It is often said there is no use arguing politics or religion, because the facts will take a back seat to an individual’s beliefs. In the past few years, a third issue has joined the list of sensitive topics: hydraulic fracturing, and more broadly, unconventional resources.

The steadily increasing development of unconventional resources—and the steadily increasing controversy surrounding that development—have attracted a lot of attention, including from some of the most respected institutions of higher learning in the U.S. Historically, those institutions were precisely where one looked for a healthy debate on any topic, with controversy expected and even welcomed. Controversial topics were not limited to the classroom, but were welcomed by their research arms as well.

Fittingly, shale gas and fracing have been irresistible topics for many academics, who have analyzed them from a variety of perspectives. In some cases, the fallout from their research has been dramatic.

In fact, it’s been a tough couple of years for those willing to take a stand—or publish a report—on what has become one of the biggest hot-button issues in the U.S. A look at some of the more high-profile debates over fracing studies and their findings follows.

The University of Texas In February 2012, the Energy Institute at The University of Texas at Austin issued a 60-page report titled “Fact-Based Regulation for Environmental Protection in Shale Gas Development,” authored by Charles G. Groat, Ph.D, and Thomas Grimshaw.

UT said the Energy Institute funded the report initiative “to promote shale-gas policies and regulations that are based on facts—that are well grounded in scientific understanding—rather than claims or perceptions.”

The Groat and Grimshaw study covered a vast amount of territory related to all aspects of shale-gas development, with only a small portion dedicated to fracing. In that section, the report “found no evidence that hydraulic fracturing…had contaminated shallow groundwater.” This relatively minor component of the report received further attention when UT’s own press office, announcing the report’s publication, emphasized that one finding.

It soon became apparent that a report that supported, or at least failed to indict, fracing would draw a swift and harsh response. Antifracing groups around the U.S. assailed the report and attacked its authors. In addition to Groat and Grimshaw, the evaluation team had consisted of “senior participants who are faculty members or research scientists conducting state-of-the-art energy research in their respective fields,” UT said.

Also, Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) staff participated as full members of the team, assisting with planning and providing expert review of the white papers and project report. Generally, the EDF is regarded as a relatively nonpartisan environmental advocacy group, with a reputation for well-balanced analyses. One might expect that its participation in the Groat study would have given the study's critics some reassurance of its credibility.

In July 2012, it was disclosed that Groat had been a director of Plains Exploration & Production Co. since 2007. His annual director’s fee was $58,500 plus 10,000 shares of stock. Groat’s response was, “The results were determined by the individual investigators, not me, and I did not alter their conclusions.”

Facing pressure from within and outside the university, UT commissioned an independent review of the report’s objectivity. But before it could be published, Groat retired from UT, effective November 30, 2012. Raymond Orbach, Ph.D, a founding member and head of the Energy Institute, also resigned that month from his role as head of the Institute, although he will remain as a tenured professor.

The independent panel’s review was issued December 6, 2012. It found, in part, “Primary among the shortcomings was the failure of the principal investigator (Groat) to disclose a conflict of interest that could have had a bearing on the credibility a reader wished to assign to the resulting work.”

Penn State

Penn State University is literally and physically at the center of one of the largest and most important natural resources in the world, the Marcellus shale. So, when the Marcellus Shale Coalition, an industry advocacy group, needed a reliable, experienced research source to perform studies on industry-related topics, Penn State was a logical choice.

Beginning in 2009, Penn State provided three studies to the coalition and was paid $146,000. The initial report, “An Emerging Giant: Prospects and Economic Impacts of Developing the Marcellus Shale Natural Gas Play,” was written by Timothy Considine, Ph.D; Robert Watson, Ph.D; and two other Penn State researchers. In 2010 and 2011 they updated and expanded that theme. They found immense advantages to developing the Marcellus, particularly economic benefits to the state and its citizens, including tax revenues and new jobs.

Immediately, anti-drilling, anti-fracing and other groups sought to discredit the report. A preliminary draft of the initial report, which the authors had not yet approved for publication, found its way to the press, which reported it had been published without acknowledging its industry-linked financing source. But the final, published version of that and the two subsequent reports disclosed the backing prominently, on page two.

Regardless, pressure mounted both from within and outside the school. As the new Marcellus-oriented industry matured in Pennsylvania during 2009, 2010 and 2011, opposition to it also matured and became more organized. But there was not much criticism of the studies’ methodology or findings. Instead, the protests, as in previous cases, were directed at the authors themselves.

