Can Universities Credibly Probe Gas Impacts When Industry Foots the Bill?
By ANDREW C. REVKIN July 28, 2012, 1:58 pm
Lisa Wright, a foe of natural gas drilling using hydraulic fracturing, or facking, sent the following essay reflecting on recent posts about apparent undisclosed conflicts of interest [ http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/?s=groat+texas+gas ] in a University of Texas gas drilling study and an unrefereed study claiming a link between drilling and fetal health [ http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/25/when-publicity-precedes-peer-review-in-the-fight-over-fracking/ ]. Her piece is cogent and constructive and worthy of being featured as a “Your Dot [ http://j.mp/YourDot ]” contribution. Wright, who recently moved to a suburb of Washington, D.C., is a native of upstate New York (and songwriter [ http://www.lisawrightsongs.com/ ]) who says she spent much of the last four years there volunteering with anti-drilling groups. Here’s her piece asks if COI (conflicts of interest) have become the new BAU (business as usual). (I think the quality of energy analysis derives from data and methods, not who pays the bills. But I agree with Wright that new standards for disclosure are clearly needed.)
Here’s her piece:
The United States is now well on its way to a renewables-crushing, decades-long shale-gas bridge with an economic commitment to exporting this non-renewable domestic fuel and, absent dramatic market changes, there’s not much Congressman Markey or anyone else can do to stop it. Given that this gas rush has been lent credibility by some sectors of academia [ http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/24/university-of-texas-will-review-fracking-study/ ], it is good that you bring up the topic of potential conflicts of interest in academia related to the issues surrounding shale gas.
There is a growing list of universities with apparent conflicts that have put their names on studies promoting gas — studies that have been used to sway elected officials and U.S. energy policy — but no one outside of the blogosphere has seemed to care.
Against this backdrop, the industry critics who stick their necks out and try to cobble together the material and the science to show harm or potential harm relating to shale-gas extraction and development are in a lose-lose situation. Anyone who attempts to challenge Big Oil and Gas is in an impossible bind, because whether their work has merit or not they will likely be placed under a microscope and met with alarming hostility. They can expect to be eviscerated by the industry, the industry’s paid bloggers, and those in media seeking “balance” who pit richly-funded academic/industry press-packet “facts” against the findings of those who challenge those “facts.”
In order to have meaningful conversations about bias on shale issues, it is perhaps not the best use of media influence to give too much criticism to young Ph.D. candidates [ http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/25/when-publicity-precedes-peer-review-in-the-fight-over-fracking/ ] attempting to investigate potential for public harm, at a time when academic/industry groups have so thoroughly saturated the media with mind-numbing propaganda.
According to the MIT Energy Initiative website: “MIT’s energy studies and reports are making a difference, providing both Congress and the executive branch with detailed recommendations to shape and influence energy policy debates, responses, and outcomes.”
When New York Times public editor Arthur Brisbane criticized Ian Urbina’s reporting [ http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/17/opinion/sunday/17pubed.html ] in his “Drilling Down [ http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/us/DRILLING_DOWN_SERIES.html ]” series, ironically, Brisbane cited that study as a source that “took issue” with Urbina’s reporting, without disclosing it was an industry-funded study. He said, “An M.I.T. natural gas study group released a statement taking issue with The Times’s analysis of shale gas economics, well productivity and other matters.”
I’m not a former C.I.A. director, the public editor, a noted academic, journalist, columnist or elected official. Nobody cares about my letters, comments and op-eds on the big issues of conflicts of interest in relation to shale studies and shale science. COI (conflict of interest) is becoming BAU (business as usual) and perhaps ordinary people like me need to come to grips with the reality that in all honesty, as long as the right people are happily lining their pockets, nobody cares.
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