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Fracking and Environmental (In)Justice in a Texas City
... community, and livelihood impacts in oil and natural gas extraction areas (e.g., Billo 2015;Lu 2012;Orta-Martínez and Finer 2010;Widener 2007;Kimerling 1994), with human rights violations, wealth plundering, and land dispossession important topics of environmental justice (EJ) scholarship in the region (Carruthers 2014;Urkidi and Walter 2011). Recent research based on geographic information systems (GIS) in the U.S. analyzes marginalized populations' exposure to environmental and health risks associated with oil and natural gas production activities (e.g., Clough and Bell 2016;Johnston et al. 2016;Fry et al. 2015;Ogneva-Himmelberger and Huang 2015); however, the application of GIS-based EJ approaches in Latin America has been limited, often due to a lack of publicly-available geospatial data on fossil fuel extraction activities in the region. While the data availability issue still exists, many countries now offer a wider array of spatial and demographic data free for download. ...
... Determining distributional environmental injustices, which are premised on the spatial allocation of risks and benefits, is obviously well suited for GIS analysis. For the placement of oil and natural gas wells, analyzing the demographics of populations near extractive activities, revenue allocation, and the dynamics of deciding where, how, and whether to drill are key considerations (Fry et al. 2015;Kroepsch et al. 2019). Due to higher incidences of exposure, people living near oil and gas activities are more likely to experience environmental and health risks. ...
... Although results from these studies are mixed, Johnston et al. (2016) and Ogneva-Himmelberger and Huang (2015) find evidence that minority and lower-income rural residents in some U.S. hydrocarbon production areas, such as the Marcellus and Eagle Ford Shales, experience traditional distributional injustices. In benefit-sharing studies, identifying and tracking the benefits associated with oil and gas production activities is a central consideration (Fry and Hilburn 2020;Fry et al. 2015). ...
This chapter reviews the contributions of an engaged archaeological framework to past and present research about human-environmental relationships in Latin America. We argue that archaeology can play an expanded role in advancing our understanding of long-term socio-environmental systems by promoting greater integration between scientific research and broader societal needs and local spatial knowledge within the context of sustainability. We further suggest that participatory approaches can bridge some of the conceptual divides that separate archaeologists and anthropologists from Indigenous and local communities and contribute to the decolonization of the discipline. Specifically, the aim is to show how participatory mapping and participatory geographic information systems can be suitable tools to engage archaeological studies of human-environment interactions from an integrative research perspective.KeywordsLandscapesHuman–environment interactionsRemote sensing and GISParticipatory mappingLocal spatial knowledgeTraditional ecological knowledge
... A community's dependence on its local environment for food, water, and sources of income for livelihood increases the extent of potential disruption caused by extractive disasters that disturb or pollute the environment, thus increasing community vulnerability (Lindon et al. 2014). Geographic proximity to sites of extraction greatly increases the susceptibility to disasters (Kroll-Smith and Couch 1990;Stephens 2015;Gulson et al. 2009;Auyero et al. 2019;Fry et al. 2015;Pearce et al. 2011). The geographic location of a community can also increase its vulnerability if it plays a role in the resource supply chain, despite not being proximate to the site of extraction. ...
... At a national level, federal governments can become dependent on revenue from extractive companies, and thus welcome their increased presence into local communities over time (Davidson 2017;Filer and Macintyre 2006). Excessive dependence on industry also empowers the industry with great political influence, which leads to bureaucratic and judicial negligence when it comes to regulation of extractive activities, making communities increasingly vulnerable in the name of sustaining resource extraction (Hames 2007;Kuhlberg and Miller 2018;Fry et al. 2015). Both of these circumstances are further amplified in undiversified economies with inadequate alternative employment and revenue generation prospects (Davidson 2017;Filer and Macintyre 2006). ...
... The effective functioning of state institutions affords community members the means seek responses to political claims. Democratic accountability mechanisms such as elections and petitions allow them to exert political influence and impact legislation (Hames 2007;Fry et al. 2015;Auyero et al. 2019). The socioeconomic status of a community plays a role in determining its political influence. ...
