It has been drawn to my attention that Mr Nick Grealy, self-styled ShaleGasExpert on Twitter, consultant and shale missionary, has called me a fake expert in a blog dated 17 December 2014. I have left it to my good friend Andy Skuce to respond to this smear, which he does in the first of several posts he is writing about the UK shale business. Andy has over 30 years in the hydrocarbon industry, and was formerly a Vice President of Encana Corporation. Turning his skills to climate change from a geologist’s perspective, he was recently a co-author of the famous ‘97% consensus’ paper, proving that there is a robust scientific consensus on anthropogenic global warming.
What is of greater interest than smear, the act of a desperado, is that Grealy has created a company, London Local Energy Limited (LLE) to apply for three onshore hydrocarbon prospecting licences in the UK. I have written to Ms Toni Harvey, head of onshore licensing at the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC), to clarify his and LLE’s credentials. Here is a copy of the letter, to which I have added extra comments (blue), links (red) and diagrams (click to enlarge).
Dear Toni
It has been widely reported in the press that London Local Energy Limited (LLE) has applied for three 14th onshore round blocks on offer within the M25; TQ18, TQ28 in NW London, and TQ26 in Merton and Sutton (Fig. 1). I am writing to provide you with some background information for your determination of this application. Continue reading →