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Ban Fracking and New Coal Mines

Liberal Democrat · what the evidence says

An independent, source-checked look at Liberal Democrat’s policy “Ban Fracking and New Coal Mines” — what it would actually do across the things that affect your life. Every claim below quotes the source behind it. How this works.

Prosperity & living standards — Mixed picture

minor · low confidence

Banning fracking and new coal mines has very little near-term cost to living standards because fracking was unlikely to lower energy prices anyway and the last coal power station has already closed. The main caveat is the impact on coking coal for steel, with long-term clean-energy job gains remaining a government projection rather than a settled fact.

The evidence

Biggest unknown: Whether banning coking coal extraction materially harms UK steel-sector competitiveness and associated jobs, or whether green-transition job creation projections materialise at the scale and in the communities claimed.

Our reading: On prosperity and living standards, this policy's near-term economic cost is minimal. The case for fracking as a route to lower energy bills or greater energy security is comprehensively undermined by the cited evidence: an expert consensus across multiple institutions holds that gas prices are set internationally, volumes would be too small to matter, and geological complexity makes UK fracking costly and uncertain. Maintaining the fracking ban therefore preserves almost no foregone economic gain. The coal-power dimension is similarly low-cost: the last coal-fired power station has already closed, so the ban formalises existing reality for electricity generation. The coking coal dimension for steel is a real concern — the ban explicitly covers all coal extraction including metallurgical uses — and expert opinion is genuinely split between those who see domestic supply as necessary for steel competitiveness and those who argue it merely delays green-steel transition. This is the main near-term drag on O13, but it is modest in scale relative to the whole economy. On the positive side, government projections and IPPR North estimates point to significant clean-energy job creation, particularly in areas previously dependent on fossil fuels. These are projected rather than measurable figures, however — they depend on policy delivery and investment materialising as claimed, and the evidence unit for IPPR North is from 2019. The verdict is therefore mixed but minor: the near-term economic cost is small (fracking ban largely costless; coal-power ban already fait accompli; coking coal effect uncertain and localised), while long-term living-standard gains from energy transition are plausible but not yet evidenced at scale. Confidence is low because the coking coal/steel interaction and actual job-creation numbers remain genuinely uncertain.

Cost of living — Little effect

minor · moderate confidence

Banning fracking and new coal mines is unlikely to make a meaningful difference to household energy bills or food costs, because experts agree fracking would not have lowered UK gas prices anyway and coal power has already ended. The main caveat is that long-run energy transition costs could affect bills, but that is driven by broader policy, not this ban alone.

The evidence

Biggest unknown: Whether the wider clean-energy transition funded alongside these bans ultimately lowers or raises household energy costs in the long run.

Our reading: The cost-of-living question here is whether banning fracking and new coal mines raises or lowers household energy bills or otherwise affects disposable income for ordinary people. On fracking: the ban maintains an existing restriction. The relevant question is whether lifting it would have reduced bills. The cited expert consensus — from multiple universities and the fracking industry's own trade body — is that it would not: gas is priced internationally, UK volumes would be negligible, and the economic viability was deeply uncertain. Maintaining the ban therefore has no meaningful bill-reducing effect foregone, and no meaningful bill-raising effect imposed. On coal mines: the UK's last coal power station closed in October 2024. There is therefore no direct pathway from a new coal mine ban to higher or lower electricity prices for households. The main residual question is coking coal for steel — which could marginally affect steel-intensive goods costs — but this is several steps removed from the essentials basket (food, energy, bills) that O2 measures, and no evidence unit quantifies a household-level effect. The direction is therefore negligible rather than 'improves' or 'worsens'. There is a plausible long-run channel — the clean energy transition supported by these bans could eventually lower bills if renewables outcompete gas — but that effect is driven by the broader investment programme, not by the bans themselves. Crediting the ban with that upside would violate the counterfactual discipline: the ban is a constraint on fossil fuel extraction, not a delivery mechanism for cheaper energy. No cited evidence shows a population-scale bill reduction traceable specifically to these prohibitions. The magnitude is rated minor rather than n/a to reflect the small but real long-term signal, with low confidence in its materiality.

Clean environment & nature — Helps

moderate · moderate confidence

Banning fracking and new coal mines removes two sources of greenhouse gas emissions, pollution, and seismic risk, helping protect the climate and environment over the long term. The near-term environmental gain is modest since the fracking ban was already in place and coal power has ended, but the long-term signal is clearly positive.

The evidence

Biggest unknown: Whether the ban on coking coal genuinely reduces global emissions or merely shifts production and imports from elsewhere, leaving net CO2 unchanged.

Our reading: The fracking ban was already in place since 2019 and the coal-power era ended in October 2024, so the near-term marginal environmental gain from this policy is limited — the most damaging uses are already stopped. However, the coal mine ban adds long-term legal certainty against new extraction, and the evidence is clear that fracking and new coal carry real environmental costs: seismic risks that could not be controlled (confirmed by a 2022 BGS review), air and water pollution risks, and substantial methane leakage that could make shale gas worse for the climate than coal. The potential emissions from a single large colliery (estimated at ~420 MtCO2e) are enormous relative to the UK's annual total, so foreclosing new mines carries genuine long-term climate value. The main contested area is coking coal: critics argue a domestic ban merely shifts steel-industry emissions to imported coal with no net global benefit. This is a real uncertainty but it applies to a narrow slice of the policy. On balance, the evidence — from climate advisers, the BGS, and institutional health bodies — points clearly toward long-term environmental improvement: eliminating seismic, pollution, and climate risks from both industries. The near-term gain is modest since the worst harms were already curtailed, but the long-term signal is positive and moderate in magnitude, primarily through cementing the trajectory away from high-emission fossil fuels consistent with net-zero commitments.

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