With hours of careful planning and  hundreds with train tickets at the ready the recent announcement to move to Balcombe, West Sussex, was a bold, slightly risky, but undeniably important decision.

It’s because right here, right now, there is community in Balcombe on the frontline of the fight for a better energy future, and they need more support.

For two weeks they have linked arms, blockaded roads, provoked an escalating national media debate and built a participatory camp and hub of community support to resist fossil fuel extraction. It’s inspirational, and if we want to win, we need more of it.

While fracking is only a part of the wider dash for gas, it’s a critical one, and currently the ‘sweet spot’ promise which masks the reality of heightened dependence on increasingly expensive gas imports.

We are not expecting the ‘shale revolution’ of the US, and both George Osborne and Cuadrilla openly admit their fracking project isn’t going to reduce bills. It’s is a shortsighted non-solution to an energy problem to which we have clean, sustainable, equitable answers, and we need to show it as such.  

It’s not that EDF and West Burton are being let off the hook either. Apart from a neat blow to the gas agenda, one of the most powerful things about any camp or community resistance is the ideas, inspiration and networks built that strengthen our movement for change and ability to stand up against injustice.

So to West Burton: it’s goodbye for now, but don’t worry – we’ll be back soon. And we’ll be bringing Balcombe too.