Fracking: Earthquakes

(asked on 14th November 2018) - View Source

Question to the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy:

To ask the Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy, if he will make it his policy to introduce a requirement for independent well integrity tests at shale gas sites in the event of seismic events of greater than the red light 0.5 ML threshold occurring at such sites.


Answered by
 Portrait
Claire Perry
This question was answered on 21st November 2018

The Traffic Light System dictates that if an event of 0.5ML or above is detected and causally linked to operations, the operator must pause operations for 18 hours and reduce well pressure. Operations are only allowed to resume once regulators are satisfied that any risks have been appropriately mitigated and this includes consideration of well integrity by the Health and Safety Executive (HSE).

The HSE robustly and independently regulates health and safety across Great Britain. The HSE has a proven track record of taking enforcement action where breaches of relevant legislation have occurred and, as an effective and proportionate regulator, will continue to do so when appropriate.

Under our existing legislation, the HSE requires operators of oil and gas wells to maintain well integrity throughout the lifecycle of the well, from design and construction to final decommissioning. The HSE routinely inspects the well integrity risk management systems of oil and gas well operators, and verifies these inspections by scrutinising statutory wells operation reports sent weekly to the HSE by the operator.

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