The government must take action against fracking – putting the burden of fighting climate change on children is disgraceful

The thing that children across the world have in common, is that they will be the victims of today’s inaction. We need to promise them we'll make changes to prevent that from happening

Last Friday, thousands of children across Britain came together to protest against the government’s inaction on climate change and relentless planetary devastation. Surely, it’s time for the government to listen. Efforts to promote fracking must be suspended and resources should be focussed on renewable energy instead.

It seems ludicrous that children are having to walk out of classrooms in order to draw attention to this issue, especially when there is near consensus amongst the scientific community that the politicians in charge are leading us down a path towards environmental destruction. Atmospheric methane plateaued in the 1990s, but has seen a recent acceleration. This increase is best explained by the growth in fracking.

Reducing methane is one of the most effective ways to ensure that we meet our Paris commitments of keeping global temperatures below 1.5 centigrade. Methane is around 85 times more potent than CO2 and approximately 5 per cent of methane is leaked through fugitive emissions, making the fracking process more damaging than coal for climate change.

We should be investing in renewable energies instead, since fracking will prevent us from meeting our environmental targets. We must stand shoulder to shoulder with the EU and remain conscious of the fact that 80 per cent of fossil fuels cannot be exploited if we are to achieve our Paris commitments. That’s why we should be investing in solar, wind and tidal energy, and removing the moratorium on onshore wind turbines in England.

However, the Conservatives are relentlessly promoting the interests of the fracking industry by providing tax breaks and removing environmental safeguards, putting corporate interests ahead of public safety. Onshore wind turbines have been all but outlawed even though they are a more cost-effective electricity source than gas, nuclear and coal. Meanwhile fracking, which has been linked with earthquakes in urban areas has been allowed to continue rising against the tide of public protests.

In addition to causing earthquakes, fracking risks the contamination of the water supply. Hundreds of lorries will be needed to remove millions of gallons of water contaminated with hundreds of radioactive and carcinogenic chemicals during the fracking process. The cost of the infrastructure needed to treat contaminated water, the replacement of road surfaces destroyed by lorries and the damage to public health caused by diesel powered lorries clogging up our countryside will be borne by the taxpayer.

At the same time, a growing body of evidence is revealing the link between fracking, air pollution and health effects. Studies conducted in America have found an association between low birth-weight and proximity to fracking sites. This evidence underlines the need for rigorous environmental controls to safeguard local populations.

That’s why my fracking bill requires methane leakage to be limited to 0.1 per cent at the oil head and 1 per cent overall, instead of the current level of 5 per cent. In addition, the bill requires the capping of decommissioned fracking sites, bans flaring and requires the decontamination of water with strict controls over air quality.

I presented these recommendations to the Council of Europe which adopted them as policy. They were subsequently introduced by the newly elected French government under Macron which led to fracking being banned in France.

Similarly in the UK, it is imperative that fracking must be subjected to stringent environmental conditions. If it can’t – and in my opinion it won’t – then we should devote all our energies to supporting renewable sources of energy.

It’s no use the world coming together in Paris to stop irreversible climate change, but then to permit Brazil to tear down swathes of the Amazon for agriculture, the German government to rip up Hambach forest in order to extract more coal, and the UK government to promote fracking.

The thing that children in the UK, Germany, Brazil, the US and across the world have in common, is that they will be the victims of today’s inaction. They will be the ones that suffer the destruction of habitats, land, species and food supplies. They will be the ones who have to manage the burden of mass climate-forced migration and the conflicts it will bring. We all have a duty to listen to our children, look them in the eye and tell them we will make the difficult change necessary to safeguard their futures.

Geraint Davies is MP for Swansea West and presented his fracking bill to parliament ahead of the youth climate strikes