Ireland poised to flout its own ban on fracking

Small bands of campaigners on the ecologically sensitive west coast of Ireland are fighting Texan fracking giant Fortress Energy over the import and onward transportation of environmentally disastrous fracked gas.

Ireland banned fracking in 2017  and in July decided to be the world’s first country to divest public money from fossil fuels  but moribund plans to build a terminal in North Kerry to import gas fracked from the USA were abruptly revitalised when Fortress Energy were recently allowed to buy the project with full planning permission.

Shocked environmentalists secured an 11th hour injunction to appeal An Bord Pleanala’s permission to Shannon LNG   and are determined that Ireland should abide by its own laws against fracking.

The text of the 2017 Prohibition of Onshore Hydraulic Fracking Act specifically prohibits the transport of fracked gas in Ireland

Anne-Marie Harrington speaking for pressure group Futureproof Clare summed up the shock and anger of local campaigners:

“This terminal will afford a foreign multinational licence to flout Irish law and pipeline fracked gas into Europe. As climate disaster looms we are effectively outsourcing the devastating environmental damage of fracking, subverting our climate change commitments and building the infrastructure of our own extinction”

Over a 20 year period fracked methane gas is at least 86 times more powerful than carbon dioxide as a greenhouse gas.

A recent explosion of a gas pipeline in Pennsylvania has raised fears of an environmental disaster – the pipeline had been operational for less than a week. 

 The proposed site at Ballylongford in the Shannon estuary is an EU Special Protected Area – one of the few places in Ireland where dolphins remain relatively undisturbed and resident all year round.

Activists note that energy security fears fuelled by Brexit and a perceived over-reliance on Russian gas has created a political climate in favour of Fracking and that fossil fuel magnate Donald Trump has pressured the Irish government to accept the terminal regardless of Irish law.

Local activist Emma Karran said that:

“We are the front line against Trump’s climate change denial and disastrous expansion of fracking – it is vital that Ireland stands by its climate change commitments and defends its own laws”  

The decision to allow the construction of the LNG terminal in Ireland would be a massive blow for anti-fracking campaigners in the USA, the UK and mainland Europe – many fear it would set a precedent for the eventual embrace of fracking in Ireland and elsewhere, placing big energy companies effectively above the law. 

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