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But Prof Underhill said his research on the influence of tectonic plates on the UK suggested that the shale formations have been lifted, warped and cooled by tectonic action.
These factors make shale gas production much less likely.
“The complexity of the shale gas basins hasn’t been fully appreciated so the opportunity has been hyped,” he told the BBC.
Big US deposits
This is very different from the US, where big deposits of shale gas were created in the continental heart of America, far from the movement of tectonic plates.
Prof Underhill’s comments are based on an unpublished paper on tectonics. He said he deduced the impact on shale formations by chance.
He said: “I’m neutral about fracking, so long as it doesn’t cause environmental damage. But the debate is between those who think fracking is dangerous and those who think it will help the economy – and no-one’s paying enough attention to the geology.
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Prof Underhill said UK shale basins had been partly formed by magma under Iceland
Prof Underhill said: “For fracking to work, the shale should be thick enough, sufficiently porous, and have the right mineralogy. The organic matter must have been buried to a sufficient depth and heated to the degree that it produces substantial amounts of gas or oil.”
Iceland magma
Professor Underhill said the UK had been tilted strongly by tectonic movement caused by an upward surge of magma under Iceland.
This subsequently led the shale gas basins to buckle and lift, so areas that were once buried deep with high temperatures which generated oil and gas, were then lifted to levels where they were no longer likely to generate either.
The basins were also broken into compartments by folds which created pathways that have allowed some of the oil and gas to escape, he said.
A spokesman for the BGS said it could not comment formally on Prof Underhill’s comments as it had not done the research.
‘Very large potential’
Cuadrilla’s technical director Mark Lappin told the BBC: “We have noted the BGS estimates for gas-in-place and consider that volume to be indicative of a very large potential reserve.
“It’s the purpose of our current drilling operations to better understand the reserve, reduce speculation from all sides and decide if and how to develop it.
“I expect Professor Underhill would be supportive of the effort to understand the resource including geological variation.”
The government’s opinion tracker showed public support for fracking has fallen to 16%, with opposition at 33%. But it also reported a lack of knowledge of the technology, with 48% of people neither supporting nor opposing it.
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Robert Lighthizer said Nafta had “failed many Americans”
The US is looking for a “major” overhaul of the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta), a senior US trade official said as negotiations on the pact got underway.
Mexico and Canada defended the deal on Wednesday in the first day of talks to revise the trade agreement.
US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer said President Trump wanted changes beyond just updating the pact.
Talks between the three countries are expected to last for months.
“He is not interested in a mere tweaking of a few provisions and a couple of updated chapters,” Mr Lighthizer said in his opening remarks in Washington.
“We feel that Nafta has fundamentally failed many, many Americans and needs major improvement.”
The Nafta talks came as President Trump suffered a setback with some of the biggest US companies over his handling of violent clashes in Virginia.
Two key White House business advisory councils were disbanded on Wednesday after several bosses quit over how Mr Trump reacted to the far-right rally last weekend.
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Donald Trump has criticised car companies manufacturing vehicles in Mexico
Renegotiating Nafta was a major campaign theme for Mr Trump, who has described it as the “worst deal”. He blames it for the loss of US manufacturing jobs, a position that struck a chord with many voters.
Mexico’s Economy Secretary Ildefonso Guajardo said he was not surprised or deterred by Mr Lighthizer’s tough posture, which is in line with earlier US statements.
The US will be seeking changes such as stronger labour provisions and stricter rules of origin, which determine where companies can say a product is made. That measure is opposed by US automakers.
The US also wants to revamp the Nafta panels used to resolve disputes.
Canada maintains that those panels – which have rejected US complaints in the past for industries such as softwood lumber – are critical.
“It’s fundamental because the commerce department [in the US] takes a lot of measures and countervailing duties which sometimes are unjust and not founded, like in softwood lumber,” Raymond Bachand, one of the Nafta negotiators on the Canadian side, told the BBC.
“Through that mechanism – which is much faster than the WTO mechanism – we win and these decisions are reversed. So they’re fundamental.”
All three sides say there is an opportunity to “modernise” the agreement to reflect new technology and online business.
Chrystia Freeland, Canada’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, shared a photo of the talks on Twitter on Wednesday afternoon, saying it had been a “productive discussion … on the mutually beneficial economic relationship between Canada and the US”.
