European Shale Gas and Oil Summit

I am sitting here waiting for the second day of two to start.

The subject of the morning is how to 'engage stakeholders'. It will be an interesting one since all the operating companies and support companies representatives that I talked to yesterday were extremely keen to let the public know what they were doing to make shale gas as safe as possible. It is no surprise that they think that no body trusts them, when actually, no body trusts them! They all believe that academics are the answer. 'People trust academics don't they!', they say. I say the problem is many fold. Perhaps the first one is in the title itself. If I go down the pub and say to the people there that I am interested in stakeholder engagement, I know what sort of response I am going to get. Yet the interest in shale gas in your average pub is extremely high.

Sam Schofield of Cuadrilla feels that it is 'naive' to assume that finding the right way to communicate the industry's method as the correct way is the goal. In fact it is 'arrogant'. He feels that a real open dialogue is required instead. Jennifer Moore, the Head of Planning at Chorley Council and Lisa Kirby of Hampshire County Council point out that council staff and planners are also mistrusted, and could be increasingly mistrusted as payments from the shale gas companies start coming to parish and local councils.

Andrew Austin of Igas makes a plea that the general public is out for information but just gets argument from the extremities.

My experience tells me that all the time you see the extremely for (companies and the Conservatives) versus those extremely against (various fracktivists). The BBC is one of the worst proponents of this, and that is important given that Sara O'Hara's team at Nottingham University have found in their polls that the great majority of people take their information on shale gas from the BBC, always set FoE or Greenpeace against a company spokesperson in the name of balance. Instead of balance, they get argument and drama. At the end of the day the BBC has failed in its remit to inform the public, instead generating only drama. There is no reason why the BBC cannot always ensure that an engaged academic occupying the middle ground can diffuse such artificial arguments.

20 Things politicians should understand ... (Part 4)

Continuing the previous three postings here is the last set of 5 more "Things politicians need to know about shale gas science", inspired by the recent Guardian article entitled "Top 20 things politicians need to know about science" from an original article in Nature.  

It is not just politicians that need to know this stuff - without it the whole debate is not possible.

16. Data can be dredged or cherry picked

Evidence can be arranged to support one point of view.

Shale gas is a subject which stirs strong passions and in which opinions are extremely polarised. I would say that more than 95% of public commentators hold a strong view on shale gas, yet the majority of the general public would like clear unbiased, evidence-based information upon which they can make their minds up.

Everyone should realise that Nature is unbiased. If we make certain decisions Nature will give us the unbiased consequences, whether good or bad. We have, therefore, a duty to be unbiased too.

This disconnection between the sources of advice and those who need it is worrying. The few who try to give balanced and factual information are constantly being badgered by both sides to accept views which are not based on tested or testable reality. In this way sources of independent advice are eroded and silenced.

One should realise that industry will not lie to you, at least UK-based industry will not. It is not in their interest to do so, and existing local, national and European regulations are such that there are huge penalties for getting it wrong, in the courts of justice and in the courts of public opinion.

Industry, will, however, put the best possible spin on what they are doing. In the past most of what they did was kept secret; not so much in order to keep the general public in the dark, but because most information is commercially sensitive in a competitive business market. Now, in the UK at least, there is a move towards being more transparent, such that the general public knows more of the information which the companies are using to make their own decisions. An example of this is the before and after water and air quality analyses that Cuadrilla carried out at Balcombe, which are freely available.

Individuals who are against shale gas do not lie either, but they also commonly choose results which and support their preconceptions.  For example, there are very real worries concerning the environmental damage that mining and processing of rare earth elements in China is causing.  Some of these rare earth elements, such as neodymium, are necessary to make the magnets that wind turbines use, and the by-products of mining and processing are toxic and radioactive.  Yet search for neodymium on the Greenpeace or Friends of the Earth web sites and you will not find it.  Rare earth element pollution is not consistent with the message that these organisations want to convey.  Since the pollution happens in rural China, it is simply ignored.  As lobbying groups, these organisations are simply controlling what is made public, and therefore behaving exactly like industry.

Studies have shown that the conscious or subconscious choice of results to fulfil preconceptions is a very human trait, and extremely difficult to guard against no matter how mindful the individual is.

George Bernard Shaw once said “The moment we want to believe something, we suddenly see all the arguments for it, and become blind to the arguments against it.


