A wave of news in 2013 about U.K. shale-gas regulation, geology and investment suggests we are witnessing an inversion in sentiment about British shale gas that sounds more like “Hello” than “Goodbye.”

After 2011, tremors were attributed to hydraulic-fracturing operations, and the completion technique was banned nationwide. Only a “Daydream Believer” could have been wildly optimistic about U.K. shale gas. But the December 2012 rescission of the fracing ban, and a proposed new shale-gas tax cut, suggest that the U.K. government is now singing from the “Let It Be” song sheet.

On July 19, 2013, U.K. chancellor George Osborne announced plans to cut shale-gas production taxes in half, from the full 62% normally paid by the U.K.’s conventional producers to a 30% rate for shale-gas producers. Parliament will review the plan after a short consultation period.

The import-dependent nation clearly could use some natural gas production “Help!” BP’s recently released 2013 Statistical Review of World Energy shows the U.K. had just six years of gas production in proved reserves at the end of 2012, the world’s second-lowest level (after Denmark, whose reserves represent a slightly worse 5.9 years of production).

The British Geological Society (BGS) recently upped its midrange gas-in-place resource estimate for the upper and lower Bowland Shale Outcrop to 1,329 trillion cubic feet (Tcf). The lower limit of the BGS range is 822 Tcf and the upper limit is 2,281 Tcf, although the BGS probability analysis found a 10% chance the resource could come in above that range or below that range.

It may seem to casual listeners that as the industry and government increasingly croon in unison “I Wanna Drill Your Land,” the environmental activists shout back “Get Off Of My Clods.” But as oil companies and local authorities work to improve social transparency, speed permitting, generate jobs, and potentially lower natural gas bills, it seems that more are thinking “We Can Work It Out.”

The U.K’s shale-gas leader appears to be Cuadrilla Resources Ltd. We don’t think that environmentalists will ever serenade Cuadrilla’s chairman, Lord John Browne, with lines from “To Sir, With Love,” but Cuadrilla is committed and well funded enough to continue down “The Long And Winding Road” to explore and potentially produce in the Bowland shale area.

Cuadrilla has amassed significant exploration licenses in the Bowland shale, has completed three exploration wells and estimates its Bowland license holds 200 Tcf of gas-in-place resources. In June, Cuadrilla sold a 25% stake in the Lancashire Bowland license to Centrica Plc for £40 million and commitments for up to £120 million for exploration and production.

Cuadrilla’s latest permitted exploration well was spudded on August 2 at Balcombe, in West Sussex. Cuadrilla plans more exploratory drilling in Lancashire County based on an environmental impact assessment and a related planning application and review which is expected to conclude in first-quarter 2014. In a process documented by Cuadrilla, drilling the well to its projected depth would follow, which would then enable fracturing and gas production flow test measurements to determine commercial viability.

Cuadrilla says the next steps in the application process would include petitioning U.K. authorities for a “permanent extraction license” and a local “permanent planning permission” to construct facilities. Then commercial production of natural gas could begin. Overall, the firm plans to drill up to six locations over the next several years, beginning in 2014.

Cuadrilla separately disclosed plans to share 1% of revenues per site with local government. A June 7 Bloomberg report cited Francis Egan, the company’s chief executive officer, as saying that commercial shale-gas production could begin as early as 2015.

Other firms known to have positions or lining up action in the Bowland and other U.K. shale plays include AJ Lucas Group Ltd. (co-owner of Cuadrilla with Riverstone LLC and now Centrica Plc), Egdon Resources Plc, IGas Energy Plc and Dart Energy Ltd., Coastal Oil & Gas Ltd., Celtique Energie Weald Ltd. and Eden Energy Ltd.

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