British Prime Minster Rishi Sunak told lawmakers Wednesday that fracking would continue to be banned. The move overturns a decision by his predecessor, Liz Truss, to lift a 2019 moratorium on that extraction method.
The British Oil and Gas Authority’s 2019 report persuaded the government to halt fracking “unless and until further evidence is provided that it can be carried out safely.” But Truss revisited the ban amid soaring energy prices as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Britain’s consumer price index
10.1 percent last month compared to the same period last year, with food inflation hitting 40-year highs. Britain is also spending billions to help households with their energy bills.But many Conservative lawmakers are opposed to fracking. The opposition Labour Party forced a vote reaffirming the ban last week in an attempt to divide Conservatives and Truss’s government.
Neither Sunak nor Truss have faced voters as leader of the Conservative Party. The last time the U.K. electorate voted the Tories into power was in 2019, when their manifesto included the anti-fracking pledge.The United States began large-scale gas production from shale around two decades ago, . Fracking sites are located in states including Arkansas, Louisiana, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania and Texas.Fracking has been politically controversial in the United States. Republicans have tended to support the method, noting its economic benefits. Politicians on the left are more split, with Sen. Bernie Sanders among those who oppose it.he supported a ban on new fracking.