Scientists are trained to keep an open and unbiased mind, but even they have a duty to be constantly mindful of what the evidence says, and not to interpret the evidence beyond its limits. One of the best tests of such a commentator is to ask whether all of the evidence supports his or her main point.

The authors of the article “Top 20 things politicians need to know about science” concern themselves with the needing to know whether the authors set out to test a sole hypothesis, or happening across a finding in a huge data set. Data that one happens across when not looking for it can be extremely good, useful and relevant. However, often it is not applicable to the argument because it applies to a different group/location/problem/population etc., or was obtained using inapplicable assumptions or using different premises.

The question one should ask is whether the study was designed to answer the particular question it is being used on, and if not whether there are differences that make its use inapplicable.

17. Extreme measurements may mislead

Any set of data (concentrations of methane in ground-water, say) will show  

• natural variation between locations (due to different geological histories), 
• plus sampling (sampling may be atypical because it is done in areas where problems are suspected),
• plus bias (the concentration of methane may depend on some other unknown factor),
• plus measurement errors (different testers using different methodologies in different locations, or simply using erroneous methods, inaccurate tools or uncalibrated tools).

However, the resulting variation is typically interpreted only with respect to the distance to the nearest well, ignoring the other sources.

Difference, even extreme ones, may be due to a combination of other factors than that in which you are interested.

18. Study relevance limits generalisations

The relevance of a study depends on how much the conditions under which it is done resemble the conditions of the issue under consideration.

For example, there are limits to the generalisations that one can make from US data when trying to predict the effect in the UK or Europe.

19. Feelings influence risk perception

Broadly, risk can be thought of as the likelihood of an event occurring in some time frame, multiplied by the consequences should the event occur. People’s risk perception is influenced disproportionately by many things, including the rarity of the event, how much control they believe they have, the adverseness of the outcomes, and whether the risk is voluntarily or not.

According to David Ropeik roughly 20% of Americans still do not wear safety belts in motor vehicles. The risk perception literature would suggest that this is, in part, because we have a sense of control when we are behind the wheel, and the risk of crashing is both familiar and chronic—factors that make risks seem less threatening. The US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration estimates that if safety belt usage increased from 80% to 85%, 2,700 lives would have been saved in 2002 (National Center for Statistics & Analysis (2003) Traffic Safety Facts 2002: Occupant Protection. Washington, DC, USA: National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, DOT HS 809 610).

Similarly, many people fail to protect themselves adequately from the sun, in part because the sun is natural and because, for some of us, the benefit of a healthy glowing tan outweighs the risks of solar exposure. However, solar radiation is widely believed to be the leading cause of melanoma, which will kill an estimated 7,910 Americans this year (American Cancer Society (2004) Cancer Facts & Figures 2004. Atlanta, GA, USA: American Cancer Society).

Focussing on the negative aspects of a development such as a shale gas pollution incident may raise fear despite the extent, timescale and likelihood of the event being small, while ignoring the risks of not carrying out the development, which would include financial and social growth, provision of jobs, better health care etc.

Risk perception should be judged both ways: the risk of doing and the risk of not doing!

20. Dependencies change the risks

It is possible to calculate the consequences of individual events, such as an extreme storm, high tides and the availability of key workers. However, if the events are interrelated then the probability of a disaster is much higher than might be expected.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/capital-weather-gang/wp/2013/11/06/super-typhoon-haiyan-hits-category-5-an-extremely-serious-threat-to-philippines/

This is exactly what happened recently in the Philippines. The government was well prepared for storms because it gets lots of them (together with earthquakes and volcanoes – who would want to live there!?). It had dumps of emergency stuff distributed around the country. Yet a combination of a large storm, an unexpectedly large storm surge and the death or ineffectiveness of police and local government workers ensured that Typhoon Haiyan was a dreadful disaster.

 Most disasters that damage the environment and take lives in Europe are due, in the last analysis, to more than one factor, which exacerbate each other. That is the reason why all new and unusual processes have to be considered extremely carefully. Shale gas operations qualify for special care simply because we have not carried many of them out in Europe.

20 Things politicians should understand ... (Part 3)

Continuing the previous two postings here is the third set of 5 more "Things politicians need to know about shale gas science", inspired by the recent Guardian article entitled "Top 20 things politicians need to know about science" from an original article in Nature.  

It is not just politicians that need to know this stuff - without it the whole debate is not possible.