In mid-2012, as the 2012 update was being prepared, its lead author, Tim Considine, accepted a significant raise to move to the University of Wyoming. Once he left, several other faculty members in the earth sciences, environmental and other disciplines were offered the lead. According to the university’s rules, Robert Watson, as an Emeritus faculty member, could not lead a research project. A third co-author, Seth Blumsack, assistant professor of energy policy and economics, also declined to take the lead on the report. Terry Engelder, professor of geosciences, similarly declined, saying, “I really would like to occupy the middle ground in the industry vs. anti-driller scrum.”

Michael Arthur, co-director of the Marcellus Center for Outreach and Research at Penn State, also said no.”It’s been a hot potato,” he said. “People are a little more thoughtful about hopping in.” William Easterling, Penn State’s dean of the College of Earth and Mineral Sciences, said, “I would speculate that some of them have just made a calculated decision that getting out there and being involved in this report isn’t the best thing for the way they would like to be seen by the outside world.”

Ultimately the study was terminated, and the Marcellus Shale Coalition said it would get data and analysis from public sources.

University at Buffalo

In 2011, the Geology Department at the State University of New York at Buffalo hosted the Marcellus Shale Lecture series and decided to develop a permanent shale research institute. In April 2012, the university distributed a prospectus for forming The Shale Resources and Society Institute (SRSI). It was to be “a network to objectively analyze the development of unconventional shale and future resources.” The institute received funding from the university’s College of Arts and Sciences and began work almost immediately.

The leadership of the SRSI included John Martin, Ph.D, director, and Robert Jacobi, Ph.D, co-director. Martin had spent 17 years working for the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority, developing projects about oil and gas, renewable energy and the environment. Jacobi had taught for 31 years at the University at Buffalo, where he was a full professor.

In May 2012, the SRSI published its first report, “Environmental Impacts During Marcellus Shale Gas Drilling: Causes, Impacts, and Remedies.” The authors were Martin, Nicholas Considine of the Center for Energy Economics and Public Policy, Robert Watson from Penn State, and Timothy Considine, now with the Center for Energy Economics and Public Policy in the School of Energy Resources at The University of Wyoming.

In addition, there were five reviewers: Scott Anderson of the Environmental Defense Fund, Andrew Hunter of Cornell University, Jacobi, Brigham McCown of United Transportation Advisors, and George Rusk of Ecology and Environment Inc.

Anderson announced the report on the fund’s website, but said, “While I was a reviewer, this does not mean that all of my suggestions were taken or that I agree with all of the report’s opinions and conclusions.” And, “In sum, there’s a lot of good information to be gleaned from the study, but caution should be exercised with regards to some of the conclusions.”

The report was based on the analysis of Environmental Protection Agency notices of violations (NOVs) that had occurred in and around Pennsylvania’s Marcellus drilling from January 2008 through August 2011. Among significant findings, the SRSI report says “the incidence of polluting environmental events declined 60% between 2008 and August 2011, from 52.9% of all wells drilled in 2008 to 20.8% through August 2011. On this basis, the Marcellus industry has cut its incidence of environmental violations by more than half in three years, a rather notable indicator of improvement by the industry and oversight by the regulators.”

It goes on to say, “In conclusion, this study demonstrates that the odds of non-major environmental events and the much smaller odds of major environmental events are being reduced even further by enhanced regulation and improved industry practice. Moreover, the environmental impacts of most of these events have been almost completely mitigated by remedial actions taken by the companies.”

The negative response was again swift. There was an immediate assault from anti-fracing groups, petitions were filed with the university, and the author’s backgrounds underwent intense analysis. Protests were led by an English professor at the University at Buffalo and a local art publication. Also weighing in with a critical evaluation was the Public Accountability Initiative, a left-leaning industry critic with ties to billionaire investor George Soros. In an attempt to placate its critics, SRSI formed an internal advisory board; the local media then attacked each member personally. Finally the SUNY trustees, separate from the university’s administration, got involved. Even after a vigorous defense by the University at Buffalo, the SRSI was permanently shut down. v

Cornell University

In April 2011, three Cornell professors, led by Robert Howarth, made headlines when they produced a report stating that shale gas could produce more greenhouse-gas emissions than coal. Their study focused on the unburned natural gas escaping to the atmosphere during the drilling and completion process, which includes fracing and tying the well into a gas sales line. Motivation for the study included concerns that unburned natural gas is primarily methane, which is generally acknowledged to be far more harmful to the atmosphere than CO2 .

The energy world was skeptical, but the anti-drilling faction was thrilled to have a name brand like Cornell supporting its position. The debate was on. The conclusion of Howarth et al’s study, “Methane and the Greenhouse-Gas Footprint of Natural Gas from Shale Formations,” can be summarized in this quote from its abstract: “Compared to coal, the footprint of shale gas is at least 20% greater and perhaps more than twice as great on the 20-year horizon...”