... For instance, the Barnett Shale in the Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington metropolitan region of Texas was projected to yield an increased revenue of $11 billion USD and create more than 100,000 new jobs in the early years of development (Kinnaman 2011;Sovacool 2014). Although some of these benefits are distributed to local residents in Texas, much of the economic gain via royalty payments from mineral rights may go to individuals who do not reside on the leased property (Fry et al. 2015). New industry also brings substantial sociodemographic changes to the community as individuals move into the area for better employment prospects (Silva et al. 2018;Kinnaman 2011;Brown 2015;Zwickl 2019). ...
... A growing body of literature has examined associations between residential proximity to the oil and gas industry and adverse birth outcomes (Caron-Beaudoin et al. 2021;Casey et al. 2015Casey et al. , 2019Currie et al. 2017;Cushing et al. 2020;Gonzalez et al. 2020;Hill 2018;McKenzie et al. 2014;Stacy et al. 2015;Tran et al. 2020;Walker et al. 2018;Whitworth et al. 2017). Health risks associated with drilling-related exposures can be difficult to accurately characterize due to local socioeconomic and demographic shifts that occur from the industrial boom that accompanies oil and gas extraction, such as increases in minority racial and ethnic populations and needs for skilled labor at drilling sites (Brown 2015;Fry et al. 2015;Zwickl 2019). Furthermore, these socioeconomic shifts change the underlying population-level risk factors for health effects such as adverse birth outcomes. ...
... In Colorado, McKenzie et al. used birth records and observed small protective associations with preterm birth and term low birth weight for infants whose mothers resided near natural gas drilling during pregnancy . We hypothesize that the inverse distance weighted drilling activity metric that they used could leave residual confounding that is related to industrial economic growth and demographic changes (Brown 2015;Fry et al. 2015;Weber et al. 2016), which could partially explain why some of our near vs. far models showed small protective effects of drilling exposure. In addition, we find that the effect estimates in the before drilling vs. during drilling activity framework are much larger than what we find in the DiD analysis, which we hypothesize is due to socioeconomic shifts (e.g., responses to environmental injustices) as opposed to the drillingrelated environmental exposures. ...
Background:
Oil and natural gas extraction may produce environmental pollution at levels that affect reproductive health of nearby populations. Available studies have primarily focused on unconventional gas drilling and have not accounted for local population changes that can coincide with drilling activity.
Objective:
Our study sought to examine associations between residential proximity to oil and gas drilling and adverse term birth outcomes using a difference-in-differences study design.
Methods:
We created a retrospective population-based term birth cohort in Texas between 1996 and 2009 composed of mother-infant dyads (n=2,598,025) living <10km from an oil or gas site. We implemented a difference-in-differences approach to estimate associations between drilling activities and infant health: term birth weight and term small for gestational age (SGA). Using linear and logistic regression, we modeled interactions between births before (unexposed) or during (exposed) drilling activity and residential proximity near (0-1, 1-2, or 2-3km) or far (3-10km) from an active or future drilling site, adjusting for individual- and neighborhood-level characteristics.
Results:
The adjusted mean difference in term birth weight for mothers living 0-1 vs. 3-10km from a current or future drilling site was -7.3g [95% confidence interval (CI): -11.6, -3.0] for births during active vs. future drilling. The corresponding adjusted odds ratio for SGA was 1.02 (95% CI: 0.98, 1.06). Negative associations with term birth weight were observed for the 1-2 and 2-3km near groups, and no consistent differences were identified by type of drilling activity. Larger, though imprecise, adverse associations were found for infants born to Hispanic women, women with the lowest educational attainment, and women living in cities.
Conclusions:
Residing near oil and gas drilling sites during pregnancy was associated with a small reduction in term birth weight but not SGA, with some evidence of environmental injustices. Additional work is needed to investigate specific drilling-related exposures that might explain these associations. https://doi.org/10.1289/EHP7678.
... These mixed findings can arise owing to a combination of factors, including differences in geographic region, which reflect heterogeneity in local preferences and regulation, the particular UOGD operation investigated (e.g., gas wells versus injection wells), and differences in data (e.g., aggregation issues) and statistical methods (Mohai et al. 2009, Banzhaf et al. 2019b. Moreover, evidence of environmental injustices may not be apparent from the geographic distribution of UOGD wells, given that UOGD has been found to exacerbate procedural inequities (Fry et al. 2015, Malin 2020. This is most evident in an investigation of UOGD lease terms in Texas, where researchers found that, controlling for income, areas that are more Black, Hispanic, and linguistically isolated, i.e., do not primarily speak English at home, are less likely to have environment-and health-protective clauses in UOGD leases (Timmins & Vissing 2015). ...
