Cuadrilla vs Lancashire: How a Fracking Company Assaults Planning Rules

About the Series

Cuadrilla Resources first attempted to frack in Lancashire in 2011, but tremors from its work led to a short-lived national moratorium on the activities. The company has since suffered planning rejections, a dive in fracking’s popularity with the UK public, and constant protest against its plans. But it has not given up.

In October 2016, Communities Secretary Sajid Javid overruled Lancashire County Council’s rejection of Cuadrilla’s planning permission to frack at its Preston New Road site. The company moved onto the site in January 2017. Its activities have been met with daily protests ever since.

This investigation casts light on the tactics Cuadrilla uses to circumvent planning restrictions on its activities: from allowing vehicles to take non-preffered routes into its site, to changing planning rules to better suit its activities, and lobbying to remove opponents from forums where the company can be publicly challenged.

In This Series

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Shale gas company Cuadrilla asked Lancashire county council to help it remove the chair of a group set up to discuss the local community's concerns about its fracking site, DeSmog UK can reveal. I...
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Fracking company Cuadrilla plans to avoid future breaches of planning permission at its shale gas site by applying to change the rules, rather than its operations, it has told Lancashire County Cou...
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When Communities Secretary Sajid Javid overruled local objections to push ahead with the government’s shale gas plans, residents were assured planning conditions placed on fracking company Cuadrill...