160 --> 00:43:55,600
that they don't want the others
to know about, so it's like a secret

539
00:43:55,600 --> 00:43:59,760
recipe, really, like the ingredients
of HP Sauce or Coca Cola.

540
00:44:01,360 --> 00:44:03,640
In fact, even the guys
that are handling

541
00:44:03,640 --> 00:44:06,720
the chemicals on the fracking job
might not know what

542
00:44:06,720 --> 00:44:10,960
the particular chemicals are,
and it's that secrecy that really

543
00:44:10,960 --> 00:44:14,400
is at the heart of, I think,
most people's suspicions,

544
00:44:14,400 --> 00:44:17,960
that it's somehow, you know,
a nasty, noxious cocktail of stuff.

545
00:44:26,400 --> 00:44:30,280
'A new law in Pennsylvania does
allow physicians special access to

546
00:44:30,280 --> 00:44:34,640
'information about the trade's
secret chemicals,

547
00:44:34,640 --> 00:44:36,920
'but it's not straightforward.

548
00:44:43,320 --> 00:44:48,120
'Dr Amy Pare has treated people with
lesions to their faces who

549
00:44:48,120 --> 00:44:52,760
'she thinks may have been
exposed to the fracking chemicals,

550
00:44:52,760 --> 00:44:56,040
'and the drilling companies will
only tell her what those chemicals

551
00:44:56,040 --> 00:44:59,520
'might be under stringent
conditions.'

552
00:44:59,520 --> 00:45:03,480
Well, they'll reveal those if you
sign a confidentiality statement.

553
00:45:03,480 --> 00:45:06,040
That's a lovely way,
that's a Catch-22, isn't it?

554
00:45:06,040 --> 00:45:09,440
So you can sign the form that
says you won't tell anyone else

555
00:45:09,440 --> 00:45:11,080
and you know. Right.

556
00:45:11,080 --> 00:45:13,160
What does that mean,
you can't tell the patient?

557
00:45:13,160 --> 00:45:15,320
Oh, correct,
you can't tell the patient,

558
00:45:15,320 --> 00:45:18,000
so, say I suspected that you had
been exposed to something.

559
00:45:18,000 --> 00:45:21,520
If it's on a regular
inhalational panel, fine,

560
00:45:21,520 --> 00:45:26,120
but if you just can't figure out
what exactly it was, you would sign

561
00:45:26,120 --> 00:45:29,880
the confidentiality statement which
is for these proprietary chemicals.

562
00:45:29,880 --> 00:45:33,440
They say that they'll release
the chemicals that they may have

563
00:45:33,440 --> 00:45:36,680
been exposed to and then
if those tests come back positive,

564
00:45:36,680 --> 00:45:38,520
I can't tell you about it.

565
00:45:38,520 --> 00:45:41,840
So, can you tell my doctor?
Can you tell anyone else?

566
00:45:41,840 --> 00:45:45,840
No, I mean, I'm a plastic surgeon
so I would refer you to

567
00:45:45,840 --> 00:45:49,960
an occupational medicine doctor
but I would just refer you.

568
00:45:49,960 --> 00:45:52,680
So you couldn't then pass
the information on to that

569
00:45:52,680 --> 00:45:55,080
person of what, the information
that you'd found?

570
00:45:55,080 --> 00:45:57,600
No, I would refer you
because it's a proprietary chemical.

571
00:45:57,600 --> 00:45:59,840
It's a trade secret, so...

572
00:45:59,840 --> 00:46:03,600
But essentially this is a gagging
order placed right across you,

573
00:46:03,600 --> 00:46:05,320
isn't it?

574
00:46:05,320 --> 00:46:07,960
So, for physicians, in order to take
care of your patients,

575
00:46:07,960 --> 00:46:11,880
there needs to be transparency
and this completely breaks

576
00:46:11,880 --> 00:46:16,520
that down, and so, yes, it's very
upsetting for us

577
00:46:16,520 --> 00:46:19,880
because you want people to get
better but if you can't

578
00:46:19,880 --> 00:46:23,200
explain to someone what's happening
to them, how do you get them better?

