Government denies watering down fracking amendments

The Department of Energy and Climate Change (Decc) has denied watering down the fracking amendments made to the Infrastructure Bill, saying the changes made mean they are “presented in a clearer and legal way” in the final Act.

The Labour party and environmental groups claim the 13 amendments the opposition added to the bill surrounding groundwater protection zones have been “watered down” in the final version which became law on Thursday.

But a Decc spokesman said greater protections to groundwater source protection zones will be added to the Act via secondary legislation once the government has provided “further clarity” on what constitutes a protected area. This is expected in July.

Shale gas developments in groundwater source protection zone 1 – an area of at least 50 metres and where water has a 50 day travel time to the water source – are banned and will continue to be so under the Infrastructure Act.

Groundwater source protection zones 2 and 3 (which have a longer travel time and a larger area) were intended to be protected under Labour’s amendments but Decc said “the way [the amendments] were initially presented meant you couldn’t do that in law”.

Shadow energy minister Tom Greatrex said: “Groundwater protection zones are defined—we know what they are—but the [climate change] minister [Amber Rudd] seems to be content to rely on the much more ambiguous term “protected areas” while having no sense of what those areas are.

“It is vital for groundwater, and sources of drinking water, to be properly protected.”

He added that Labour will, if they win the general election in May, introduce these protections to groundwater source protection zones.

Greenpeace energy campaigner Simon Clydesdale also slammed the Infrastructure Act. He said: “The regulations passed are so full of loopholes that they cannot be trusted to protect our water, countryside or climate.”