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These company names aren’t so strange but others in China are a little more unusual
China has banned companies from registering weird and long names.
Last year, Beijing banned any more “bizarre” buildings. In recent years the country has seen buildings shaped like a teapot and another resembling a pair of trousers.
Now, China’s State Administration for Industry and Commerce has continued the government’s crusade for normalcy with restrictions on such names as ‘scared of wife’ or ‘prehistoric powers’.
So, just how weird and wonderful are Chinese company names? Well, a few otherwise-unoccupied social media users in China have dug up some gems.
Skinny blue mushrooms
Some curiosities have crept into business names from internet memes.
“Shenyang Prehistoric Powers Hotel Management Limited Company” might sound weird but less so to Chinese sports fans who remember swimmer Fu Yuanhui.
She famously won a bronze medal at the Rio Olympics, afterwards declaring: “I have used all my prehistoric powers to swim!”
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China’s swimmer Fu Yuanhui attributed her win to her “prehistoric powers”
There are also lots of restaurants and cafes with the phrase “skinny blue mushroom”.
The phrase originated from a meme which mocked a man from Guangxi province who uploaded a video of himself talking about his loneliness while his girlfriend was away.
“Unbearable, I want to cry,” he moaned – but thanks to his accent, it ended up sounding more like “skinny blue mushroom”.
Scared of wife
One of the best known offbeat names on Chinese social media is a condom company called “Uncle Niu”.
Or, more accurately, “There Is a Group of Young People With Dreams, Who Believe They Can Make the Wonders of Life Under the Leadership of Uncle Niu Internet Technology Co Ltd.”
It’s not concise, but at least it’s positive.
Others aren’t so upbeat, especially when it comes to home life.
And given “Beijing Scared of Wife Technology Company” and “Anping County Scared of Wife Netting Products Factory” are both registered companies, the trend doesn’t seem to be limited by industry or region.
Lost in translation
The rules of written Chinese are vastly different to those of written English, so many names seem far stranger in translation than in the original tongue.
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Western company names often have no direct equivalent in Chinese
English names can seem pretty strange in Chinese too, and there’s a cottage industry among branding agencies to help western companies come up with names for the Chinese market.
Western company names often follow the name of their founder (think Boeing, Ford or Gucci), which might have no direct translation.
Or they might be a concocted portmanteau (think Verizon, which is the Latin word “veritas” meaning truth, with horizon bolted on to the end) or maybe even just tech nonsense (Etsy, Hulu).
“What we think is most important to come up with a name that captures the spirit of the brand,” says Tait Lawton, from Nanjing Marketing Group, which provides naming services.
Mighty liquid guard
Western companies sometimes try to phonetically replicate the original, or come up with a Chinese name that’s fairly neutral in meaning.
Others will come up with a new name that tries other ways of encapsulating the brand.
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A stable of treasure horses – or BMWs
“BMW’s current Chinese name is 宝马. It’s great. The first character means ‘treasure’ and the second character means ‘horse’. The sound is ‘bao ma’, starting with a B and M. Plus, it’s short. It just has a great feel to it,” says Mr Lawton.
He has a few other examples he likes too.
Pampers, for example, is 帮宝适 or “bang bao shi”, which means “helps make baby comfortable”.
Walch soap 威露士 or “wei lu shi” loosely translates as “mighty liquid guard”, and who wouldn’t want to wash with that?
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Baden-Wuerttemberg has firms which are “hidden champions”, says Professor Winfried Weber
Driving along the “romantic road” between two towns in Baden-Wuerttemberg in southern Germany it’s easy to admire the lush rolling hillsides, vineyards and picturesque villages.
But peer a bit closer and you catch site of a factory.
Look harder and you discover that this area between the historic towns of Bad Mergentheim and Wertheim is dotted with medium-sized or “Mittelstand” companies.
“You don’t expect to find companies here from the heart of German world class industry but they are just in between those valleys in these hills,” says Winfried Weber, professor of management at Mannheim University of Applied Sciences.
His passion for the privately owned – often still family run – Mittelstand companies is personal.
His grandfather was a clockmaker who was forced out of business by Japanese competition in the 1950s.