... Because ownership of underground resources can be severed from surface rights, resource owners who do not live where resources are located (Brown et al. 2019) can still profit by leasing their rights and earning royalties tied to UOGD production (Fitzgerald 2014, Fitzgerald & Rucker 2016. Fry et al. (2015) find that the main beneficiaries of UGOD in Denton, Texas were nonlocal mineral owners, representing 61.4% of all owners, while local homeowners received only 6.3% of the total production value held by mineral owners. Studies in this area demonstrate that, on average, resident nonmineral owners, who presumably experience the major share of environmental and health burdens associated with UOGD, do not internalize the benefits (Krupnick & Echarte 2017a). ...
... Studies in this area demonstrate that, on average, resident nonmineral owners, who presumably experience the major share of environmental and health burdens associated with UOGD, do not internalize the benefits (Krupnick & Echarte 2017a). In some cases, such as that in Denton (Fry et al. 2015), local residents have responded to such inequities through the voting process, highlighting the importance of procedural justice in the distribution of UOGD benefits and costs. ...
The shale gas boom revolutionized the energy sector through hydraulic fracturing (fracking). High levels of energy production force communities, states, and nations to consider the externalities and potential risks associated with this unconventional oil and natural gas development (UOGD). In this review, we systematically outline the environmental, economic, and anthropogenic impacts of UOGD, while also considering the diverse methodological approaches to these topics. We summarize the current status and conclusions of the academic literature, in both economic and related fields, while also providing suggested avenues for future research. Causal inference will continue to be important for the evaluation of UOGD costs and benefits. We conclude that current economic, global, and health forces may require researchers to revisit outcomes in the face of a potential shale bust.
Expected final online publication date for the Annual Review of Resource Economics, Volume 13 is October 2021. Please see http://www.annualreviews.org/page/journal/pubdates for revised estimates.
... These mixed findings can arise owing to a combination of factors, including differences in geographic region, which reflect heterogeneity in local preferences and regulation, the particular UOGD operation investigated (e.g., gas wells versus injection wells), and differences in data (e.g., aggregation issues) and statistical methods (Mohai et al. 2009, Banzhaf et al. 2019b. Moreover, evidence of environmental injustices may not be apparent from the geographic distribution of UOGD wells, given that UOGD has been found to exacerbate procedural inequities (Fry et al. 2015, Malin 2020. This is most evident in an investigation of UOGD lease terms in Texas, where researchers found that, controlling for income, areas that are more Black, Hispanic, and linguistically isolated, i.e., do not primarily speak English at home, are less likely to have environment-and health-protective clauses in UOGD leases (Timmins & Vissing 2015). ...
... Because ownership of underground resources can be severed from surface rights, resource owners who do not live where resources are located (Brown et al. 2019) can still profit by leasing their rights and earning royalties tied to UOGD production (Fitzgerald 2014, Fitzgerald & Rucker 2016. Fry et al. (2015) find that the main beneficiaries of UGOD in Denton, Texas were nonlocal mineral owners, representing 61.4% of all owners, while local homeowners received only 6.3% of the total production value held by mineral owners. Studies in this area demonstrate that, on average, resident nonmineral owners, who presumably experience the major share of environmental and health burdens associated with UOGD, do not internalize the benefits (Krupnick & Echarte 2017a). ...
... Studies in this area demonstrate that, on average, resident nonmineral owners, who presumably experience the major share of environmental and health burdens associated with UOGD, do not internalize the benefits (Krupnick & Echarte 2017a). In some cases, such as that in Denton (Fry et al. 2015), local residents have responded to such inequities through the voting process, highlighting the importance of procedural justice in the distribution of UOGD benefits and costs. ...
... Notably, this is the case of China, where investments into SGE and production are encouraged and subsidized by the central government. Unlike the fracturing debate in the Western countries, media coverage in China has primarily focused on SGE's technological progress and benefits instead of its environmental risks [8,9]. Moreover, as most of China's shale gas fields are located close to densely populated areas [10], where residents' livelihoods are often tightly bound to the availability and utilization of natural resources, SGE in China may pose more pronounced environmental and health risks than it may do in the Western countries. ...
