Recent research from Duke University, in North Carolina USA demonstrating a strong correlation between fracking and contaminated drinking water supplies, see http://sites.nicholas.duke.edu/avnervengosh/duke-study-on-shale-gas-and-fracking/

This research has been peer reviewed and can therefore be deemed to be Indepenedent. The research paper has been published at http://sites.nicholas.duke.edu/avnervengosh/files/2012/12/PNAS_Jacksonetal2013.pdf , and their observation from data gathered from 141 drilling sites is that “Overall, our data suggests that some homeowners living < 1 km from gas wells have drinking water contaminated with stray gases " (sic).

The House of Commons Welsh Affairs Committee meeting of 22 Oct 2013 gathering evidence on shale gas in Wales, see website at http://www.parliamentlive.tv/Main/Player.aspx?meetingId=13991
Cutting to the chase they said that tens of thousands of wells will be needed across the UK to commercially exploit the shale gas reserves.

Perhaps we should setup a competition to guess how many will be needed across the Vale? Send your answers to @llantrithyd

If an estimate of 413 rigs in the Vale come true. What will you see flying into Cardiff airport?
http://commonsensecanadian.ca/birds-eye-view-texas-fracking-causes-rumble/
Amazing aerial photo of how fracking can change the landscape. Do we want this in the Vale, or anywhere in Wales or Britain?

Follow up:
I just got a message from @amy_youngs who took the picture. I asked her if anyone had found the site on google maps. “Luckily, someone found it on the map here: https://maps.google.com/maps?q=31.421485,+-96.326416&hl=en&ll=31.422218,-96.344261&spn=0.134475,0.209427&sll=31.421962,-96.324477&sspn=0.016809,0.026178&t=h&gl=us&z=12 …”

Any other google maps of other Fracking sites?

This is important to everyone that lives in the Vale of Glamorgan.

“A bank’s mortgage offer for a house was initially withdrawn due to its valuer being “unable to assess the property’s risk” from a West Sussex drill site.

Santander withdrew the offer for the house, 6 miles (9km) from the Balcombe site, following environmental searches.”

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-sussex-24640990

We are appealing to these landowners to think again and to prevent our rural landscape, health and environment from being exposed to this irreversible, long-term damage.

https://www.change.org/en-GB/petitions/evan-williams-and-w-philip-thomas-landowners-at-llantrithyd-don-t-allow-your-agricultural-land-to-be-used-for-test-drilling-for-gas

Extracts from the planning committee, including the condition(s):
Extract from minutes of PC meeting 03.10.13

We hope that you will support the petition we have started.

SIGN HERE

We are appealing to the landowners, Evan Williams and W Philip Thomas, to think again and to prevent our rural landscape, health and environment from being exposed to this irreversible, long-term damage.

By signing the petition you will be sending out a crucial message early on in the mad dash for energy riches that our natural environment and the health of local wildlife and residents must be protected.

Please visit and sign our change.org petition

then

Please email your friends, post on facebook and send a tweet.

You can also help us by printing of a petition and gathering names local, at schools, pubs etc.

Please contact us if you can help us spread this very important message.

Further development: Planning Committee Update

No longer taking place on the 6th June

There has been a further development regarding the Vale of Glamorgan Planning Committee’s meeting and proposed site visit. These will no longer take place on the 6th June. We are waiting for a new date to be confirmed and we will inform you of our newsletter, twitter @llantrithyd and here on the website.

D Day 6^th JUNE

• On Thursday June 6 at 10.30am, members of the Vale of Glamorgan planning committee will visit the site, between the chapel and Caemaen Farm on the Bonvilston to Llancadle road, where Coastal Oil & Gas Ltd proposes to drill its exploration borehole.
• On Thursday June 6 at 6pm, the same members will meet at the Civic Offices at Holton Road, Barry to consider the application.

We all stand together:

Let’s show the planning committee members in a dignified way that we care about this application by turning up at either or both locations at the appropriate time. Please let us know if you can or can’t make it so we can organise ourselves for maximum impact.

I can make 10.30am

I can make 6pm

I can make both

Sorry I can't make either

Any questions please email villagersagainstdrilling@gmail.com

You attendance can make ALL the difference.

The situation:

• A firm called Coastal Oil and Gas Ltd has filed a planning application (2013/00335/FUL) to drill an exploratory borehole 1,000m deep on agricultural land beside the Bonvilston to Llancadle road, between the chapel and Caemaen Farm.
• The company has already said that if it finds gas there it is likely to apply to extract it.

The facts:

• This is an inappropriate site for this activity.
• The field in question is in a prominent rural location and opens onto a blind bend on busy country lane with a historically high accident rate.

Within 1km radius of the proposed drill site:

• There have been 15 recorded sightings* of Priority and Protected Species, including the noctule bat, soprano pipistrelle bat, pied flycatcher, common grasshopper warbler, spotted flycatcher, the Eurasian curlew, European turtle dove, northern goshawk and bluebells.
• There are 11 recorded sightings* of Species of Conservation Concern, including the long-eared owl and green woodpecker.
• There are 39 recorded sightings* of Species of Local Conservation Concern, including the Iceland Gull, the wood anemone, agrimony.
• Lies a stretch of Ancient Semi-Natural Woodland*.

(*Source: South East Wales Biodiversity Records Centre (SEWBReC) )

• Lives a family of peregrine falcons*, for more than 10 years now, who are successfully breeding. The peregrine falcon is afforded the highest degree of legal protection under schedule 1 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981.

(*Source: The British Trust for Ornithology)

Within just a few hundred metres downhill of the proposed drill site:

• Lies The Llantrithyd Conservation Area, set up in March 1973 to preserve “the character or appearance” of an area of special architectural or historic interest.

The Conservation Area also seeks to protect Nant Llantrithyd brook and the biodiversity and wildlife that surrounds it.

In March 2009 the Directorate of Environmental and Economic Regeneration recommended to the Vale of Glamorgan Council cabinet that:

“Development which impacts in a detrimental way upon the immediate setting of the Conservation Area will be resisted.

“The Council will resist applications for change on the edges of the Conservation Area which would have a detrimental effect on the area’s setting.”*

(*Source: http://www.valeofglamorgan.gov.uk/living/planning/planning_policy/conservation_areas/llantrithyd.aspx )