Thats a huge flame…wonder how that will sit with their green focus and climate change agenda? 
I haven’t seen the ones in France, but did see the troglodyte houses in Tunisia, which were used for the filming of the early star wars movies.
Perhaps having many UK dwellings suddenly shifted underground might be a good idea in terms of insulation and that passive heating stuff that comes up in Grand Designs from time to time?
The fracking plans at the site we protested about got put on hold in the end and they will not be revived now, I don’t think. I hope not, anyway.
The site has changed ownership and is now owned by a company which is exploring the possibility of producing geothermal energy instead.
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GeoThermal seems to have almost as many disadvantages as Fracking:
What are the Disadvantages of Geothermal Energy?
1. Location Restricted
The largest single disadvantage of geothermal energy is that it is location specific. Geothermal plants need to be built in places where the energy is accessible, which means that some areas are not able to exploit this resource. Of course, this is not a problem if you live in a place where geothermal energy is readily accessible, such as Iceland.
2. Environmental Side Effects
Although geothermal energy does not typically release greenhouse gases, there are many of these gases stored under the Earth’s surface which are released into the atmosphere during digging. While these gases are also released into the atmosphere naturally, the rate increases near geothermal plants. However, these gas emissions are still far lower than those associated with fossil fuels.
3. Earthquakes
Geothermal energy also runs the risk of triggering earthquakes. This is due to alterations in the Earth’s structure as a result of digging. This problem is more prevalent with enhanced geothermal power plants, which force water into the Earth’s crust to open up fissures to greater exploitation of the resource. However, since most geothermal plants are away from population centres, the implications of these earthquakes are relatively minor.
4. High Costs
Geothermal energy is an expensive resource to tap into, with price tags ranging from around $2-$7 million for a plant with a 1 megawatt capacity. However, where the upfront costs are high, the outlay can be recouped as part of a long-term investment.
5. Sustainability
In order to maintain the sustainability of geothermal energy fluid needs to be pumped back into the underground reservoirs faster than it is depleted. This means that geothermal energy needs to be properly managed to maintain its sustainability.
It is important for industry to assess the geothermal energy pros and cons in order to take account of the advantages while mitigating against any potential problems.
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As I understand it, a lot of the disadvantages relate to digging and access.
On this site, the aim is to repurpose old gas wells which have already been dug.
I think it’s worth exploring whether they can use the heated water in the bottom of these wells without the level of environmental damage involved in fracking or digging new access wells.
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@Boot @Omah , thanks for those articles. Very informative and its plugged one of the many holes of my ignorance.
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I agree, and I did mention this elsewhere on the forum some time ago.
They’ve been mining coal here for two hundred years Pixie, and suffering subsidence for just as long. I don’t think fracking (which is a lot deeper) will bother us Yorkies much. And anyway, whichever kind of energy you prefer, there is always a playoff, even wind and solar.
You have to break eggs to make an omelette.
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…and you need fuel to cook it 
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It gets worse for the green brigade…They are asking for all retirees who worked at Drax power station to consider returning to work in an advisory capacity. They will shortly be returning to burning coal, and nobody knows how to do it. Only downside that I can see is, they are buying the coal from Poland (I think) when Drax is sat on the biggest coal field in europe…
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Personally I would not like to see fracking start again. Unless it’s in her back yard of course, then she can frack all she wants.
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The bottom line for Scotland as it is elsewhere, is that fracking only produces small amounts of energy from massive numbers of wells with massive ecological costs. Communities across Scotland are waking up to this threat and a rapidly growing community resistance is fighting the industry every step of the way.
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Succinctly put … 
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We’re sitting on the answer but no one wants to grasp that nettle, there are air scrubbers out there to clean the smoke from the chimneys.
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Yes I agree Rox, but I also believe that wind turbines are equally so in the respect that they cover large areas, need lots of maintenance, still use lots of oil, and are not a reliable source of power when it’s needed.
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When we are considering the damage that fracking will do to property and the water table, we should also consider what damage to third world countries we are doing with the extraction of lithium.
[
](In pictures: South America's 'lithium fields' reveal the dark side of our electric future | Euronews)
Not in our back yard…
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Yes I agree with you about those horrible wind turbines, we have a huge farm of them a few miles south of Thurso. You can see them for miles, there’s smaller ones dotted about as well in twos and threes.
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I’ve always been sceptical of them. It must cost a fortune in electricity to keep those gigantic desk fans going and I don’t think they turn fast enough to cool the air and help combat global warming 
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They make a heck of a noise at times when they do get going. I was heading up the A9 a while back going home, and I thought there was something wrong with the car, I pulled into a passing place near them and turned the engine off. It was then I realised the noise was the turbines not the engine.
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to frack or not to frack that is the frackin question - whether it is nobbling in the minds of pollies …how does the rest go??