BRITAIN’S anti-fracking campaigns are a triumph for social movement organising. Since 2011, it has rooted itself local communities using a diversity of tactics from door-to-door canvassing, legal challenges, planning interventions, protest camps and direct action blockades.

While this opposition at first emphasised the threats of water and air pollution, earthquakes and the erosion of local democracy, the movement is also now articulating its demands in terms global climate breakdown and the urgency of keeping all fossil fuels in the ground. With corporate energy giants planning to build large new gas-fired power stations across the country, anti-fracking activists are widening their focus to address the threat of fossil gas elsewhere.

Over the last eight years, a strong and effective movement has formed across Britain to prevent shale gas companies gaining a foothold. Now, parts of these anti-fracking networks are broadening their focus to confront the wider threat of new fossil gas infrastructure.

In February 2019, the “Supply & Demand” day of action, saw groups hold protests against the “Big Six” energy companies that are supporting fracking and planning new gas-fired power stations. If allowed to be built, these gas plants could provide a ready outlet for fracked gas. Both should be resisted.

The last 12 months have been a case of one step forward and many steps back for the struggling shale gas industry. Hydraulic fracturing began at Cuadrilla’s Preston New Road site in Lancashire last October 2018, but the company now finds itself unable to frack at profitable levels due to tight earthquake regulations. Planning permission for a second site nearby at Roseacre Woods in Lancashire was recently rejected by the communities secretary.

Elsewhere, Greater Manchester and Sheffield councils have announced a presumption against all fracking planning applications in their jurisdictions. And fracking firm Third Energy was forced to pack down its exploration site in North Yorkshire last year when ministers raised concerns about the company’s financial resilience  in the wake of the Carillion collapse.

These successes for the anti-fracking movement are testament to the organised campaigning that has boxed the industry in and made politicians reluctant to expend further political capital supporting a deeply unpopular energy form. Since 2011, the movement has rooted itself local communities using a diversity of tactics from door-to-door community building, legal challenges, planning interventions, protest camps and direct action blockades.

Trade unions came out against the industry since 2014 and their flags can be seen at many of the roadside protests outside drilling sites.

Cuadrilla and chemical giants Ineos who also have fracking licences, are now lobbying Westminster to lift the earthquake limits that they previously insisted they could operate within safely. Government regulations are only as strong as the public pressure that can keep them enforced.

While the fight against shale gas extraction is not yet won, some anti-fracking networks are expanding their focus to include the wider debate about new gas infrastructure in Britain. Climate activists from Bristol Rising Tide and Reclaim the Power which have prioritised support for frontline communities opposing fracking for many years, joined air quality campaigners for a demonstration against new gas-fired power stations outside the regional offices of Scottish, Southern & Electric (SSE). A string of fossil fuel companies including SSE, Drax, RWE and Scottish Power intend to bid for public funding to build large new gas plants.  

As the victory against Eon’s plans for new coal stations 10 years ago demonstrates, corporate energy giants will happily put forward dodgy fossil fuel solutions if they think they can get away with it — and if there’s public money available. SSE is planning to build three large new gas-fired stations: Keadby 2 in Lincolnshire is already under construction and two further plants planned for South Wales and West Yorkshire are in the planning stages.  

Meanwhile Drax power station is applying to replace its remaining coal units with units that burn gas (the rest are already burning trees). Client Earth argues these proposals would blow Britain’s climate targets.    

As a recent report by Sandbag illustrates, if all current gas development in planning was to go ahead it could lock Britain into emissions for the next 40 years at levels way above our international commitments under the Paris Climate Agreement. If these stations are built but not used, they risk becoming huge stranded assets propped up with taxpayer money. Like the frackers, fossil fuel companies argue that gas is a “bridge” fuel away from coal to clean renewables. But burning gas for electricity isn’t clean — it’s a bridge to climate breakdown.

Fuel poverty campaigners highlight the higher electricity bills that these gas proposals represent — as international gas prices can fluctuate significantly for decades to come. Wind and solar by contrast have no fuel costs once they are up and running. In February 2019 every one of the Big Six energy companies raised their prices for customers — even while their profits soar.  

Protesters Fuel Poverty Action and other groups gathered outside Centrica’s headquarters to demand clean, safe and affordable energy in warm, well-insulated homes — and an end to the company’s support for fracking.

The climate movement in Britain is changing. Thousands of young people are walking out of schools and joining in generalised acts of civil disobedience in city centres calling for climate justice.

Labour Party members, trade unionists and climate campaigners are organising Labour for a Green New Deal to transform the party’s entire economic vision. These signs are promising, because creating an energy system that prioritises the needs of people and planet rather than corporate profit will require a social movement that is ready to fight for it.

Robbie Gillett is an organiser with the direct action network Reclaim the Power.  

This July 2019, the network will co-organise an action camp in South East England drawing the links between new fossil fuel infrastructure, climate change, displacement and the “Hostile Environment” policy faced by migrants to Britain. www.reclaimthepower.org.uk