Cuadrilla given extra year to evaluate fracking wells

Fracking firm Cuadrilla will not have to seal up the UK's only two shale gas wells at the end of June, as previously instructed by regulators.

Regulators have lifted an order for the controversial wells near Blackpool to be capped with concrete.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson has been under pressure from Conservative MPs to end a 2019 moratorium on fracking.

The move comes ahead of the publication of the government's delayed energy strategy.

The North Sea Transition Authority (NSTA) said the firm now had until the end of June 2023 to evaluate options for the Preston New Road and Elswick sites.

Cuadrilla chief executive Francis Egan said: "I would like to thank the Prime Minister and the Business Secretary [Grant Shapps] for seeing the light and realising - just in time - how absurd it would have been to force us to pour concrete down Britain's only two viable shale gas wells in the middle of an energy crisis.

He added that the suspension "will have a cul-de-sac ending unless we now reverse the moratorium preventing us from using the wells".

The NSTA said Cuadrilla applied for consent to keep its wells on 28 March, and it approved that just three days later.

"The North Sea Transition Authority has looked carefully at this application, alongside recent developments, and agreed to withdraw the requirement to decommission the wells by the end of June," the regulator said.

"Cuadrilla now have until the end of June next year to evaluate options for the Preston New Road and Elswick sites.

"If no credible re-use plans are in place by then, the North Sea Transition Authority expects to reimpose decommissioning requirements."