Frackademia

"Frackademia" - shorthand for bogus science, economics and other research results paid for by the oil and gas industry and often conducted by "frackademics" with direct ties to the oil and gas industry - has struck again in California.

It comes in the form of a major University of Southern California (USC) report on the potential economic impacts of a hydraulic fracturing ("fracking") boom in California's Monterey Shale basin that's hot off the presses, "Powering California: The Monterey Shale and California's Economic Future."

California Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown recently gave his cautious support to fracking, the toxic process via which oil and gas embedded deep within shale rock basins made famous by the documentary film "Gasland," currently a topic of contention in California. The new report gleefully says we could be witnessing 1849 all over again, the second-coming of a "Gold Rush," a term the co-authors utilize 9 times in the Preface. 

The report, co-authored by a Los Angeles-based public relations firm, The Communications Institute (TCI), concludes that "development of the 1,750-square-mile formation in central California could generate half a million new jobs by 2015 and 2.8 million by 2020," as reported by The Los Angeles Times, which blared the headline, "Tapping California shale oil could add millions of jobs, study says."  

Given California's population of 37,683,933 people, this would mean 7.4 percent of the state's citizens can gain employment and economic uplift from the industry. It would also shrink the 20.3-percent unemployment rate in the Golden State down drastically, to 12.9 percent. 

"The Monterey shale would help stimulate the California economy to a significant extent," USC professor and co-author Adam Rose told The Times. "It's not just a benefit to the oil industry. These impacts ripple throughout the economy."  

While a nice sentiment, the age-old questions quickly arise: who are the authors and who funded this study? 

The answers to these questions, a DeSmogBlog investigation has revealed, paints an entirely different picture of the report's findings and how it came to such rosy conclusions. 

New York's Department of Environmental Conservation has chosen Robert Jacobi, a University at Buffalo geologist with ties to the natural gas industry, to study the link between fracking and earthquakes, a DEC spokeswoman told Bloomberg's Jim Esftathiou, Jr. Jacobi, who is a senior advisor to gas driller EQT Production and who runs a geoscience consultancy, was a co-director of the University at Buffalo's short-lived Shale Resources and Society Institute (SRSI), which was closed in November 2012 following a controversy over an industry-friendly study that downplayed fracking's risks. "Jacobi has a vast range of experience that makes his expertise useful," the DEC said in a statement e-mailed to Bloomberg. Jacobi's experience includes a long career with the fossil fuel industry, to which he still has ties, and recently reviewing the report that led to SRSI's closure.

Today, SUNY Buffalo closed the doors of its Shale Resources and Society Institute (SRSI), what we at DeSmog have described as an epicenter for "frackademia" and a public relations front for the oil and gas industry to promote hydraulic fracturing ("fracking") under the guise of scientific legitimacy that a university offers.

A letter from SUNY Buffalo President Satish K. Tripathi said that the nail in the coffin for SRSI was what we coined its "shill gas study," the first paper published by SRSI. All of the co-authors of this paper had direct ties to the oil and gas industry, as did four out of five of its peer reviewers.

Tripathi explained his rationale behind slamming the door shut on SRSI, writing,

The university upholds academic freedom as a core principle of our institutional mission. With that being said, academic freedom carries with it inherent responsibilities...The May 15, 2012 report...led to allegations questioning whether historical financial interests influenced the authors' conclusions. The fundamental source of controversy revolves around clarity and substantiation of conclusions. Every faculty member has a responsibility to ensure that conclusions in technical reports or papers are unambiguous and supported by the presented data. It is imperative that our faculty members adhere to rigorous standards of academic integrity, intellectual honesty, transparency, and the highest ethical conduct in their work.

Because of these collective concerns, I have decided to close the Shale Resources and Society Institute.

Tripathi's announcement comes shortly before the upcoming SUNY Board of Trustees meeting set to take place in Albany, NY on Dec. 3-4.  

New Yorkers Against Fracking proclaimed the announcement a "victory for real science over junk science peddled by the gas industry." 

Pennsylvania recently passed Act 147 - also known as the Indigenous Mineral Resources Development Act - opening up the floodgates for hydraulic fracturing ("fracking") on the campuses of its public universities. As noted in a recent post by DeSmog, the shale gas industry hasn't limited Version 2.0 of "frackademics" to PA's campuses, but is also fracking close to hundreds of K-12 schools across the country, as well.  

We noted the devastating health consequences of fracking close to a middle school/high school in Le Roy, New York, where at least 18 cases of Tourette Syndrome-like outbreaks have been reported by its students. This has moved Erin Brockovich's law firm to investigate the case, telling USA Today, "We don't have all the answers, but we are suspicious. The community asked us to help and this is what we do."

Earthworks Oil and Gas Accountability's just-published report, "Gas Patch Roulette: How Shale Gas Development Risks Public Health in Pennsylvania," makes the case that the decision to allow fracking on PA's campuses has opened up a Pandora's Box stuffed with a looming health quagmire of epic proportions.