The Council of State on Tuesday halted the extraction of natural gas in a part of Groningen which has been at the centre of a spate of earthquakes.

The council, which is the highest administrative court in the Netherlands, said the Loppersum gas works can only be used if extraction at other sites is no longer possible or if supplies are threatened. The ruling is preliminary and the final verdict will be delivered later this year when all complaints have been assessed.

There are five extraction points in the Loppersum area, where thousands of homes have been damaged by the quakes caused as the land settles.

Ministers agreed earlier this year to cut back the volume of gas extracted from under the province in an effort to reduce the earthquake risk.

In total, the government has set a ceiling of almost 40 billion cubic metres this year. Some three billion cubic metres of this should have come from the Loppersum field.

Campaigners had asked the court to halt gas extraction altogether. However, this is not an option because a ban would have a severe impact on supplies to the Netherlands and abroad, the court said.

Safety

The Dutch safety board said in a report in February the economic affairs ministry, drilling company NAM and the Dutch mining body have all ignored safety concerns in their pursuit of profit from the gas fields.

Tens of thousands of homes have to be shored up because of the damage caused by earthquakes.