Today he says his mission is to tell the story of these companies’ current success.
‘Hidden champions’
He travels the world lecturing and hosts business delegations from South Korea and China.
“I tell them don’t go to Berlin, come here to this rural province in southern Germany,” he tells me as he drives along the gently winding road.
“You find here a very high concentration of world class Mittelstand companies in relation to the population,” he says.
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Mittelstand firms often manufacture and sell niche products
About 99% of German companies are small and medium sized. There are about 3.3 million of them.
Strictly speaking, they would have fewer than 500 employees to be classed as Mittelstand, but it’s a term that goes much deeper and has come to define a business mindset.
“In Germany a lot of those small and medium sized companies are doing exports from the beginning,” Prof Weber says.
“They try to be in the forefront of innovation, and find and define a niche, and then sell on an international level.”
And the most successful ones are world market leaders in their niche sectors, which Prof Weber says are “hidden champions”.
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Prof Weber says small German firms embody “patient capitalism”
This is where he believes much of Germany’s exporting prowess stems from.
“In Germany we have only 28 of the global 500 biggest companies but we have around 48% of those small world market leaders,” Professor Weber says.
We’re on our way to meet Gabriella Koenig, managing director of Koenig & Meyer, a “hidden champion”.
Her company makes music and microphone stands. If you’re a musician you have probably used one of them.
Slim with shortly cropped dark hair, she fizzes with energy and enthusiasm.
In the car park she introduces me to her 81-year-old father and both are keen to tell me the history of the company.
Gabriella’s grandfather started the firm with a business partner in the early 1930s in eastern Germany, but after the Second World War, they moved to Wertheim in the west.
Gabriella is the third generation to take charge.
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Gabriella Koenig’s firm, which makes music stands, has three factories
She goes into a vast noisy factory full of green metal-bashing machines.
“We have almost every production process in-house to guarantee the best quality so that we can really control every step,” she says above the roar of the machines.
True to the spirit of the Mittelstand, exporting has long been vital to the company.
“Already in the 1950s Koenig & Meyer was visiting the first trade shows in Frankfurt,” she says, “and found the first international partners.”
Today the company employs 280 people in three factories and has a turnover of 38m euros (£34m; $44m).
About 60% of sales are exports to 80 countries worldwide, with 70% of their turnover in Europe.
Gabriella says customers, “accept that the product can be 15-20% more expensive than a competitive cheaper made item.”
But has the weakness of the euro helped?
“I would say yes definitely. The euro helps us, as all other Germany companies who are exporting a lot,” she says.
Trade surplus
Germany has been criticised by its trading partners for exporting much more than it imports.
Last year it had a whopping current account surplus of just under $300bn.
Wage restraint in the last fifteen years and labour market and welfare reforms are all credited with making Germany more competitive.
Another criticism levelled at Germany is that it’s not investing enough at home.
The International Monetary Fund is urging the government to spend more on public infrastructure projects, which it says would encourage German companies to invest there too, and help re-balance its global trade.
But Prof Weber says that in spite of their exporting success, the Mittelstand does face challenges.
Succession can be an issue. Gabriella doesn’t have children but says the company will stay in the family.
Finding enough skilled staff is also a challenge – Koenig & Meyer trains employees on apprenticeship schemes.
However, Gabriella says, “it gets more and more difficult nowadays to find young people who will join the company.”
While there is clearly innovation in the Mittelstand, at Koenig & Meyer they come up with 20 to 30 new products every year, they are not Silicon Valley.
Prof Weber says Germany has, “fewer IT start-ups, we have less venture capital.”
But he says the outlook is long-term and, “You can say that our capitalism is more patient capitalism”. He also believes that others can learn from the Mittelstand.
“I think that the future big company will be a little bit like many Mittelstand companies, with a more down-to-earth approach, with flatter hierarchies and more responsibility, and more flexibility for the workforce.”
Ryanair has accused Lufthansa and the German government of conspiring to carve up collapsed airline Air Berlin.
Lufthansa is negotiating over buying Air Berlin planes, which are still flying following a 150m euro German government loan.
Ryanair said there was an “obvious conspiracy” between Germany, Lufthansa and Air Berlin to carve up the assets.
The German government rejected the accusation and said its support for Air Berlin did not breach anti-trust rules.
