A British energy exploration and production firm called IGas recently has estimated that the area it has been licensed to explore in the United Kingdom may hold as much as 170 trillion cubic feet of natural gas in tight shale formations similar to the shale formations that have revolutionized energy markets in the United States. How much of that gas can be extracted using fracking technology is not yet known.

A U.K. energy analyst notes that Britain is in the same place with hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, that the United States was in way back in 2001. Commercial development of the country’s tight gas resources is at least five years in the future and, perhaps, longer given the resistance to fracking that could develop.

Another British energy firm, Caudrilla, estimates that as much as 200 trillion cubic feet of gas may lie within its license area in northwest England. As much 400 trillion to 500 trillion cubic feet of natural could be present, enough to meet the United Kingdom’s needs for more than 100 years at the current consumption rate of about 3 trillion cubic feet a year.

Environmental groups like Friends of the Earth have begun arguing that fracking is both dirty and unnecessary, saying that the country should concentrate investment in renewable energy. Opposition will coalesce as exploration companies get closer to drilling, but that is likely only to slow the process, not stop it.

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