My Lords, I think that the period for monitoring proposed in Amendment 113G—the previous 12 months—is unnecessary. The British Geological Survey found that background methane in aquifers is generally low. It also concluded that the majority of sites it studied showed little change in methane levels. That says to me that we should monitor situations on an individual basis, based purely on risk and not on anything else. Extensive monitoring like that proposed in the amendment is only going to delay safe projects from going ahead. Once we get a green light at an extraction site, we should get on with it.
On Amendment 115A, I do not see a great need for the Government to spend time putting together a report on fugitive emissions. Industry will already monitor emissions from the site; indeed, all the companies involved are committed to doing so. Fugitive emissions occur from leaks and poor-quality construction. In the UK the well design and plans have to be signed off
by the regulators and reported on, so that is unlikely to be a major issue. Civil servants could spend their time far more productively than producing such a report.