UK

Proposed North Yorkshire fracking site becomes source of clean, geothermal energy

An underground well in the North Yorkshire village of Kirby Misperton was drilled but never fracked after a fightback by protesters. It has now taken on a "second life" as a source of clean, green, geothermal energy.

Tom Heap
Climate presenter @tomheapmedia
Saturday 21 October 2023


Tom Heap learns about how we can reuse gas wells for geothermal energy

Amid the fields of North Yorkshire, people who once eyed each other with enmity across rolls of razor wire are now walking side by side.

A proposed and highly contested fracking site has become the source of clean, green, geothermal energy.


In 2016, the North Yorkshire village of Kirby Misperton, like many others across Yorkshire and Lancashire, was a magnet for protest campaigners drawn by the threat of fracking.

Deep beneath the surface was a potential shale gas reserve and the way to extract it was to hydraulically fracture the rock, using water under enormous pressure.

If it went ahead, earth tremors were feared - and extracting fossil fuel was a certainty.

Steve Mason, then head of anti-fracking group Frack Free Ryedale, didn't like it.

"The proposal to frack in the area came along and, as a local resident, I looked into it," he said.

"The industrialisation, climate change and the need to get away from fossil fuels really motivated me."

Steve helped organise a protest locally and coordinated political pressure too - and, after two years of confrontation and 80 arrests, the opponents won.

The well was drilled but never fracked - leaving the site owners, Third Energy, with a deep hole in the ground.

Tom Heap with Steve Mason and Russell Hoare at the once highly-contested proposed fracking site

Its managing director, Russell Hoare, showed me the well and explained its second life. They are even re-using the two metre-high gas valve which caps the hole.

"This is the actual well that was drilled for fracking and it's about 3,000 metres deep, but the protesters were successful, and Steve was successful, in stopping that operation.

"But it's perfect for testing geothermal energy. There's hot water at the bottom. All we're doing is bringing it to the surface."

The well, in the North Yorkshire village of Kirby Misperton, is "perfect" for testing geothermal energy

How does geothermal energy work?

Geothermal energy comes from heat radiating from the Earth's molten core, with rocks beneath the surface warming by 30C for every 1,000 metres down.

So if you circulate water down a deep well and up again, you've got hot water on tap.

In a volcanic region, such as Iceland, you can get super hot steam for driving electricity generators - but here, they are more interested in showers and radiators.

The idea has garnered so much "green love" that Steve has now become a director of Third Energy.

"When we were campaigning, we had to say what the solution was," he said.

"You can't just say 'No, no, no' all the time. We need to be telling people this can be done and this is a solution."

The company, which spent a generation supplying gas into Yorkshire, including backing fracking, is now fossil fuel free.

Third Energy managing director, Russell Hoare, tells Sky News' Tom Heap he is not tempted to return to using fossil fuels

'No going back to fossil fuels'

But despite the huge profits being made by gas companies right now, Russell is not tempted to return to using fossil fuels.

"I think once you've seen what the potential is and you see people in the community come and feel the radiator and see the excitement, there's no interest in the company going back to fossil fuels."

On this site, the water heated by the Earth's core is making a couple of radiators nice and toasty in their shipping container "show home".

Once commercially exploited, they reckon this well could supply 300 homes, so we would need a lot more deep drilling to keep Britain warm.

Gas to geothermal conversion company, CeraPhi, thinks there are 680 wells in the UK ripe for conversion together with millions around the world, and that new wells can be sunk cheaply enough to expand further.

Such potential provokes interest. While we are on the site, chief executive Karl Farrow is showing around a group of academics and industry players.

They've had more than 100 such visitors in the past month.

Academics and customers being shown around the site in North Yorkshire - which has attracted 100 visitors in the past month

Karl told me: "Wells at the end of life can be repurposed and reused for energy.

"Using direct heat from the ground is a natural resource. It's there 24/7. It's baseload. It's on demand and it's infinite".

For now, geothermal energy is still very rare, but widespread cheap extraction of energy from the Earth's core would be a climate solutions gamechanger.

But more locally, what do the villagers of Kirby Misperton make of what is still an industry on their doorstep?

Tom Heap with Reverend Jackie Cray

Reverend Jackie Cray, a resident who was arrested during the protest, said she was "absolutely delighted".

"I think now the village has something positive to focus on, something that will provide local jobs.

"It does feel redemptive that something so bad - not just for the village, but actually for the environment and nationally - has completely turned full circle.

"And that's what redemption is in baptism. There's hope for the future and not just for our generation, but for the generations to come."

More focus needed on climate and social impact of dull buildings – top designer

Thomas Heatherwick said the public need to demand better from designers and the wider building industry (Ian West/PA)

By Rebecca Speare-Cole, PA Sustainability Reporter

Yesterday at 12:55

The world-renowned designer behind London’s new buses and the 2012 Olympic cauldron has called for a national conversation to confront the public health and climate issues caused by boring buildings.

Thomas Heatherwick, founder of the award-winning British design firm Heatherwick Studio, said the public need to demand better from designers and the wider building industry for change to happen.

It comes as he launches a 10-year global campaign to tackle the growing number of buildings that lack visual complexity, which coincides with the publication of his book Humanise.