579
00:46:23,200 --> 00:46:24,800
And then how do you find out

580
00:46:24,800 --> 00:46:27,640
if other members of their family
may have been exposed or other

581
00:46:27,640 --> 00:46:29,520
people that are in the area
have been exposed?

582
00:46:29,520 --> 00:46:32,240
Because no-one can talk about it
so it's,

583
00:46:32,240 --> 00:46:35,640
it really goes against
any type of modern medicine.

584
00:46:43,920 --> 00:46:48,000
You know, the thing is, I'm not
one for conspiracy theories or

585
00:46:48,000 --> 00:46:52,640
anything like that but this secrecy
is just...weird, really.

586
00:46:52,640 --> 00:46:56,400
You know, as a kind of academic,
as a scientist,

587
00:46:56,400 --> 00:46:59,160
you're wanting transparency.

588
00:46:59,160 --> 00:47:00,800
You want openness.

589
00:47:00,800 --> 00:47:04,240
I know it sounds cliched,
but you're wanting the truth.

590
00:47:04,240 --> 00:47:06,960
What Amy is talking about here
is just that.

591
00:47:06,960 --> 00:47:10,440
She just wants to know the data,
the scientific data.

592
00:47:10,440 --> 00:47:13,720
And the fact that that's been

593
00:47:13,720 --> 00:47:19,960
kind of held back is just really
exasperating.

594
00:47:19,960 --> 00:47:23,520
It's really frustrating to try and
get to the bottom of most of these

595
00:47:23,520 --> 00:47:27,600
real, you know, controversies
and what people want to know.

596
00:47:27,600 --> 00:47:30,280
They want to know, is it safe?

597
00:47:30,280 --> 00:47:31,800
We just don't know.

598
00:47:48,360 --> 00:47:51,560
'But there's one scientist who has
carried out a number

599
00:47:51,560 --> 00:47:56,760
'of studies on the potential impact
that fracking has on ground water.

600
00:48:04,960 --> 00:48:08,200
'Rob Jackson
and his research team have tested

601
00:48:08,200 --> 00:48:11,880
'hundreds of samples from drinking
water wells, like this

602
00:48:11,880 --> 00:48:17,960
'one in north-western Pennsylvania,
for evidence of contamination.'

603
00:48:17,960 --> 00:48:20,200
So where's the water coming from?

604
00:48:20,200 --> 00:48:23,640
Well, this is coming from a private
well for the house

605
00:48:23,640 --> 00:48:28,120
and it's coming from about 250 feet
under the ground, and what Tom's

606
00:48:28,120 --> 00:48:31,800
doing there is just hooking the hose
up and we'll purge the water, run it

607
00:48:31,800 --> 00:48:35,880
for a while to get a fresh water
sample from that, from that well.

608
00:48:37,280 --> 00:48:40,320
'The water is from a shallow aquifer
which provides drinking

609
00:48:40,320 --> 00:48:45,360
'water to the local community and,
unusually, it's full of bubbles.'

610
00:48:47,240 --> 00:48:49,480
What we have here is basically
a methane leak detector.

611
00:48:49,480 --> 00:48:52,280
This lets us determine
if the bubbles we're seeing

612
00:48:52,280 --> 00:48:54,320
are related to air
trapped in the water, if it's

613
00:48:54,320 --> 00:48:58,000
something combustible like methane
or ethane. You'll see as we...

614
00:48:58,000 --> 00:48:59,680
INSTRUMENT BUZZES
Wow!

615
00:48:59,680 --> 00:49:02,720
..get closer, you know, without a
doubt this is basically methane

616
00:49:02,720 --> 00:49:04,440
that's coming from the water.

617
00:49:08,160 --> 00:49:13,840
'This drinking water
is fizzing with gas,

618
00:49:13,840 --> 00:49:18,280
'so saturated that bubbles trapped
in a bottle quickly build up

619
00:49:18,280 --> 00:49:19,920
'to worrying proportions.'