... However, no empirical studies with the qualitative method have analyzed the influence of fairness concerning the SGE context. As the energy technology acceptance literature suggested, perceived fairness would influence the acceptance indirectly, via its connections with risk and benefit perceptions associated with the energy technology [8,32]. Thus, we hypothesize that residents will stand a better chance of perceiving fewer risks and more benefits if they perceive the SGE as fair, and the following hypotheses are proposed accordingly: ...
... However, no empirical studies with the qualitative method have analyzed the influence of fairness concerning the SGE context. As the energy technology acceptance literature suggested, perceived fairness would influence the acceptance indirectly, via its connections with risk and benefit perceptions associated with the energy technology [8,32]. Thus, we hypothesize that residents will stand a better chance of perceiving fewer risks and more benefits if they perceive the SGE as fair, and the following hypotheses are proposed accordingly: Hypothesis 1 (H1). ...
Local communities and their opinion on shale gas exploitation (SGE) play an essential role in the implementation of energy policies, while little is known about the reasoning process underpinning the acceptance of SGE. The present study develops a conceptual framework to examine the psychological process of residents' acceptance of local SGE, in which the impacts of trust, knowledge, and fairness are mediated by risk and benefit perceptions. Structural equation modeling has been applied to analyze the hypothesized relationships based on a dataset of 825 households in China's largest shale gas field. Our results indicate that residents' perceived fairness and trust positively affect their benefit perceptions and negatively affect their risk perceptions, which results in positive influences on acceptance, and knowledge of SGE's environmental impacts positively affects perceived risks, which results in a negative influence on acceptance. Moreover, residents' acceptance is primarily determined by their benefit perception, followed by perceived fairness, and knowledge is the least important determinant. Thus, our study contributes to the literature by exploring the structural relationships between various psychological predictors and the acceptance toward SGE, and the results from our empirical survey provide insight into designing appropriate strategies in the process of generating and communicating shale policies.
... Water is a key resource in extractive energy development, including processes surrounding hydraulic fracturing, or "fracking, " which involves injecting highly pressurized water mixed with chemicals into the Earth to release natural gases that are then harvested for energy development. Fracking, which requires an inordinate amount of water, often occurs in marginalized communities due to a perception of cheap land and limited resources, including limited political power to challenge fracking permits (Brady et al., 2019;Fry et al., 2015;Johnston et al., 2016). Some studies have found rurality to be a significant factor in marginalization because of its often associated poverty status (Fry et al., 2015;Johnston et al., 2016). ...
... Fracking, which requires an inordinate amount of water, often occurs in marginalized communities due to a perception of cheap land and limited resources, including limited political power to challenge fracking permits (Brady et al., 2019;Fry et al., 2015;Johnston et al., 2016). Some studies have found rurality to be a significant factor in marginalization because of its often associated poverty status (Fry et al., 2015;Johnston et al., 2016). Johnston, Werder, and Sebastian (2016) examined the intersection of race and poverty on proximity to fracking injection wells in southern Texas, finding that geographical areas with a higher proportion of people of color communities comprising poor Latinx, Black, and American Indian residents were granted a disproportionate number of fracking permits compared to White and more affluent communities, demonstrating racism along dimensions of poverty and rurality. ...
Environmental racism forces people of color, including Indigenous, Black, and Latinx communities, to bear the brunt of environmental degradation and climate change. BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color) communities are disproportionately affected by the climate crisis as they breathe more polluted air, live in hotter temperatures, experience more natural disasters, are displaced at higher rates, and often have limited resources to respond to crises (Fernandez Rysavy & Lloyd, 2016). Environmental racism is defined as environmental policy, practice, or directive that differently affects or disadvantages, whether intentionally or not, individuals, groups, or communities based on their race, ethnicity, or color (Bullard, 1993, 2003; Taylor, 2000). In the occupied lands now known as the United States, environmental racism has deep roots, embedded in economic and racial inequities including, but not limited to, genocide, segregation, immigration, and racial discrimination in practically all aspects of life for communities of color (Bullard, 1999; Taylor, 2000). We have intentionally described the United States as a collective of occupied lands to affirm that the land which comprises the United States was stolen from Indigenous communities throughout the violent colonial history of the country’s initial and ongoing settlement. Environmental racism is a form of institutionalized discrimination and is reinforced by government, legal, economic, social, political, and military institutions, and can take a multitude of forms (Bullard, 1999, 2003; Taylor, 2000). Environmental racism perpetuates an inequitable and unjust society, through environmental circumstances that contribute to and maintain health disparities among historically marginalized racial and ethnic communities.
