Fracking, if its opponents are to be believed, causes devastating earthquakes and before the decade is out the gas it produces will be responsible for us all either burning to a crisp or being drowned by raging torrents from the rising seas. And in the meantime methane leaks will turn kitchen taps into inverted Bunsen burners.

The process of releasing shale gas by pumping water into the rocks under high pressure can indeed produce minor tremors, such as occur around 15 times a year in the UK with no ill-effects, but the main issue is opening up more cheap sources of fossil fuel when government policy on climate change dictates the opposite. But although the UK imports it by the tankerload, fracking equals Trump-esque evil and that’s the end of the matter.

Judging by Edinburgh’s planning committee meeting on Wednesday, the new Beelzebub is data centres, and the direct comparison with fracking was drawn by a deputation from Hermiston Data Centre Campaign Group’s highly articulate representative Sarah Matthews fighting a proposal near Heriot-Watt University. Hyperscale centres are, she said, “huge black, noisy, meaningless boxes the size of 40 football pitches that distribute fine pollution particulates into the atmosphere”. What’s more, she claimed, they don’t deliver promised high quality jobs.

Bad news all round and apparently it’s only going to get worse if a moratorium isn’t called, except it wasn’t really a pause to clarify policy she was after, but an outright ban. “At what cost are we willing to consider hyperscale data centres? Are you truly willing to put the health of the people of Edinburgh at risk and diminish vital natural resources – land, water and energy forever?” she........

© Herald Scotland