THE reasons why folk hold strong views about fracking for shale gas are many and varied, with some being mainly self interest while others take a much wider world view. Both attitudes have been well exercised in the recent planning decision to allow exploratory drilling in North Yorkshire.

Some suggest that as natural gas produces a third less CO2 than coal it's a less damaging form of energy. That might technically be the case with North Sea or Libyan gas, but shale gas is different because it requires hydraulic fracturing to force it out of fine grained shale.

This act requires a physical assault on the rock 10,000 feet down, by pumping in water, foam, a range of chemicals, some explosives, and sand grains to keep the pores open, all at a pressure of 8,000 lbs, four tonnes, per square inch.

As well as all the extra energy used to bring the supplies by road and pumping the toxic mix at pressure which all produce extra CO2 there are a number of other negative side effects. Occasionally there could be surface subsidence and even earth tremors, such as the 35 Scale three earthquakes in Oklahoma in one week last year. The one near Blackpool in 2011 was the reason why the UK put fracking on hold.

However perhaps the most significant problem is the disposal of the toxic waste water, containing heavy metals, carcinogens and a mix of chemicals, by pumping it into boreholes and risking contamination of the local water supply.

All that's bad enough and should make us pause when deciding whether to frack or not but it gets worse as it's time that we called natural gas by its proper name.. It's methane, a carbon gas that's over thirty times as effective as CO2 in preventing heat leaving the atmosphere and so increasing climate change. After ten years it even becomes the longer lasting CO2.

Fracking figures are quite staggering. There can be over 100 well heads per square mile, not just the single one that we have seen on our screens in Kirby Misperton in North Yorkshire, and as their half life is about two years they need fracking a number of times to keep producing. The USA has over a million well heads requiring about thirty billion gallons of water a year.

The whole process encourages up to ten percent of the methane to escape, so increasing the atmospheric concentration and more climate change. Yorkshire won't suffer much away from the valleys, but millions in the developing world will starve, be flooded, or have their coastlines submerged.

So fracking is an unacceptable, short-sighted selfish abuse of the only atmosphere we have.