This afternoon Greenpeace activists have occupied the entrance to the South Downs National Park Authority building in Midhurst ahead of their AGM. Campaigners have set up a Not For Shale mock real estate roadshow in front of the HQ’s main entrance, featuring 4-metre-tall flags and a large map of the South Downs Park and surrounding area showing the level of opposition to fracking.
The protest comes just weeks before South Downs National Park Authority is set to become the first such authority to decide on whether to grant planning permission for shale exploration inside a National Park.
Recent Greenpeace polling showed two thirds of people in Sussex are against fracking[1], and three quarters feel there needs to be more debate before any drilling occurs. Celtique, the company applying for permission to drill, is refusing to reveal the locations of its next applications. In an attempt to bring some transparency, and an opportunity for the debate which Sussex residents want and Celtique are trying to avoid[2], Greenpeace have launched a crowd-sourced investigation into their fracking plans, and are appealing to the people of Sussex and the South Downs to send any information they have to a confidential email account, frackertracker.uk@greenpeace.org
Greenpeace UK energy campaigner Simon Clydesdale said :
“We need to fight back against companies and authorities who are trying to quite literally undermine the property and rights of people across the South Downs and Sussex, putting both the local environment and the climate at risk, without asking permission or even telling us what they’re up to. Celtique won’t show us their plans, so if you can do it for them, please get in touch. If you’ve got an idea of where the next frack pad might be, or anything else you think we should know, email us at frackertracker.uk@greenpeace.org - all emails will be treated with absolute confidentiality.”
Over 14,500 South Downs residents have expressed their opposition to fracking by signing up to a Greenpeace legal block against under-house drilling and a petition calling on David Cameron to ditch his fracking plans.
Later this afternoon Simon Clydesdale will address the SDNPA AGM and say :
“We’re in danger of industrialising some of the most beloved countryside in Britain for the sake of a small amount of oil which is likely to be uneconomic to extract. This is against the interests of the country, against the interests of Sussex and against the stated purpose of the South Downs National Park to ‘conserve and enhance the natural beauty, wildlife and cultural heritage of the area’. You’re the game-keeper here. It’s not your job to help the poachers.”
ENDS
Contacts:
Graham Thompson, Greenpeace UK press officer, 020 7865 8255
For stills, photo.uk@greenpeace.org or 020 7865 8294
Notes
About the survey
- Redshift conducted the survey among 527 UK adults living in Sussex. The interviews were conducted online by Redshift Research in May 2014 using an email invitation and an online survey.
- Two thirds (66%) of people in Sussex would like to see a moratorium on fracking, and nearly three quarters (73%) think more time should be allowed for a public debate on shale gas to take place before planning authorities make a decision on whether shale drilling should go ahead, according to a Redshift survey for Greenpeace UK.
Fracking in the UK
The only time high-pressure hydraulic fracturing has taken place in the UK was at Cuadrilla’s Preese Hall site in Lancashire three years ago, but operations were halted following tremors that geologists linked to fracking in the area, and evidence of fractured well casings.
Three weeks ago in the Queen’s Speech the government announced new legislation to allow shale gas firms to frack under people’s homes without their permission. Greenpeace is calling on local people to write to their local MPs urging them to vote against the fracking bill when it comes to parliament: https://secure.greenpeace.org.uk/page/s/stop-fracking-law