The acknowledgements section at the end of the report says, “Preparation of this paper was supported by a grant from the Park Foundation…,” among others. The Park Foundation, which provided a $35,000 grant, is an anti-drilling organization perhaps best known for giving $175,000 to Josh Fox, the producer of the film “Gasland.” Adelaide Gomer, foundation president and Park heir, said in a speech last year, “In our work to oppose fracing, the Park Foundation has simply helped to fuel an army of courageous individuals and NGOs.”

While the anti-drilling groups were spreading the news that a well-known, well-respected university had concluded that natural gas is very bad for the environment, other evaluations of the study were under way.

MIT

In November 2011, MIT published its own study of greenhouse-gas emissions from natural gas wells. The researchers, O’Sullivan and Paltsev, studied 4,000 wells drilled during 2010 in five major shale sites, including the Haynesville and Barnett shales, that had also been studied in the Howarth report. The MIT report calculates that the highest potential gas emissions are far less than Howarth et al’s numbers: 42% less in the Barnett shale and 86% less in the Haynes - ville shale.

More significantly, when taking into account actual field conditions, MIT found that the most likely methane emissions were only a fraction of Howarth et al’s: 86% less and 96.7% less, respectively. To state the obvious, that’s a big difference, especially considering that both studies were performed by highly regarded research universities studying the same issue at roughly the same time. In essence, the MIT report didn’t just find Howarth’s study to be inaccurate; it found it to be wrong.

Adam Brandt, an assistant professor at Stan-ford University, said that the MIT analysis “provides an important contribution to the literature by greatly improving our understanding of potential shale-gas emissions using a very large dataset.” He went on to say, “Previous studies used much smaller and more uncertain datasets, while O’Sullivan and Paltsev have gathered a much larger and more comprehensive industry dataset. This significantly reduces the uncertainty associated with potential emissions from shale-gas development.”

Following closely on the heels of MIT’s study was another report critical of the Howarth study, this from a group of researchers from Cornell itself. The new Cornell report was published in January 2012. Written by Cathles et al, it criticized the Howarth report for multiple aspects of its methodology, including overestimating leakage, undervaluing existing technology that reduces emissions, downplaying the typical end-use of coal, and an unreasonably short time-period of impact.

The authors said, “Using more reasonable leakage rates and bases of comparison, shale gas has a GHG (greenhouse gas) footprint that is half and perhaps a third that of coal.” They added, “We argue here that their (Howarth et al’s) analysis is seriously flawed… .”

After such negative critiques, one would expect that Howarth et al would be scrambling to save their reputations, and perhaps their jobs. The findings against Howarth’s methodology and conclusions were far more specific and relevant than any criticisms of the Penn State, UB and UT reports. No one suggested that any of those reports were off by anything close to 96%.

Despite the rational, quantitative and compelling evidence against their work, less than a month after the Cathles commentary was published, Howarth et al published an 11-page response. In its conclusion they say, “We stand by our conclusions in Howarth et al (2011) and see nothing in Cathles et al and other reports since April 2011 that would fundamentally change our analyses.” They noted that the latest EPA estimate for methane emissions from shale gas falls within the range of their estimates but not those of Cathles et al, which are substantially lower.

“Cathles et al believe the focus should be just on electricity generation, and the global warming potential of methane should be considered only on a 100-year time scale. Our analysis covered both electricity (30% of U.S. usage) and heat generation (the largest usage), and we evaluated both 20- and 100-year integrated time frames for methane…

“Using all available information and the latest climate science, we conclude that for most uses, the GHG footprint of shale gas is greater than that of other fossil fuels on time scales of up to 100 years. When used to generate electricity, the shale-gas footprint is still significantly greater than that of coal at decadal time scales, but is less at the century scale.”

The debate over shale gas and fracing will no doubt continue, as more studies are undertaken and opposing sides strive to support their respective positions. Past university studies on fracing and other issues have made substantial contributions, yet despite their significance to the U.S. and their schools’ history of encouraging healthy debate, a number of these studies have been shut down. Professors are withdrawing from participation, institutes are being shuttered, and fewer and fewer qualified researchers are willing to get involved. Shale-based reserves are too important to our domestic energy picture to allow the continued elimination of these valuable sources of research and analysis.

Geoffrey G. Roberts is a 34-year veteran of the upstream oil and gas industry. He currently manages evaluations and business development at his fifth start-up, Escudo Oil & Gas LLC, in Houston.