I will come to some of the hon. Lady’s concerns a little later.
First, we announced last December that fracking could resume with robust regulation, and I emphasise that nothing now prevents a licensee from bringing forward new drilling plans. Secondly, we provided the industry with much fuller geological data on the gas resource in the Bowland-Hodder basin, thanks to the work of the British Geological Survey, and our knowledge of shale resources will be further enhanced when we publish estimates for the Weald basin in the south of England by March next year. Thirdly, we have been very active in creating the right framework to accelerate shale gas exploration in a responsible way. Let me be clear. Accelerating shale gas exploration does not mean that communities will be put at risk.
We have a long history of successful onshore oil and gas production. Getting it right will benefit the industry where it matters in the long term, and across Government we are creating a coherent and concerted approach to shale. We have created the Office of Unconventional Gas and Oil to co-ordinate the activities of the regulatory bodies and Departments. We have a world-class safety and environmental regime with a joint approach to inspecting new exploratory operations, and for new and first-time operators, their key operations will be inspected, including the cementing and the main hydraulic fracture.
We are providing tax incentives to create a fertile ground for shale to prosper. We will consult shortly on a new pad allowance to help to unlock investment and to provide significant support to the industry, particularly during the critical exploration phase. I have already announced that next year we will launch a new round of onshore licensing, in which we expect a great deal of interest.
I turn to the planning and regulatory system, which will have a high degree of local scrutiny and prior consultation, which we are setting out in guidance that we will publish very soon. That guidance will not cover every issue when considering proposals for shale gas. It must be read alongside other planning guidance and the national planning policy framework, but it will carry weight in the system. The Government have heard loud and clear what the industry and others in the community have said about the importance of clarifying that the main focus of planning should be on the surface issues—traffic, noise, visual impact and so on.
Responsibility for regulating activities beneath the surface rests largely with the other key regulators. For example, seismic activity is regulated by my Department under our licensing arrangements; potential pollution
of ground water falls to the Environment Agency; and design and integrity of the wells rests with the Health and Safety Executive. It will, of course, be critical for planning authorities to be content at the planning decision-making stage that the issues that fall to the other regulators will be adequately regulated.
The Environment Agency and the Health and Safety Executive have already agreed to work closely together and have developed a joint approach to inspecting new exploratory shale gas operations under a memorandum of understanding. That means they have agreed a joint programme of inspection for the next series of hydraulic fracturing operations in England and Wales. For new and first-time shale operators, they will meet and advise them of their legal duties, and conduct a joint inspection of key operations, including the cementing and verification of cementing, and the main hydraulic fracture. In addition, my Department will check that the Environment Agency or its Scottish equivalent, the Scottish Environment Protection Agency, and the HSE have no objections before consenting to drilling operations.
If hydraulic fracturing for shale gas is intended, we will also require measures to address the risk of induced seismicity—namely, prior analysis of geological risks—and the submission of a detailed fracturing plan, including a traffic light control protocol, before my Department gives any consent for fracking operations.
It remains our strong view that there should be early and constant engagement by the operators with local communities and the key regulators before any planning application is submitted. I therefore welcome the industry’s commitment, in the community engagement charter, to engage earlier with local communities and to be transparent in their activities. However, close engagement with the regulators by such firms is also beneficial, helping to identify issues to be addressed as part of the planning application and other approvals at an early stage. That is the right approach to create a sound basis for a shale industry that can provide more energy security, jobs and investment.
The industry has said that we can expect about 20 to 40 exploration wells to be drilled here in the next couple of years, but I am clear—this point was also made by the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Rutherglen and Hamilton West (Tom Greatrex)—that success will come only if development is done in true partnership with communities. That means a responsibility to the communities that host shale operations, and there are two vital areas in achieving that: first, it is about engaging communities right at the start of every shale application, and secondly, it is about ensuring that where shale operations are hosted, local people feel that they are getting their fair share of benefit from the development of shale. The community charter that has just been adopted will now be consulted on in the autumn, and its proposals, I hope, will be developed further.
I now want to try to answer some of the questions that were put to me. The hon. Member for Worsley and Eccles South asked me about the impacts on adjacent wildlife sites, which are important issues to be addressed in the planning system. Where an environmental impact assessment is required, such issues will have to be addressed in the report. They will have to be consulted on and considered again by the planning authority on the basis of that report, before any decisions are made. If any SSSI or other European protected site might be affected,
a habitats assessment must be made, and that, too, must be similarly considered by the planning authority before any decision is made on planning permission.
The hon. Lady also asked whether the Growth and Infrastructure Act could allow shale and gas projects somehow to bypass local authorities’ planning permission. The Act allows for certain business and commercial projects, defined by regulation, to go directly to the national regime for obtaining planning permission. The Department for Communities and Local Government has consulted on the possible inclusion of oil and gas projects in that process, but in light of the responses to that consultation, I can tell her that option is not being pursued for the moment. We want those planning decisions to remain with the minerals planning authority in the normal way.
The hon. Lady also asked about the Columbia university study on the domino effect, where distant quakes in one place can trigger quakes at other water disposal sites. It is important to point out, as my hon. Friend the Member for North Warwickshire (Dan Byles) did, that the research relates to waste water disposal wells involving volumes of water much greater than those used in fracking. The injection of very large volumes of water can trigger quakes in the ground. That is not news; it has been understood for some time. However, as he also pointed out, that particular technique of disposing waste water is not used at the moment in the United Kingdom, and it is very unlikely that it would be approved if it were proposed.