620
00:49:23,760 --> 00:49:25,040
Oh, there's a pop there!

621
00:49:32,560 --> 00:49:34,000
Look at that!

622
00:49:35,240 --> 00:49:36,520
It's burning.

623
00:49:36,520 --> 00:49:39,840
A flaming bottle of gas.
That's a lot of methane.

624
00:49:39,840 --> 00:49:42,640
You don't want that in your water,
do you? Certainly don't!

625
00:49:45,920 --> 00:49:49,160
'By analysing the different
kinds of carbon

626
00:49:49,160 --> 00:49:51,600
'and hydrogen that make up
methane gas, Rob

627
00:49:51,600 --> 00:49:55,720
'and his team are able to determine
where this gas has come from.'

628
00:49:58,320 --> 00:50:01,760
Natural gas that's found underground
and is formed under high heat

629
00:50:01,760 --> 00:50:04,200
and pressure, millions
and millions of years ago,

630
00:50:04,200 --> 00:50:06,440
has a different fingerprint
than natural gas

631
00:50:06,440 --> 00:50:10,760
formed in shallower layers
by microbes, by biological activity.

632
00:50:12,960 --> 00:50:16,520
'Lab results are consistent
with water that's come up to the

633
00:50:16,520 --> 00:50:20,280
'surface from the deep shale layer
two miles underground.'

634
00:50:28,360 --> 00:50:33,200
This gas looks like what you find
naturally in the Marcellus.

635
00:50:33,200 --> 00:50:36,480
The gas is actually mined by
the companies for extraction.

636
00:50:36,480 --> 00:50:39,360
Right, so that's down at that
level where the fracking's going on,

637
00:50:39,360 --> 00:50:40,560
is it? It is.

638
00:50:40,560 --> 00:50:43,600
Could I drink this?
You could certainly drink it.

639
00:50:43,600 --> 00:50:46,600
I mean, yeah, all right,
should I drink this?

640
00:50:46,600 --> 00:50:50,920
I don't know, I probably wouldn't
be crazy about drinking it.

641
00:50:50,920 --> 00:50:54,200
I mean, apart from the bubbles,
it looks pretty clear
and all the rest of it.

642
00:50:54,200 --> 00:50:57,040
It does. I certainly wouldn't
want to drink it regularly.

643
00:50:57,040 --> 00:50:59,160
Would I drink that now? Absolutely.

644
00:50:59,160 --> 00:51:01,480
But would you, would
I want to drink that every day

645
00:51:01,480 --> 00:51:03,760
If I lived in this house?
Absolutely not.

646
00:51:05,160 --> 00:51:08,560
'One of his studies found
measurable amounts of methane

647
00:51:08,560 --> 00:51:10,640
'in 85% of the samples.

648
00:51:10,640 --> 00:51:14,480
'Now, methane can leak
naturally from deep underground

649
00:51:14,480 --> 00:51:18,000
'but the pattern that Rob
found is revealing.

650
00:51:18,000 --> 00:51:22,000
'He found levels that averaged
17 times higher

651
00:51:22,000 --> 00:51:27,680
'from water sources located within
a kilometre of a natural gas well.'

652
00:51:27,680 --> 00:51:30,320
Yeah, there's no
question that there are homes

653
00:51:30,320 --> 00:51:33,040
and historical data that
show methane in people's water

654
00:51:33,040 --> 00:51:35,760
long ago,
and there are stories going back

655
00:51:35,760 --> 00:51:38,880
generations of people being able to
light their water naturally.

656
00:51:38,880 --> 00:51:43,040
I think what we see is that
you have a much higher

657
00:51:43,040 --> 00:51:46,320
prevalence of that for people who are
living near a natural gas well,

658
00:51:46,320 --> 00:51:48,400
so it's not that that
doesn't occur,

659
00:51:48,400 --> 00:51:51,360
it's just it occurs a lot more
often if you're near a gas well.

660
00:51:51,360 --> 00:51:53,680
So, the million dollar
question, then -

661
00:51:53,680 --> 00:51:55,480
how is the gas getting
to the surface?

