A charity has urged Christians to limit the amount of energy they use as fracking has resumed in the UK on Monday for the first time since it was linked with ea

Cuadrilla began drilling despite protesters blocking the entrance to the Little Plumpton shale gas site in Lancashire.

A police team had to cut a man and woman out of a set of tyres into which they had apparently cemented their arms.

Jonathan Essex from Green Christian told Premier why protesters opposed the controversial process.

Speaking during Premier's News Hour, Essex said: "Just because something is commercially viable, doesn't mean it's good.

"That's why many people including Christians are at the front gates of that drilling site saying, 'this is not acceptable - there is a climate crime about to be committed'.

The work had been due to start on Saturday but was delayed by the effects of Storm Callum.

It followed an environmental campaigner failing in a bid to halt the work at the High Court.

At a hearing in London on Friday, Mr Justice Supperstone dismissed Bob Dennett's application for an injunction preventing the company from fracking the UK's first horizontal shale gas well pending his proposed legal challenge.

Mr Dennett claimed Lancashire County Council's emergency response planning and procedures at the site were inadequate, but the judge ruled there was not a "serious issue" to be tried which would justify an interim order.

Essex said Christians shouldn't ignore the effects the drilling will have on the environment.

A police team cut a woman out of a set of tyres, which she had apparently cemented her arms into outside energy firm Cuadrilla's site in Preston New Road, Little Plumpton, near Blackpool.

"If you go back to Jesus and the stories of the Good Samaritan, when something's happened, when a crime is about to be committed or has been committed, we shouldn't just walk by the other side," he said.

He added: "It's up to us as Christians with a high moral standard to say, 'we've really got to challenge on what basis our society is being built'.

"I don't think fracking oil out of the ground or gas out of the ground for that matter is the right basis. We need to change the way we live.

"The climate scientists say we need to transform the way we live within the next twelve years and we're not going to do that just by pumping more oil out of the ground."

Listen to Jonathan Essex speaking to Premier's Alex Williams:

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