Mr Heatherwick warned that the UK is demolishing more than 50,000 buildings a year while many buildings around the world are being pulled down within years of construction.

They're knocking down the buildings that society doesn't care about and nobody loves

Thomas Heatherwick

Speaking to the PA news agency, the designer said: “What do you think they knocked down?

“In general, they’re knocking down the buildings that society doesn’t care about and nobody loves, instead of adjusting and repairing and extending and adapting.

“There’s this sense of: ‘There’s a climate crisis. There’s an inequality crisis. There’s a health crisis. There’s a housing crisis – all these crises’ yet this is a problem for later.

“But in reality, it’s a problem for immediately now.”

Mr Heatherwick said the public needs to “fearlessly demand interestingness” to help put these issues higher on the agenda.

“Who are the people who are going to say: ‘Don’t knock something down?’” he said.

“It isn’t the designers. It isn’t really even the planners and it isn’t the property developers. Actually it’s us – the public. The public are the defenders.”

The designer added that global discourse around decarbonising the built environment, which accounts for 39% of annual emissions, pales in comparison to those around the aviation sector, which accounts for around 2%.

Thomas Heatherwick designed the new London buses (Dominic Lipinski/PA)

Mr Heatherwick is also calling for the social impact of boring buildings to be recognised.

A recent Think Insights poll of more than 2,000 British adults found that 76% of the UK public said boring buildings impact their mental health and that 67% feel powerless to get involved in how those in their area look.

Meanwhile, recent studies by those such as Canadian neuroscientist Colin Ellard suggest that buildings with a lack of visual complexity can spike cortisol levels and increase loneliness.

Mr Heatherwick also spoke about Grenfell Tower as an example of the poorest in society living in the worst buildings and research finding how rows of tower block buildings in Syria physically separated faiths, potentially contributing to divisions that led to conflict.

On why there are so many boring buildings, he argued that designers have been stuck under the influence of the post-Second World War fascination with mind over emotion as well as the Swiss-French architect Le Corbusier, who advocated for extreme functionality.

Mr Heatherwick said Grenfell Tower is an example of how the poorest in society live in the worst buildings (Victoria Jones/PA)

Mr Heatherwick also believes the industry has become an “echo chamber” that is “utterly disconnected” from the opinions of the wider public and is therefore failing to engage or bring joy to the millions of people who might walk past their buildings.

“What is now clear is that emotion is a function,” he said.

“When you are building the backdrop to public life, in effect your job is to some extent a public service and you need to make buildings that give something to public life.”

He said it is the current design mindset “coupled with chasing short-term profit” that has led to the current global landscape of unsustainable boring buildings.

Asked about higher costs associated with good design, Mr Heatherwick said: “Buildings are cheaper than they’ve ever been in history.

“While we do have immense challenges, we need to get perspective and look at the longer term and look at real value.”

He added that the industry openly acknowledges that there is a “green premium” where making a really sustainable, environmentally high building that strives to be net zero will cost a little bit more.

“But boardrooms, the investors, the companies who are going to use those office buildings or create them, they know that the investors, the big pension funds and the kinds of people who fund buildings – there is really now a moral compass,” Mr Heatherwick said.

The Olympic Flame at the Olympic Stadium in 2012, which was designed by Thomas Heatherwick (Adam Davy/PA)

“We’re still missing an ingredient though, which is the human premium.

“I think there’s a chance as mental health is starting to be discussed in different aspects of the world around us for it to be understood that there is not a disconnection between mental health and sustainability.

“They go together. Without things nourishing our mind, the environmental impact will be that we destroy things.”

Asked if he could face pushback against the campaign, Mr Heatherwick said he expects it from within the industry as he is taking “one of the most controversial approaches”.

“This is challenging the current way that teaching is done and practice is run,” he said.

Climate change may push up to 158.3 million more women, girls into poverty: SDGs Progress Report

If unchecked, climate change will significantly increase women's vulnerability to poverty and hunger, undermining hard-won development gains, according to a UN report.

Abu Dhabi [UAE], October 21 (ANI/WAM):

"Globally, by mid-century, under a worst-case climate scenario, climate change may push up to 158.3 million more women and girls into poverty (16 million more than the total number of men and boys). Food insecurity is projected to increase by as much as 236 million more women and girls, compared to 131 million more men and boys,'' said the "Progress on the Sustainable Development Goals: The gender snapshot 2023", the latest edition in the annual series produced by United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women) and the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA), and launched in Abu Dhabi on Friday.

"Investments in a comprehensive SDG stimulus package would help to mitigate this effect, reducing the number of women falling into extreme poverty from 158.3 million to 43.3 million. But the impact will still be less than what could be achieved if the world abates climate change now, before it gets exponentially worse.

A recent review of national climate action plans, known as nationally determined contributions, found that only 55 have specific climate adaptation measures referring to gender equality and only 23 recognize women as agents of change in accelerating progress on climate commitments.

Multi-sectoral plans and efforts to respond to climate change must prioritize women and girls mostat risk. A lot more is also needed in the areas of conservation, disaster preparedness, adaptation and resilience, including expanding women's access to quality health, education, economic opportunities and information,'' the report noted.

