Dáil Éireann Debate, Tuesday - 11 June 2013
501. Deputy Timmy Dooley asked the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources his views on whether a request to facilitate the development of fracking pre-empts the outcome of the Environmental Protection Agency assessment of the matter (details supplied). [27818/13]
View answer502. Deputy Timmy Dooley asked the Minister for Communications, Energy and Natural Resources in view of the fact that Loop Head, County Clare, was recently chosen tourism destination of the year by the Irish Times and is the subject of an application for an exploration licence for hydraulic fracking for the extraction of shale gas, otherwise known as unconventional hydrocarbons, the steps he will take to ensure that the natural beauty and other tourism resources of the Loop Head peninsula and other areas of County Clare and the country in general are protected into the future; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [27819/13]
View answerI propose to take Questions Nos. 501 and 502 together.
As the Deputy may be aware, in February 2011 my Department announced that it was offering Onshore Petroleum Licensing Options to Tamboran Resources PTY Ltd over 986 km2 in the Northwest Carboniferous Basin; Lough Allen Natural Gas Company Ltd over 467 km2 in the Northwest Carboniferous Basin; and Enegi Oil Plc over 495 km2 in the Clare Basin.
These "options" were valid for a period of up to a maximum of 24 months and gave the holder the first right, exercisable at any time during the period of the Option, to an Exploration Licence over all or part of the area covered by the Option. The licensing options awarded were preliminary authorisations and were designed to allow the companies assess the shale gas potential of the acreage largely based on desktop studies of existing data.
Exploration drilling, including drilling that would involve hydraulic fracturing was not allowed under these Licensing Options. Two of the three companies, which had been granted onshore licensing options in February 2011, have submitted applications for a follow-on exploration licence. My Department will initially evaluate these applications, focussing on the technical rationale underpinning the applications, along with the corporate information provided. Where the outcome of this evaluation is positive, further consideration of the applications will then be put on hold until after the findings of EPA Research Programme have been published. The key questions to be addressed by this research are, whether this technology can be used while fully protecting the environment and human health, and what the best environmental practice in using this technology might be.
The EPA is currently in the process of finalising Terms of Reference to engage the appropriate expertise to consider the potential environmental impacts of hydraulic fracking. These draft Terms of Reference have been the subject of a public consultation process and I understand that over a 1,000 submissions were received under this process and these are currently being examined. It is anticipated that following the engagement of the relevant experts, the study will take considerable time to complete, leading to a potential publication date in 2015.
I would like to confirm that any application for an exploration licence submitted to me that proposed the use of hydraulic fracturing as part of an unconventional gas exploration programme would be subject to a full environmental impact assessment. An Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) entails consideration of the potential impacts of a project on population, fauna, flora, soil, water, air, climatic factors, material assets, including the architectural and archaeological heritage, landscape and the inter-relationship between the above factors. Under the EIA Directive, it is not possible to permit a project unless it can be determined following assessment that it would not have an unacceptable environmental or social impact.
I would also like to confirm that it is not proposed to consider applications for exploration authorisations in respect of other onshore areas until the EPA Research Programme has concluded.