Climate change disproportionately impacts BIPOC communities. The world is in a global environmental crisis as a result of anthropocentric climate change, human-induced destruction, environmental injustice, and ecological devastation of land, air, water, and living beings (Gray et al., 2018). The consequences are now being felt across generations, with BIPOC communities experiencing the disproportionate impacts of environmental injustice and climate change. The exponential rate at which the planet is warming and the subsequent damaging impacts are repeatedly described by scientists as greatly outpacing their predictions among BIPOC communities around the world. Importantly, the brunt of the initial environmental crises are borne by the poorest countries and most vulnerable communities (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [IPCC], 2018). They are usually hit the hardest by ecological destruction and subsequent disasters, which is exacerbated by the fact that these populations have the fewest resources for combating them. Often those who are currently impacted the greatest are not those who created the problem. Following these principles, environmental justice organizing attends to the fair distribution of both environmental amenities and hazards (distributive justice), the use of inclusive decision-making processes (procedural justice), and is dedicated to creating safe and welcoming spaces for those who have been traditionally marginalized (interactional justice) (Krings & Copic, 2020; Schlosberg, 2007).
... It also reflects known patterns of UOG development in the Marcellus and Utica shale regions, where activities tend to be concentrated in less densely populated rural areas. This pattern is in contrast to other regions such as the Barnett shale, where intensive drilling can occur in densely populated urban and suburban neighborhoods (Fry et al., 2015). In Table 2, the odds of a census tract having elevated GWV also decreased 5%-6% (e.g., OR = 0.947, 95% CI 0.896, 0.995 for varsel) for every $1,000 increase in per capita income, indicating that lower income census tracts tended to have higher groundwater vulnerability to contamination. ...
... Populations in these settings have a lower likelihood of owning land or mineral rights, and thus are potentially exposed to contamination risks without accruing any direct economic benefits from UOG development. Indeed, scenarios where the largest benefits of UOG go to those who bear little to none of the environmental and public health risks have been identified by previous research in the benefit-sharing environmental justice literature (Clough & Bell, 2016;Fry et al., 2015;Hardy & Kelsey, 2015;Lieberman-Cribbin et al., 2022). Residents who do not own land or mineral rights may also face procedural injustice as they have limited mechanisms to influence and consent to leasing and drilling decisions, and may lack recognition as legitimate stakeholders to participate in policymaking processes (Baka et al., 2019;Jalbert et al., 2019;Whitton et al., 2017). ...
Unconventional oil and gas (UOG) development, made possible by horizontal drilling and high-volume hydraulic fracturing, has been fraught with controversy since the industry's rapid expansion in the early 2000's. Concerns about environmental contamination and public health risks persist in many rural communities that depend on groundwater resources for drinking and other daily needs. Spatial disparities in UOG risks can pose distributive environmental injustice if such risks are disproportionately borne by marginalized communities. In this paper, we analyzed groundwater vulnerability to contamination from UOG as a physically based measure of risk in conjunction with census tract level sociodemographic characteristics describing social vulnerability in the northern Appalachian Basin. We found significant associations between elevated groundwater vulnerability and lower population density, consistent with UOG development occurring in less densely populated rural areas. We also found associations between elevated groundwater vulnerability and lower income, higher proportions of elderly populations, and higher proportion of mobile homes, suggesting a disproportionate risk burden on these socially vulnerable groups. We did not find a statistically significant association between elevated groundwater vulnerability and populations of racial/ethnic minorities in our study region. Household surveys provided empirical support for a relationship between sociodemographic characteristics and capacity to assess and mitigate exposures to potentially contaminated water. Further research is needed to probe if the observed disparities translate to differences in chemical exposure and adverse health outcomes.