662
00:51:56,520 --> 00:51:59,800
Well, we think the most likely
pathway is through the well

663
00:51:59,800 --> 00:52:03,960
itself by drilling a hole
into the ground, by not sealing it

664
00:52:03,960 --> 00:52:07,760
properly with cement or by
using steel tubing where the joints

665
00:52:07,760 --> 00:52:11,840
aren't sealed, that it's actually
kind of leaking out the well itself.

666
00:52:11,840 --> 00:52:15,280
Probably not what
people are most concerned about

667
00:52:15,280 --> 00:52:19,160
and that's a direct
communication from thousands of feet

668
00:52:19,160 --> 00:52:21,920
underground, all the way up to
surface through the rock.

669
00:52:21,920 --> 00:52:24,840
So it's unlikely, then, that you
frack, and that there's a fracture

670
00:52:24,840 --> 00:52:27,160
goes all the way up
and gas starts to kind of follow it?

671
00:52:27,160 --> 00:52:29,040
Yeah, I think it's very unlikely.

672
00:52:29,040 --> 00:52:31,680
It's not impossible in an area
even like this where you have

673
00:52:31,680 --> 00:52:33,920
natural fractures
and fissures underground.

674
00:52:33,920 --> 00:52:37,160
A frack might connect to
one of those natural fractures

675
00:52:37,160 --> 00:52:39,560
but in general, I think
that's much less,

676
00:52:39,560 --> 00:52:42,440
much less likely than in a well
that's constructed poorly.

677
00:52:45,440 --> 00:52:48,520
'If he's right, it suggests
the problem here is not with

678
00:52:48,520 --> 00:52:53,160
'fracking deep underground
but nearer the surface
with well construction,

679
00:52:53,160 --> 00:52:56,640
'certainly when it comes to methane,

680
00:52:56,640 --> 00:52:59,000
'but he didn't find any evidence

681
00:52:59,000 --> 00:53:03,360
'here nor anywhere else
that fracking fluid
had leaked from a well.

682
00:53:03,360 --> 00:53:10,480
'It makes for a complex picture,
one that's just starting to emerge.'

683
00:53:10,480 --> 00:53:13,280
So it sounds like there's lots
and lots of questions,

684
00:53:13,280 --> 00:53:15,280
and, at the moment,
very few answers.

685
00:53:15,280 --> 00:53:17,520
Yeah, there are a lot
of unanswered questions

686
00:53:17,520 --> 00:53:19,880
but a lot of good people
in different groups around

687
00:53:19,880 --> 00:53:22,880
the country and around the world
trying to answer those questions.

688
00:53:29,160 --> 00:53:32,600
'And those questions are being
asked around the world,

689
00:53:32,600 --> 00:53:36,240
'because other countries, including
Britain, are set to follow

690
00:53:36,240 --> 00:53:40,240
'the Americans and start fracking,

691
00:53:40,240 --> 00:53:42,760
'because if you look at a geological

692
00:53:42,760 --> 00:53:48,600
'map of Britain, it's clear we have
substantial reserves of shale gas.'

693
00:53:48,600 --> 00:53:55,120
So what we're seeing now is, flying
over Britain, about maybe

694
00:53:55,120 --> 00:53:57,840
300 metres above the surface,

695
00:53:57,840 --> 00:54:03,560
and ahead of us you can
see following the road, is Mam Tor.

696
00:54:03,560 --> 00:54:05,880
So this is where
I was just the other day,

697
00:54:05,880 --> 00:54:07,520
walking around on that hill.

698
00:54:07,520 --> 00:54:08,960
What a great way to see it.

699
00:54:08,960 --> 00:54:12,160
And if we start to descend, now this
is the beauty of this model...

700
00:54:14,000 --> 00:54:15,600
We crash through!

701
00:54:19,200 --> 00:54:23,320
That's the ground, looking from
below, and what we see here is the

702
00:54:23,320 --> 00:54:29,680
bottom surface of the shale, and now
you can see clearly this landscape,

703
00:54:29,680 --> 00:54:33,720
places where the shale is deep,
places where the shale is shallow.

