About 3 decades ago, myself and a colleague, spent more than 10 years in the Persian Gulf energy business.
Then I retired but he moved on to work at the hydraulic fracturing sites in the Dakotas. As we still converse and share many ideas. So a couple of observations:
*"Fracking" is not new, being developed in West Texas some 75 years ago.
* Because of the geological rock/shale mix in virtually all of our north-west, the earth, up to a depth of 30,000 feet, has been acting as a filter/purifier for oil and methane for millions of years. As a result, the quality of their product, makes it the most desire-able/refine-able in the world.
* The Middle East has been drilling and exporting oil since the end of the Great War, 100 years ago. As result their costs are rising and their proven reserves declining; both steadily.
* Henry Ford commissioned Thomas Edison in 1904, both engineers, to assess the cost effectiveness of powering his Model T w/electricity rather than the internal combustion engine. After some 20 months of analysis and experiment, Edison declared it economically unfeasible. There has been no engineering breakthrough to challenge Edison's verdict.
We hold an enormous advantage here, if we can see our way to exploit it and stop kissing the rear end of the green weenies who are compulsively illiterate in both the science of energy and its economics.
Wind. solar, tidal and all the rest of their fantasies are just that.