11. Seek replication, not pseudoreplication

Results consistent across many studies, replicated on independent populations, are more likely to be solid. There is nothing better than good quality data and lots of it from different locations. Unfortunately data is often man-power intensive and hence expensive. However, government and companies must be prepared to spend money on collecting that data if the general public are to trust their operations (and here).

Moreover, data from different scenarios or locations can often be combined in a systematic review or a meta-analysis to provide an overarching view of the topic with potentially much greater statistical power than any of the individual studies. This requires that data is made freely available between companies and to the general public as well as academics.

Since data is expensive and represents a commercial advantage, companies are not likely to share it or make it available on their own, however enlightened they are. Interestingly Cuadrilla have released a large amount of water quality testing data here and here because they recognise that it represents part of the community patrimony. It is hoped that this will continue. The government should take a central role in coordinating the archiving and publication of all shale gas data through, for example, the British GeologicalSurvey, but is currently avoiding it.

12. Scientists are human

It is not a case of companies bad, politicians bad, activists bad, scientists good – scientists are human too. Although most scientists take extreme care in balancing evidence and following a scientific rationale, a few are less than candid. One must always remember that scientists have a vested interest in promoting their work, often for status and further research funding, and occasionally for direct financial gain. This can lead to selective reporting of results and occasionally, exaggeration. Peer review is not infallible: journal editors might favour positive findings and newsworthiness.

All this adds up to the statement that scientists should not be believed blindly nor their statements regarded dogmatically. If shale gas extraction is to be carried out successfully, it needs the informed consent of the local communities – informed consent means listening to the statements of a range of scientists and others to form a balanced evidence-driven view upon which solid decisions can be made.

13. Significance is significant

Opinion is not important. The only way of testing data is by using valid statistical tests.

One of the most common ways of stating whether an effect, such as whether hydraulic fracturing has contaminated an aquifer, is real is the statistical significance or P-value. The P-value is a measure of how likely a result is to occur by chance. Thus P = 0.01 means there is a 1-in-100 probability that what looks like a link (say fracking and aquifer contamination) actually occurred randomly. We would call P=0.01 very significant as it also indicates that there is a 99-in-100 probability that the link is real. Usually P<0.05 is taken as the limit where a link is considered to be proven.

So far we have no data in the UK that can be used to carry out a test like this because there has been no fracturing where back-ground data is available (no fracking was carried out at Balcombe). Similarly, no background data is available in the USA and so proper statistical tests cannot be carried out there either. However, such tests will be common in future, in the UK at least, because companies are committed to carrying out before and after water quality tests on aquifers.

14. Separate no effect from non-significance

The lack of a statistically significant result (say a P-value > 0.05) does not mean that there was no underlying effect: it means that no effect was detected. A small study may not have the power to detect a real difference. For example, tests of local wild-life around the Balcombe drilling site may suggest that it suffered no adverse effects from disturbance by the drilling operation. Yet if the tests sampled too few animals it would not have the power to detect impacts had there been any. Even then, it would be extremely difficult to distinguish between disturbance by the drilling operations and disturbance by the large number of protestors.

15. Effect size matters

Small responses are less likely to be detected and may fall below the measurement sensitivity of whatever instrument is being used. However, a study with many replicates might result in a statistically significant result but have a small effect size (and so, perhaps, be unimportant).

Let’s take drilling or fracturing induced earthquakes. When hydraulic fracturing is carried out it results in thousands of tiny earth tremors by definition – the whole process is designed to make fractures in the rock and each fracture formation is an earthquake, however small. These earthquakes are mapped in the sub-surface by microseismic methods, and it is possible to see where each one occurs and to delineate the fracture network that forms. If one correlated these earth tremors with the hydraulic fracturing process, there would be, not surprisingly, an extremely significant result -  an apparent smoking gun! However, all of these earthquakes have such a small magnitude that they are never felt at the surface, and are hence unimportant – in fact, a smoking pop-gun!

However, occasionally one earthquake might be big enough to be felt at the surface, but it would not materially alter the significance of the correlation. We must try to correlate problem earthquakes with hydraulic fracturing, but so far there are just too few for this to be possible (only two in the UK, and few in the USA where most of the bigger earthquakes associated with shale gas are not due to hydraulic fracturing, but the irresponsible and thankfully obsolescent habit of disposing of old fracking fluid by deep underground injection).

20 Things politicians should understand about shale gas science (Part 1)

In the light of the recent Guardian article entitled "Top 20 things politicians need to know about science" from an original article in Nature, and inspired by it, here are the first five of their points but with particular emphasis on shale gas extraction. But its not just politicians that need to know this stuff - without it the whole debate is not possible.

