{"id":7368,"date":"2015-04-17T06:15:31","date_gmt":"2015-04-17T11:15:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=7368"},"modified":"2015-04-17T06:15:31","modified_gmt":"2015-04-17T11:15:31","slug":"fierce-opposition-heck-eu-lets-fracking-in-through-back-door","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=7368","title":{"rendered":"Fierce Opposition? Heck, EU Lets Fracking in through Back Door"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3 class=\"entry-title\"><a href=\"http:\/\/wolfstreet.com\/2015\/04\/16\/don-quijones-despite-fierce-opposition-european-commission-teases-open-back-door-to-fracking\/\" target=\"_blank\">Fierce Opposition? Heck, EU Lets Fracking in through Back Door<\/a><\/h3>\n<p>In Europe these days, the pace of legislative change is dizzying, as Brussels continues its blitz-like power grab.\u00a0Last year saw the birth of\u00a0the banking union. This year, it\u2019s\u00a0Energy Union. With the European Commission determined to push through an ambitious consolidation of the continent\u2019s disparate energy sectors, the coming months and years promise to be highly lucrative for energy lobbyists \u2013 particularly those representing the fracking industry.<\/p>\n<p>For the public, the Commission talks up Europe\u2019s renewable energy credentials. Behind the scenes, it is teasing open the back door to fracking, despite overwhelming public opposition across Europe.<\/p>\n<p>This is the finding of a\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/corporateeurope.org\/climate-and-energy\/2015\/04\/carte-blanche-fracking\">new report<\/a>\u00a0on the\u00a0<em>European Science and Technology Network on Unconventional Hydrocarbon Extraction<\/em>, otherwise known as \u201cThe Network.\u201d The study was published jointly by Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO) and Friends of the Earth.<\/p>\n<p>The Commission launched the Network in 2014 with the official aim of \u201cbringing together all relevant stakeholders (practitioners from industry, research, academic as well as civil society) to foster a common understanding on unconventional hydrocarbons.\u201d A closer look, however, reveals the Network as a Commission-funded lobby vehicle whose ultimate aim is to drive the industry\u2019s expansion across Europe.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>The Fracking Revolution Crosses the Atlantic<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>As the Guardian recently reported, America\u2019s shale revolution has had a huge impact not only at home but far beyond U.S. shores, including by providing a bonanza for the fracking lobbies in Brussels:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>From shale to climate-change policies, from car exhaust rules to renewables, from carbon-capture technologies to carbon-trading schemes, the energy lobby is highly active and successful in Brussels, with companies such as BP and Shell maintaining big operations aimed at shaping policy.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;click on the above link to read the rest of the article&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Fierce Opposition? Heck, EU Lets Fracking in through Back Door In Europe these days, the pace of legislative change is dizzying, as Brussels continues its blitz-like power grab.\u00a0Last year saw the birth of\u00a0the banking union. This year, it\u2019s\u00a0Energy Union. With the European Commission determined to push through an ambitious consolidation of the continent\u2019s disparate energy [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[95,279,281,284,331,412],"class_list":["post-7368","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-energy-2","tag-brussels","tag-eu","tag-europe","tag-european-union","tag-fracking","tag-hydraulic-fracturing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7368","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7368"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7368\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7369,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7368\/revisions\/7369"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7368"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7368"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7368"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}