Let then eat cake says Dame Helen Ghosh

mayonnaise

michaels wrote: »

So flood defences we need to 'consider the evidence' but for fracking the answer is 'never' - sounds pretty open minded to me.

The NT manages about 630,000 acres, that's barely 1.5% of the UK's total surface. 'Never' is the right answer when fracking on NT properties is concerned.
I happen to be a firm supporter of fracking, but this shouldn't come at the price of giving up any of our most treasured natural heritage.
Nothing to do with nimby-ism, it's plain common sense.

BillJones

mayonnaise wrote: »

The NT manages about 630,000 acres, that's barely 1.5% of the UK's total surface. 'Never' is the right answer when fracking on NT properties is concerned.
I happen to be a firm supporter of fracking, but this shouldn't come at the price of giving up any of our most treasured natural heritage.
Nothing to do with nimby-ism, it's plain common sense.

But why would it be "giving up" our heritage? Would a few years of a few machines, in exchange for funds to use for decades, not be a decent thing to do? There's no reason that fracking should "damage" heritage any more than installing modern plumbing or electrics has.

CLAPTON

one remembers the faux outrage when BG dug up huge swathes of the country side to build the gas grid.

nothing can be seen now.

mayonnaise

BillJones wrote: »

But why would it be "giving up" our heritage? Would a few years of a few machines, in exchange for funds to use for decades, not be a decent thing to do? There's no reason that fracking should "damage" heritage any more than installing modern plumbing or electrics has.

Sure, the footprint of fracking will probably be quite small, but why even consider fracking on NT land before we even made a start with fracking on the other 98.5% of the UK.

CLAPTON

mayonnaise wrote: »

Sure, the footprint of fracking will probably be quite small, but why even consider fracking on NT land before we even made a start with fracking on the other 98.5% of the UK.

Whilst I'm not sure I'm in favour of fracking (lack of real facts and figures), I see no particular reason why my back garden should be favoured before NT land.

One would hope the decisions would be made on looking a combination of factors like benefits, cost, environment considerations (water supply, access etc)

mayonnaise

CLAPTON wrote: »

Whilst I'm not sure I'm in favour of fracking (lack of real facts and figures), I see no particular reason why my back garden should be favoured before NT land.

Why the need for exaggeration to make a point?
NT land = 1.5% of the UK
Your back garden and everybody else's back garden = an even smaller percentage of the UK.

There's plenty of space to frack without touching NT land, green belt and Clapton's back garden.

antrobus

mayonnaise wrote: »

....And on fracking she says no to fracking on NT land. Good.....

Actually she doesn't.

It's true that the National Trust has adopted a "presumption against fracking" on it's own land, however that position needs to be qualified by statements like "It doesn't mean that in time that won't change - if the environmental and visual impacts are negligible and it is part of a strategy to move to a low carbon economy."

Whilst it's also the case that certain comments made byHelen Ghoshsuch as "It's not for me to judge the relative merits of fracking versus wind turbines" or that the NT has an "open mind" on fracking have been taken to mean something quite different. (And got George Monbiot in quite a tizzy.)

See:
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/georgemonbiot/2013/oct/24/dame-helen-ghosh-fracking-wind-turbines-national-trust
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-24653826

JWF

You'll find that the mineral reserves are not controlled by the landowner anyway, so while the NT may be able to prevent the drilling rigs from being located on the land they own, they will not be able to prevent fracking from occurring directly under it. unless, of course, they come up with some very robust objections through the planning process.

CLAPTON

mayonnaise wrote: »

Why the need for exaggeration to make a point?
NT land = 1.5% of the UK
Your back garden and everybody else's back garden = an even smaller percentage of the UK.

There's plenty of space to frack without touching NT land, green belt and Clapton's back garden.

I have a large garden and I think it is very beautiful and many other people will see their own locality as special even if it is not owned by the NT.


Every-one's near locality makes up less than 1.5% of the land so presumably can also be excluded.

Ownership of the land does not seem the best way of deciding where to frack.

antrobus

mayonnaise wrote: »

....There's plenty of space to frack without touching NT land, green belt and Clapton's back garden.

The ownership of all oil and gas within the land area of Great Britain is vested in the Crown by virtue of the Petroleum (Production) Act 1934. If there so happens to be a shale gas reservoir that extends beneath land owned by the NT, or indeed Clapton's back garden for that matter, I'm not convinced that either of them can do frack all to stop someone extracting it.:)