Danish Government Halts Total’s Shale Gas Exploration in Jutland
The Danish government has imposed a halt to shale gas exploration in north Jutland, less than two days after Total started its campaign on Monday. According to local media, the French company used a chemical which was not authorised in the environmental guidelines defined by the municipality where the operations were taking place.
“We will not tolerate this kind of violation of our environmental regulations” Anders Brandt Sørensen, the head of the municipality’s planning and environment committee, told DR Nordjylland, as reported by The Copenhagen Post.
He added that local authorities would keep an eye open on future developments near Vendsyssel. The Frederikshavn Council in Jutland issued its green light to the contested well in June 2014.
Total holds two exploration licenses for shale gas in Denmark - the Nordjylland exploration license that runs to 2016 and a second around the country’s capital Copenhagen which is equally valid till 2015. In both licences, the French company cooperates with Nordsøfonden.
On Tuesday, European Commission Vice President Maroš Šefčovič said that shale gas in Europe would find many obstacles on the way.
"I think that we have seen over the last years that, simply, geological conditions in Europe are different, that we are more densely populated than in the States and our citizens are much more environmentally conscious also because the potential sites could be much closer to densely populated areas,” he said during a conference in Brussels, in which he confirmed European commitment to support Ukraine.
In July 2014, Total said that it planned to drill Denmark's first test wells for shale gas in December 2014 or January 2015. In February, the company then announced it would have postponed the exploration by several months, due to a delay in the manufacturing of the drilling rig.
According to a survey published in The American Association of Petroleum Geologists Bulletin reported by Sputnik on Tuesday, significant reserves of shale gas have been discovered in Sweden.