Air Berlin filed for bankruptcy on Tuesday, after its biggest shareholder, the Abu Dhabi-based airline Etihad, withdraw its financial support.
Over the past year Air Berlin’s passenger numbers have been in freefall. Last month the airline – Germany’s second-biggest carrier – lost a quarter of its customers compared with July last year.
‘Manufactured insolvency’
Germany’s economy minister, Brigitte Zypries, said that a deal whereby Lufthansa took over part of the insolvent airline should be struck in the next few months.
Ryanair said: “This manufactured insolvency is clearly being set up to allow Lufthansa to take over a debt-free Air Berlin which will be in breach of all known German and EU competition rules.
“Now even the German government is supporting this Lufthansa-led monopoly with 150m euros of state aid so that Lufthansa can acquire Air Berlin and drive domestic air fares in Germany even higher than they already are.”
A German economy spokeswoman said: “I reject the accusation by Ryanair today that it was a staged insolvency application.”
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Ryanair has lodged a complaint with the German regulator, the Bundeskartellamt, and the European Commission.
Lufthansa said it was already in negotiations with Air Berlin to take over parts of the company and was considering hiring more staff: “Lufthansa intends to conclude these negotiations successfully in due time.”
Other criticisms
Ryanair has in the past made other criticisms of the relationship between Air Berlin and Lufthansa.
Lufthansa has been operating 38 Air Berlin Airbus jets on its behalf under a “wet lease” arrangement. In January Ryanair chief executive Michael O’Leary described the deal as a “joke”.
He told the German magazine WirtschaftsWoche that the deal was “a takeover with the aim of dominating the market. Lufthansa controls the capacities of its most important competitor, sets the prices and decides where aircraft will start. The German authorities are doing nothing”.
Lufthansa’s interest in Air Berlin has also upset its own staff.
At its Eurowings subsidiary, unions are balloting cabin crew about industrial action after pay talks broke down – something the unions blame on Air Berlin’s collapse.
German cabin crew union UFO said: “The reasons why no solution could be worked out with Eurowings management became clear yesterday: the Lufthansa group can obtain cheap aircraft through Air Berlin’s insolvency and doesn’t need to take on its staff or their wage agreements.”
More competition
However, the demise of Air Berlin could open up the German market to more competition.
Ryanair and EasyJet have only managed to get a toehold at airports such as Berlin, Cologne/Bonn, Düsseldorf and Frankfurt.
Gerald Khoo, transport analyst at Liberium Capital, said: “Based on August schedules, Germany currently represents just 9% of EasyJet’s capacity and 7% of Ryanair’s, compared with 76% of Lufthansa’s, highlighting the relative importance of that market to each carrier.”
Ryanair has been targeting the German market, with new routes to and from Frankfurt.
Mr Khooo said: “We would expect German airports to move up the list of priorities for next summer for both major low cost carriers, whether or not they attempt to pick up assets and/or staff from Air Berlin’s bankruptcy process.”
Reuters reported on Tuesday that Easyjet was in talks to buy assets from Air Berlin. EasyJet declined to comment.
An activist investor hedge fund has agreed to halt its long-running feud with Dulux paint owner AkzoNobel.
US hedge fund Elliott Advisors reached a “standstill” agreement after clashing with Akzo over the way the company should be run.
The feuding was fuelled by a failed 27bn euro (£23bn) takeover bid for Akzo, which its management rejected.
Elliott has agreed to suspend legal action against the Dutch firm and back Akzo’s plans to improve the business.
Gordon Singer, the boss of Elliott’s UK division, said it was pleased to come to an agreement with Akzo.
In May, the hedge fund made a legal bid to force the removal of Akzo’s chairman, Antony Burgmans, after the firm refused to enter takeover talks with US rival PPG Industries.
PPG walked away from its bid in June and Akzo is now pursuing plans to strengthen its business, which include selling its chemicals division.
Mr Burgmans said he was “pleased our recent constructive discussions with Elliott improved understanding between both parties”.
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Elliott had sought to remove Antony Burgmans as Akzo chairman
Elliott has also agreed to back new chief executive, Thierry Vanlancker, at a shareholder meeting on 8 September.