 

1. Differences and chance cause variation

The real world varies unpredictably. For some branches of science such as physics, the questions may be reduced to very simple experiments whose results are more straightforward to interpret. In Earth Sciences, as in Life Sciences, we cannot simplify the complexity of Nature, and hence scientific results may seem more open to interpretation. The important thing is to recognize that there is a natural complexity and variability and take that into account in the interpretation of scientific observations. There is, for example, a variation of the amount of natural methane in aquifer waters. We need to understand that before we can attribute methane in drinking water to shale gas extraction.

 

2. No measurement is exact

Practically all measurements have some error; and let's be candid here, errors are not bad things but a recognition that there is a limit to what we can do.

Some things cannot be measured very well. Imagine you want to weigh 10 grammes of salt but you only have a 5 kg kitchen scale, the chances are that you might weigh out anything between 1 gram and 50 grammes even if you are careful as can be.

Some things can be measured with incredible accuracy: Arsenic in drinking water can be measured accurately to about 10 parts per trillion! (The US EPA sets its safety threshhold for arsenic in drinking water at 10 parts per billion because it believes that arsenic is cummulatively dangerous at higher levels and it knows it can accurately measure these amounts.)

The good news is that measurement errors can be quantified and quoted easily. You should NOT trust any measurement unless it has an associated measurement error especially if the argument rests on the value of the measurement.

 

3. Bias is rife

Experimental design or measuring devices may produce atypical results in certain circumstances. The corollary is that it is not sufficient to just take the results of a study, but to understand how it was carried out.

For example, a study of gas in drinking water may show that there is more methane within 100 m of a shale gas well. An interpreter (politician, activist, scientist) might then say "shale gas is leaking into the aquifer and contaminating it." This is wrong. There has been no distinction made between thermogenic methane (shale gas, formed at depth by heat) and biogenic methane (naturally occurring methane in aquifers formed at shallow layers by bacteria).

Perhaps if the analysis showed that most of the gas was biogenic (which is actually the case), the interpreter may then say "As the gas is biogenic it was not caused by shale gas extraction." This may also be wrong because the drilling, though not contaminating the aquifer with shale gas from a deep provenance, has disturbed shallow biogenic gas in a way that it has entered the aquifer temporarily.

The results of studies should be carefully studied for interpretation bias.

 

4. Bigger is usually better for sample size

The average taken from a large number of observations will usually be more informative than the average taken from a smaller number of observations. That is, as we accumulate evidence, our knowledge improves. The problem with shale gas is two-fold:

• Most of the concerns come from the practice of shale gas extraction in the USA.
• Almost no scientific studies have been carried out there, although the situation is slowly improving, most opinion is not based on evidence.

It is extremely irresponsible to extrapolate the US situation to the UK and other parts of Europe for a number of reasons (population density, different shales, regulation and data gathering). There is already more high quality independent publicly available scientific data from the few wells drilled in the UK than for all the thousands of wells in the States. That is a result of the responsible attitude of the companies and government protection agencies. We need public overview to ensure that it continues.

 

5. Correlation does not imply causation

It is tempting to assume that one pattern causes another. However, the correlation might be coincidental, or it might be a result of both patterns being caused by a third factor – a “confounding” or 'lurking' variable. For example, it is tempting to believe that methane exists in aquifers because of shale gas drilling, and it is important to find out if that is true. However, we have already seen that an inability to discriminate between two types of gas (thermogenic and biogenic) can lead to misinterpretation, and acts as a 'lurking' variable.

Early studies in the US were not very good because they had not measured the methane in aquifers before shale gas extraction started and hence could not be sure that what they were measuring was natural or as a result of the drilling. These studies relied on the association of a rise in groundwater methane close to wells (other more recent studies have also found the opposite).

However, even if it were true that there is a correlation between well position and high levels of groundwater methane it does not imply that the drilling caused the groundwater gas concentrations. It may simply be that the wells were placed to extract shale gas at a position where gas has been reaching the surface naturally for millions of years. In other words, a well placed well.

In this example correlation does not imply causation, though:

• causation may exist too - more study needs to be carried out if this is suspected, and
• if gas has been reaching the surface naturally (not caused by the drilling), how is this the case? Are there natural pathways, fractures and faults that ease the transport of the gas? A responsible producer would be using science to have the best solution to these questions to ensure that the drilling operations did not exacerbate the effect.

