According to the Hollywood actor, who is also an active anti-fracking campaigner in the US, fracking can't be done safely, and globally we should be focussing on renewable energy sources instead.
Ruffalo was involved in the successful campaign to ban fracking in the State of New York, where the State’s Department of Health found that fracking posed a serious public health and safety risk to New Yorkers.
Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, as it is commonly known, is a process of drilling into the earth before a mixture of chemicals, sand and water is injected at high pressure to fracture the rocks and release gas.
Ruffalo’s message to the UK prime minister comes as public hearings for fracking begin in Lancashire. Cuadrilla – the company, which wants to frack in Lancashire - is appealing against the two rejected fracking applications from last year.
In a short video message filmed with green group Friends of the Earth, Ruffalo said: ““Mr Cameron you’re making an enormous mistake. Your people don’t want it [fracking], you have already told them once before that if they didn’t want it you wouldn’t push them to take it. You’re turning your back on your wo
Donna Hume, Friends of the Earth Senior Campaigner, said: “David Cameron is indeed turning his back on the people of Lancashire by ignoring their local democratic decision to reject fracking.
“The government admits that the more people know about fracking, the more they oppose it. That’s why Mark Ruffalo, who has seen the impacts of fracking first-hand, doesn’t want Lancashire to suffer the same impacts as so many states in the US.
“Mark Ruffalo is right: Mr Cameron must listen to the people of Lancashire and not force this risky and unpopular industry on the county or anywhere else in England.”
However, the government is unlikely to back down on the decision to frack in the UK, after MPs voted in favour of fracking under the UK’s national parks at the end of 2015 – a move which was slammed as “back-door tactics” by Labour and Liberal Democrats.
Speaking to BBC Countryfile Magazine, Energy minister Andrea Leadson, said: "Fracking for shale gas is our way of solving the trilemma of energy security, keeping bills down and moving to a cleaner energy future."
Watch the video message by Mark Ruffalo to David Cameron here
