On Wednesday, Lancashire County Council responded to applications by energy company Cuadrilla, which is hoping to drill for shale gas at two new locations in the county.

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A report on the applications to begin 'fracking' at sites at Preston New Road and Roseacre Wood recommends that planning permission be refused. Fracking is a controversial energy extraction technique that involves shooting water, sand and chemical compounds at high pressures into rock formations to release trapped natural gas

In their report, councillors said that, if permission was granted, work at the sites would risk disturbing nearby areas with noise pollution and increased traffic, including heavy goods vehicles servicing the sites.

In recent months, Lancashire has been at the centre of the debate over fracking in the UK. Although government ministers have expressed support for shale gas, claiming it will create jobs and improve energy security, environmental campaigners have suggested the invasive extraction method risks causing air and groundwater pollution.

They warn that those living in areas where fracking has been conducted are being unwillingly subjected to "An uncontrolled health experiment on an enormous scale."

Tony Holden, a farmer's son and agricultural engineer, who helped organise an anti-fracking protest involving many of the county's farmers in Preston last year, said that, if fracking goes ahead, "It's us in the community who will pay for it; us in the Fylde, with our property prices, our health and our children's health."

Mr Holden pointed to comments made in medical journal The Lancet last June by oil and gas engineer Michael Hill, who said that congenital health problems have been detected in people living within 10 miles of fracking well pads in the United States, where shale gas extraction has been carried out for nearly 20 years. Hill also said, "The reality of shale gas regulation in the UK is far from best practice… and far from that needed to protect the public and environment in [such] a densely populated country."

Responding to the councillors' recommendations on Wednesday, Frack-Free Lancashire spokesperson Bob Dunnett commented, "They’ve chosen noise and traffic as the reason to refuse permission for the planning application. Unfortunately, these are easy issues for Caudrilla to mitigate, though the company has said they can't reduce noise levels any further."

Mr Dunnett said that noise levels have already been exceeded at a nearby fracking site in the recent past. However, he continued, "[Councilors] have focused on immediate impacts, when there are much more serious issues. We are concerned about the long term effects; effects like groundwater pollution and health impacts will take years to appear, but it is these that will harm the farming community."

Mr Dunnett said that he is especially concerned that some areas which have been slated for shale gas exploration sit above the country's second most important aquifer – the Fylde Aquifer – which lies beneath parts of Lancashire and Cheshire. The Frack-Free Lancashire spokesperson said supporters' claims that fracking will create more jobs in the area are misleading, adding that Lancashire's important agriculture and tourism industries stand to suffer as a result of fracking.

Lancashire County Council's Development Control Committee will consider the councillors' recommendations next week. Mr Dunnett, who is the Fylde constituency's Green Party candidate for the upcoming general election, added, "This is only a small victory for us, but we are going to stop them."