The Price of Energy

The government has tried to explain how shale gas might reduce the price of energy. On the 19th of July 2014 the Chancellor George Osbourne said:

“I want Britain to be a leader of the shale gas revolution – because it has the potential to create thousands of jobs and keep energy bills low for millions of people.”

Many commentators including this blog have shown how unlikely that is.

However, shale gas could easily stop the incessant rise in energy prices by using shale gas revenue to support the development of green alternatives. 





What we saw at Balcombe was in some ways a triumph of free expression, responsibility, regulation and control. 

• The police guaranteed that protestors could express their opinions while upholding the rights of others. 
• Cuadrilla has shown a remarkably responsible approach to the development, especially in their lack of inflammatory language and their preparedness to consider and comission independent scientific measurements of the environment. 
• The responsible attitude was matched by the Balcombe Parish Council, whose report on the exploration before it started is a fine example of evidence-based pragmatism delivered in a clear way. I look forward to a summary report in about a year or so that describes their experience of all aspects of the exploration.
• The Environmetal Agency applied the existing regulations and control in what seems to be a fair and balanced manner, taking account of environmental sensitivities and recognising pragmatic approaches when necessary. Even after the  fact the Environmental agency are having meetings with the local residents to see if they can communicate and inform better.

The price of energy is an environmental issue, but it is also one of government policy, and a decision the government could make with very little delay is to pledge at least to stabilise energy prices for 5 years by using shale gas revenues.

Coal vs. Gas II: A perspective

Just how many premature deaths are there in the UK each year from pollution caused by coal-fired power stations? 

Greenpeace says the death toll was 2115 in 2010, which is slightly smaller than deaths due to road traffic accidents (2337).

In 2011, Balcombe had a population of 1424. 

Hence, coal deaths per year in the UK are the equivalent of wiping out Balcombe and its rural neighbours, and then doing it again in each subsequent year.

Diagram from the Greenpeace report "Silent Killers".

Premature winter deaths are even bigger (25,875 per year). That is the equivalent of wiping-out Haywards Heath (pop. 25,550 in 2006) next year! At that rate we can depopulate East Sussex (pop. 795,800 in 2012) in 30 years.

But what does it matter - these people were going to die anyway providing we do nothing. But if we did replace coal generation by gas and made some of the gas freely available for the exposed parts of our society, may be we could save at least some of these lives.

Coal vs. Gas Revisited

In June The Guardian reported on the release of an important Greenpeace report on coal-fired power generation. The summary made shocking reading:

"Air pollution from Europe's 300 largest coal power stations causes 22,300 premature deaths a year and costs companies and governments billions of pounds in disease treatment and lost working days" 

In fact a total of 240,000 years of life were said to be lost in Europe in 2010 with 480,000 work days a year. 

The UK was Europe's fifth most coal-polluted country in 2010, with 22,600 "life years" lost. Drax, Britain's largest coal-powered station, was said to be responsible for 4,450 life years lost, while Longannet in Scotland was said to be responsible for 4,210 life years lost.

The Greenpeace report is not scaremongering. In fact it is in line with studiesdone in the USA and previously reported in this blog. 

Greenpeace would like to replace coal with renewables, which is frankly impracticable. If, for example, we switched our coal generation to wind, it would require 851,000 5 MW windmills working flat-out all year. And that does not consider their effect on our environment, the radioactive and chemical pollution they cause in China, the lack of constant wind (except in some parts of the Houses of Parliament) and the lack of space for such a number of mills.

By contrast shale gas is a known, practicable, increasingly well regulated and greening industry. There are many reasons why we should produce shale gas, not the least of which is the saving of life and living potential that switching coal generation to gas generation would bring.

I would suggest we

·         produce shale gas,

·         compensate the PIMBYs,

·         tax the companies,

·         use revenues to boost the energy saving and renewable energy developments, as well as

·         making gas-fired power and heating available free to all families with children under 10 as well as those over the age of 70. 
 

Then we’ll improve social justice, save lives from coal pollution, reduce premature winter deaths (about 24,000 per year) significantly, and reduce our greenhouse gas emissions. 

Do nothing and coal-fired generation and pollution will go up as a result of imported coal (unwanted coal from the USA ironically), energy efficiency and renewable development will limp along, green-house gas emissions will continue to rise, and we will carry on trying to avoid thinking about the annual winter death toll.