The hedge fund oversees about $30bn (£23.5bn) of assets and has a reputation as a no-holds-barred activist investor.
The firm, founded by billionaire Paul Singer, is notorious for pursuing Argentine debt for more than a decade, seizing one of the country’s naval ships while it was docked in Africa.
Separately, Elliott has increased its stake in mining firm BHP Billiton as it looks to force the company to sell its US shale business.
Elliott took its holding in BHP to 5% in a bid to keep the commodities giant “accountable for delivering results”.
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Gardline operates 40 vessels, including crew transfer ships and survey catamarans
A British family-owned marine services company has been sold outright in a deal worth £40m.
Norfolk-based Gardline, founded by the Darling family in 1969, employs 750 people and has been bought by Dutch firm, Royal Boskalis Westminster.
Gardline’s activities include marine geophysical surveys, offshore geotechnical services and environmental surveys.
Boskalis has taken on the firm’s debts, which also amount to £40m.
In a joint statement, the firms said there were “significant synergies” between them.
Gardline operates 40 vessels, including crew transfer ships and survey catamarans.
Its head offices are in Great Yarmouth, with further activities in the USA, Brazil and Singapore.
Boskalis has a fleet of more than 900 vessels and floating equipment and 11,700 employees, operating in more than 90 countries across six continents.
“With the acquisition, Boskalis strengthens its position as marine services provider in north-west Europe,” it said.
Gardline’s profits have fallen in recent years, and Boskalis said the company had suffered from the downturn in oil and gas.
It said it was not forecasting Gardline’s finances would be turned around in the short-term but that the acquisition “positions Boskalis well for when end-markets recover”.
Earlier this month, Gardline secured contracts worth £6m with Scottish Power Renewables to carry out a range of pre-construction surveys across East Anglia offshore wind farm sites.
Boskalis has yet to respond to questions on whether jobs will be affected by the takeover.
The online retail giant says it will start recruiting engineers, operations managers, HR and IT specialists in 2018 ahead of the Severn Beach site’s opening next year.
‘Customer demand’
Other new warehouses are set to open in Doncaster, Warrington and Tilbury this autumn. The firm’s UK workforce will total 24,000 by the end of this year.
The decision to launch a Bristol site was driven by “increasing customer demand”, Amazon said.
It added the move would expand its selection and support small businesses using its online Marketplace and help these small businesses grow.
Filton and Bradley Stoke MP Jack Lopresti said: “This will bring more jobs to our area and offer careers with training opportunities, helping the local economy to grow.
“An international outward-looking company like Amazon will help us maximise the fantastic opportunities for our region after Brexit.”
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Argos has already admitted failing to pay the minimum wage
Workers whose bosses failed to pay the National Minimum Wage are to be refunded a record £2m, the government has revealed.
In its latest “name and shame” campaign, it lists 230 employers which have not complied with the law.
In total 13,000 employees have received – or will receive – compensation for their loss of pay.
Among the worst offenders were hairdressers and beauty treatment businesses, involving about 60 firms.
About 50 employers in the hospitality sector – including two fish and chip shops – were fined for not paying the minimum wage, or the National Living Wage for those aged over 25.
However the largest fine, of £800,000, was levied on Argos.
In February Argos admitted failing to pay 37,000 staff an average of £64 each. However, only a third of those are included in the latest figures, as the others were no longer working for the company at the time.
Employees had been required to attend briefings before their shifts started, but without being paid. They also had to undergo security searches after their shifts ended.
Sainsbury’s, which bought Argos a year ago, has already apologised for the mistake.
“I am pleased to say the issue was resolved quickly, and processes have been updated to ensure this cannot happen again,” said John Rogers, the chief executive of Argos.
‘Cheated’
Despite the government’s apparent success in cracking down on pay, it is thought that hundreds of thousands of workers are still not getting their legal entitlement.
In October last year the Office for National Statistics (ONS) put the figure at 362,000.
The TUC said the problem was still far from being solved.
“We know there are more wage-dodging employers out there,” said Frances O’Grady, the TUC’s general secretary. “TUC research suggests there are at least a quarter of a million workers being cheated out of the minimum wage.”
The current rate for the National Living Wage is £7.50 per hour.
The adult rate for the National Minimum Wage is £7.05 for those between 21 and 24.