"Progress on the Sustainable Development Goals: The gender snapshot 2023" presents the latest evidence on gender equality across all 17 Goals, including prevailing trends and gaps on the road to 2030.

The report calls for an integrated and holistic approach to advancing gender equality, including via greater multi-stakeholder collaboration and targeted and sustained funding in support of the gender equality agenda. Failure to scale up and invest in gender equality now will place the entire 2030 Agenda forSustainable Development in peril.

 (ANI/WAM)

Climate change poses existential risk to children, says paediatrician

Dr Camilla Kingdon said that the Government must ‘take action on poverty and health inequalities’ (Dominic McGrath/PA)
By Luke O'Reilly, PAToday 

Climate change poses an existential risk to children, the UK’s most senior paediatrician has said.

Dr Camilla Kingdon, the president of the Royal College of Paediatrics and Child Health (RCPCH), said that extreme weather, pollution, and “unprecedented energy costs” are having a “very real” detrimental effect on young people.

Dr Kingdon said: “Climate change poses an existential risk to the health and wellbeing of all children; however, the current impacts of climate change are not experienced equally.

“Extreme weather, air pollution and unprecedented energy costs are having a very real and detrimental effect on our most vulnerable children and young people.”

She said that healthcare professionals are already seeing its impact across the UK, with children from low-income families facing increased mortality risks.

“Every child is at grave risk of the effects of our changing climate, but none more so than children in lower-income families,” she said.

“These children are facing an increased mortality risk from extreme weather events, exacerbated respiratory conditions from dirty air and even increased rates of cancer, diabetes and obesity.”

Dr Kingdon added that the Government must “take action on poverty and health inequalities” while also emphasising the unequal impact of climate change.

As part of Dr Kingdon’s statement, the RCPCH has made a number of policy recommendations.

The recommendations include that the Government appoints a Cabinet level Minister for Children, and that all four UK Governments commit to engaging with young people when developing climate change and health inequality policies.

The RCPCH also called on all four UK Governments to introduce a statutory obligation to conduct a children’s rights impact assessment when developing policies that impact children and young people.

 

Premiers ask federal government for COVID-19 small business loan extension

Dirk Meissner, 

Up to 250,000 small businesses across Canada face uncertain futures if the federal government continues with its repayment options for a COVID-19 loan program, says Dan Kelly, president of Canadian Federation of Independent Business.

Kelly applauded a joint letter sent Friday to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau from Canada's premiers asking the federal government to extend the repayment period for a year for interest-free loans given to small businesses and non-profits during the pandemic.

He said extending the loan repayment time period by a year would give more businesses the opportunity to qualify for a $20,000 forgivable payment on a loan of up to $60,000, he said.

"The premiers are listening," Kelly said in an interview. "I sure wish the federal government was listening. Our estimate is if small business owners lose the forgivable portion, we believe up to a quarter million businesses — their future is at risk."

The federal government's Canada Emergency Business Account offered interest-free loans to small businesses during the COVID-19 pandemic, which included a $20,000 forgivable portion if the loan was repaid within a set time period, which has now been extended to Jan. 18, 2024. 

Kelly said most small businesses borrowed the money through the CEBA program during the pandemic, but extending the repayment period to increase the opportunity for businesses to receive the forgivable benefit will "help thousands and thousands of small businesses make it across the recovery zone from the COVID-19 damage they took on."

The letter signed by all the premiers said that small businesses, like most other Canadians, are feeling squeezed by the rising cost of housing, groceries and other daily essentials, and just when they are starting to recover after the pandemic they are facing higher inflation and interest rates."

"That’s why I’m joining other premiers in asking the federal government to give small businesses a chance to recover with more time to qualify for loan forgiveness and by extending CEBA loan repayments for another year," B.C. Premier David Eby said in a statement sent out with the letter to media. 

A spokeswoman for federal Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland said in a statement that the federal government has implemented several repayment options, including an extension last month on the Dec. 31, 2023 eligibility period. 

"The bottom line is that, if you are a small business and do not currently have the funds to repay your CEBA loan, you now have three years to repay it in full," said press secretary Katherine Cuplinskas.

"The CEBA program, which delivered over $49 billion to nearly 900,000 small businesses and non-profits across the country, was an essential part of the federal government’s swift response to the COVID-19 pandemic," she said. "The additional flexibility that we announced is significant support for small businesses who might still be struggling to make ends meet."

The premiers' letter follows the recent request by Eby and premiers Doug Ford of Ontario and Andrew Furey of Newfoundland and Labrador, that the Bank of Canada consider the human impact of further rate increases, and the potential for additional increases to drive up housing costs. 

"Whether it’s homeowners and renters, or small businesses struggling to recover, we need to support people in these difficult times," Eby said in the statement. "I would like to thank the other premiers in joining this very important request of the federal government and I am confident that Prime Minister Trudeau will respond positively to support small businesses."

The federal government's website says Ottawa approved CEBA loans of $40,000 and $60,000 for 898,271 businesses and the number of businesses approved for expansion loans of $20,000 was 571,851.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 20, 2023.