Member Article

Barclays-backed firm applies for fracking licence near North Yorkshire’s Flamingo Land

Yorkshire and London-based Third Energy, a company backed by Barclays, is seeking planning permission to frack for shale gas near the Flamingo Land theme park in North Yorkshire.

If approval is granted, fracking by Third Energy, which is 97% owned by Barclays Natural Resource Investments, the bank’s private equity division, could begin as early as next year.

The British Geological Survey has estimated that 1,300 trillion cubic feet of gas lies within the Bowland shale between Cheshire and Yorkshire.

If 10% could be extracted it could meet UK needs for 40 years according to The Telegraph.

The company will pay £100k in community benefits if it fracks the well, and 1% of revenues if it proceeds to producing shale gas.

The firm said that if the gas field proved commercially viable, it was “not unreasonable” to assume this could result in production of 1 trillion cubic feet of gas, generating £70 million payments to local communities over 20 years.

Rasik Valand, Third Energy chief executive, said: “Our analysis indicates that there could be a significant new gas reservoir in our North Yorkshire licence area.”

The site is less than a mile from Kirby Misperton, a village of about 400 inhabitants that is probably best known as the site of the Flamingo Land zoo and theme park.

However the proposals have met with criticism from local MP Anne McIntosh.

Anne McIntosh, Conservative MP for the Thirsk and Malton constituency which covers the site, raised concerns that tourism to the area could be affected.

She said:“People really will not look kindly on companies coming into Ryedale with their shaft sinkers and traffic movements to hydraulically frack at depth; potentially impacting upon tourism, leaving a legacy of spoilt landscape and ruining the countryside forever,” she said.

“Will visitors really want to sit behind hundred of lorries pre construction and taking the contaminated water away after construction?”

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Clare Burnett .