Fracking may be closer than we think

Friends of the Earth supply an interactive map showing where existing licences for fracking have been granted, and also areas that are under consideration for this alarming technology. We in Scotland have tended to assume that we do not come into these proposals – but we do. An existing licence covers a tract of land running from Glasgow through Stirling and spreads north-east as far as Glenrothes and Cupar. This means any application to set up hydraulic fracturing to mine natural gas will go ahead unchallenged.

More ominous from the Arran point of view is the area designated for potential fracking. This, coloured lime green on the map, begins just across the water in Largs and covers Bute and Cumbrae, Rothesay, Dunoon, Garelochhead and a wide swathe of territory running north of Loch Lomond into the Trossachs.