704
00:54:33,720 --> 00:54:36,600
Now we're coming out
somewhere in the north of England,

705
00:54:36,600 --> 00:54:37,960
by the look of it.

706
00:54:41,000 --> 00:54:44,800
And what we have here is
the Pennines, and to the right

707
00:54:44,800 --> 00:54:47,160
and the left or the east and west,

708
00:54:47,160 --> 00:54:51,360
the shale goes down deep underneath
those areas, so into Lincolnshire

709
00:54:51,360 --> 00:54:55,120
and, for example, under Blackpool
and under Lancashire,

710
00:54:55,120 --> 00:54:59,760
but also there's shale underneath
these areas here, north of London

711
00:54:59,760 --> 00:55:03,960
then curling round south of London
to Sussex and also into Hampshire.

712
00:55:03,960 --> 00:55:08,000
So a big question, really,
how much shale gas is there?

713
00:55:08,000 --> 00:55:10,720
All I can say is we know
a lot about how much shale there is

714
00:55:10,720 --> 00:55:13,440
but we don't quite know how
much gas there is.

715
00:55:13,440 --> 00:55:16,240
But it looks to me
that there's a lot of it.

716
00:55:16,240 --> 00:55:18,000
Yeah, there's a lot of shale

717
00:55:18,000 --> 00:55:20,880
so the chances are there's quite
a lot of shale gas.

718
00:55:20,880 --> 00:55:24,720
'The go-ahead to frack has been
given by the Government in Britain

719
00:55:24,720 --> 00:55:28,800
'but on a small scale, and it's
going to happen differently here

720
00:55:28,800 --> 00:55:32,880
'in a legal and regulatory framework
that's tougher than in the States.

721
00:55:32,880 --> 00:55:36,880
'For instance, in the UK, companies
will have to disclose

722
00:55:36,880 --> 00:55:38,920
'what's in their fracking fluids.

723
00:55:40,360 --> 00:55:42,400
'But what I think British engineers

724
00:55:42,400 --> 00:55:46,000
'and scientists will have to
convincingly demonstrate is not

725
00:55:46,000 --> 00:55:51,720
'just that they know the risks, but
that they will manage them safely.

726
00:55:59,080 --> 00:56:05,240
'There is one risk that arose here
that needs to be put into context.

727
00:56:05,240 --> 00:56:09,000
'When the first frack
happened in 2011,

728
00:56:09,000 --> 00:56:14,040
'it triggered an earthquake,
a small one, similar to the

729
00:56:14,040 --> 00:56:15,520
'hundreds that have taken place

730
00:56:15,520 --> 00:56:18,320
'in the last century
because of coal mining.

731
00:56:21,200 --> 00:56:24,600
'So, despite the alarm,
from that perspective,

732
00:56:24,600 --> 00:56:26,920
'the seismic risks are small.'

733
00:56:48,200 --> 00:56:52,920
I set out to explore the American
experience of fracking,

734
00:56:52,920 --> 00:56:56,320
and it seems to me that there's some
real lessons to be learned.

735
00:56:56,320 --> 00:57:00,200
From a technical perspective,
there's a consensus emerging

736
00:57:00,200 --> 00:57:03,200
that says that the risks of ground
water contamination are fairly low

737
00:57:03,200 --> 00:57:08,320
as long as you can ensure the
safe engineering of those gas wells.

738
00:57:08,320 --> 00:57:12,840
In the UK, a Royal Society
report came to pretty
much the same conclusion.

739
00:57:14,280 --> 00:57:15,960
You know, there's broader questions.

740
00:57:15,960 --> 00:57:17,880
I mean, should we do it?

741
00:57:17,880 --> 00:57:21,960
Do we want to do it? And what is the
ultimate price we're going to pay?

742
00:57:21,960 --> 00:57:25,120
Answering those questions isn't
just for scientists.

743
00:57:25,120 --> 00:57:27,200
It's for all of us.

744
00:57:52,840 --> 00:57:55,840
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