Earthquake forces temporary halt to UK shale gas drilling site

Residents woke up to ‘wardrobe shaking’ tremor as oil and gas exploration company investigates

A worker at the Cuadrilla fracking site in Preston New Road, Little Plumpton, Lancashire. Getty Images

Fracking was temporarily suspended at the UK's only active shale gas site after a 2.9 magnitude earthquake was recorded this week.

The tremor near Blackpool, in northern England, is the third in less than a week and by far the largest related to the drilling practice.

Oil and gas exploration company Cuadrilla ceased drilling under the UK government guidelines, whereby fracking must stop following any tremor detected more than 0.5 magnitude on the Richter scale.

Cuadrilla said no fracking took place at the weekend and it is investigating the cause of the tremor with regulators.

Local residents took to social media to describe a "wardrobe shaking" tremor at 8.30am local time. Stephen Cheatley, a local photographer, told The Guardian his house shook for five seconds and said it was a "pretty serious tremor".

“We appreciate this has caused concern for local people and by way of reassurance it is worth noting that this event lasted for around a second and the maximum ground motion recorded was 5mm per second.

“This is about a third of that permitted for construction projects,” Cuadrilla said.

Fracking is a practice that involves pumping water and chemicals at high pressure to release shale gas underground.

Cuadrilla says the UK’s 0.5 magnitude limit has inhibited the UK’s shale gas industry and would like Britain’s government to extend its licence beyond November’s expiry date to carry out drilling.

Britain’s regulatory body, the Oil and Gas Authority, says it must be “satisfied that controls are in place to minimise the risk of a seismic event or any disturbance to those living and working nearby” before drilling can be given the green light.

Local anti-fracking group Preston New Action Group Friends said its “very frightening when you hear a loud bang and things in the house rattle”.

Environmental groups have called for an outright ban on fracking.

UK shale gas reserves are substantially lower than previously thought. New research by science journal Nature Communications published this week found that the amount of shale gas available may be just one-sixth of the official estimate.

A UK government study in 2013 published under former prime minister David ­Cam­eron estimated that one site in Lancashire could provide the UK with up to 50 years of gas.