Why a UK shale gas industry is incompatible with the 2°C framing of dangerous climate change
This piece is a response to Professor Robert Mair’s Royal Society science policy blog, “Hydraulic fracturing for shale gas in the UK – an opportunity to shape a constructive way forward” (In Verba, 26th Jan):
Professor Mair’s Royal Society post suggests that the development of a UK shale gas industry is compatible with the UK’s climate change targets. I suggest this conclusion is premised on a partial and overly simplistic interpretation of the UK’s muddled climate change obligations.
Shale gas within domestic carbon budgets
The development of a UK shale gas industry may be compatible with the UK’s domestic carbon budgets – just.
These budgets are however premised on a high probability of exceeding the 2°C threshold between acceptable and dangerous climate change and on a highly inequitable allocation of the global carbon budget to the UK.
Even under such lax conditions (and hence a larger UK carbon budget) there is a significant risk that a new and large-scale UK shale gas infrastructure could become a stranded asset within a decade or so of major shale gas extraction.
…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…
