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Can Liz Truss kick-start UK fracking by lifting the shale gas ban?

The new UK prime minister says ending a moratorium on fracking will “get gas flowing” within six months, but there are many reasons why a boom is unlikely

By Adam Vaughan

8 September 2022

Anti-fracking protesters

An anti-fracking protest in Blackpool, UK, in 2016

Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

Alongside plans to cap energy prices for two years, license new North Sea oil and gas fields and speed up deployment of clean energy, new UK prime minister Liz Truss today also said she would lift England’s moratorium on fracking for shale gas.

The prohibition of fracking in 2019 followed almost a decade of exploration for shale gas in the UK. Fracking transformed the energy landscape in the US, but faltered in the UK in the face of public hostility and …

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