By Lloyd Burr
A model drilling rig popped up next to Parliament this afternoon in a bid to stop the practice of fracking.
Around 30 protestors attempted to set up their drilling rig prop, which wasn't real, on Parliament’s lawn but were kicked off by security staff.
They moved their protest to the main gates of Parliament and proceeded with a role-playing exercise – oil drillers versus protestors.
Anti-fracking organiser Jessie Dennis says she installed her own fracking rig to “prove the point that the Government doesn’t want it on their lawn and we don’t want it on ours”.
“It has been scientifically linked to earthquakes and it is incredibly fossil fuel intensive,” she says.
Hydrofracking, or fracking, is a process by which gas and oil is accessed by drilling into open rock deep in the earth.
The rock is then fractured by water, sand and lubricant chemicals inserted at high pressure down into shale.
A blast fractures the shale bed around the well which allows natural gas and oil deposits to flow freely back up to the surface.
Ms Dennis says fracking is the most dangerous form of fossil fuel extraction and it is happening in New Zealand.
“Communities such as Parihaka in Taranaki are already facing it happening in their area with dangerous chemicals being pumped under their ancestral homeland.
“We need to put a stop to fracking now, before it's too late,” Mr Dennis says.
Bans and moratoriums on fracking have been put in all over the place, she says, in France, South Africa, Australia and a number of states in America.
Ms Dennis says there are a number of places that have been ear-marked for fracking, the most concerning is in the Canterbury region and Hawke’s Bay – two regions where earthquakes have caused significant damage and loss of life.
“As we have seen with deep-sea drilling, the Government is on the side of the industry and they are becoming increasingly politically isolated in that sense,” she says.
3 News