... Objetivo de Desarrollo Sostenible (ODS) (9) Objetivo de común acuerdo en la alianza de 193 países en procura de mejoramiento y desarrollo de los pueblos Igualitarista 12 (73,74,75,76,77,78,79,80,81,82,83,84) Integrativa 20 (85,86,87,88,89,90,91,92,93,94,95,96,97,98,99,100,101,102,103,104) Proteccionista 16 (105,106,107,108,109,110,111,112,113,114,115,116,117,118,119,120) En la tabla 2 se observa el resultado de la búsqueda sistemática en las diferentes bases de datos. ODS 4. Educación de calidad (55) ODS 8. Trabajo decente y crecimiento económico (57,67,68,71) ODS 9. Industria, innovación e infraestructura (58,61,62,63,70,72) ODS 10. Reducción de las desigualdades (59,60,64) ODS 16. ...
... desarrollo económico y seguridad de la salud global. (57) Enfoques diversos del abordaje de los ODS desde la salud pública y la bioética, incluyen la gestión del desarrollo humano, sus recursos, calidad de la condición humana, y las instituciones, lo que invita a pensar que al dar respuesta a las situaciones de la salud pública, estas se alejan de los presupuestos bioéticos, en lo social, ambiental y económico. ...
Introduction: Social inequalities are the main generator of differences in health, which appear more frequently in disadvantaged groups or in clearly disadvantaged groups. health differences, which appear more frequently in disadvantaged or socially disadvantaged groups, even in developed countries.
Objective: To analyze the empirical evidence of the category of social justice in the field of bioethics in bioethics in public health and its contribution to sustainable development objectives.
Methods: Systematic review of empirical articles without distinction between quantitative and qualitaive quantitative and qualitative design, published between January 2000 and August 2017, in eleven databases. The search terms were bioethics, social justice, and public health, in English, French, Spanish and Portuguese; review or reflection articles were excluded. Thematic analysis was performed prior grouping by categories into themes and sub-themes.
Conclusions: The empirical publications on bioethics and public health are aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals as a strategy to achieve equity and social justice.
It is relevant to direct research in the light of sustainable development, so that its products contribute to and evidence and evidence of the progress made, rather than the gaps identified.
Keywords: social justice; bioethics; public health; sustainable development.
... Conversely, Theodori's (2013) study found no significant correlation between civic engagement and economic benefits. Furthermore, in what is perhaps the most famous case of anti-fracking mobilization, multiple authors have documented how residents protested and ultimately exiled fracking companies after practices negatively affected the quality of water in the region of Denton, Texas (Briggle and Menasche 2015;Fry, Briggle, and Kincaid 2015;Gullion 2015). ...
... We hypothesize that, despite the inclusion of political party variables, the belief that fracking has a positive effect on the local economy will predict support for fracking. Conversely, we also recognize the power of perceived (or experienced) risk (Briggle and Menasche 2015;Fry, Briggle, and Kincaid 2015;Gullion 2015;Theodori 2013). We thus hypothesize that those who believe that fracking poses risks to public health and the environment will be significantly less likely to support fracking than oppose it. ...
The American public is split on support for hydraulic fracturing (“fracking”). This study seeks to better understand fracking attitudes by predicting support via economic, environmental, and public health concern. We find support for fracking is intertwined with political partisanship. We show those identifying as “other” political party are significantly more likely to claim “don’t know” in response to questions of fracking support. However, fracking attitudes are not solely the product of political ideology, but also of perceived effects on the environment, the economy, and especially public health.
... In addition to potential health and safety impacts, residents near oil and gas development may not benefit from the development of hydraulic fracturing operations. For example, Fry et al. (2015) found that 1% of residents of Denton, Texas owned the value extracted from mineral rights developed in the area, even though the city is a beneficiary of the hydraulic fracturing industry. The residents of Denton voted to ban fracking within city limits in 2014. ...
Environmental justice and sustainability have both become major concerns for water resource management, particularly with recent federal emphasis on environmental justice under the Biden administration in the United States. Texas, like many U.S. states, lags behind the federal government in this emphasis. While many localities have made progress in some respects—for example, some major Texas municipalities have included equity and sustainability metrics in their recent climate action plans—others have not. This has left a patchwork of persistent water management and availability issues that are exacerbated by extreme weather and worsening impacts of climate change. We provide a review of many of Texas’s water equity and sustainability challenges, both now and in a more extreme climate future. These include water access, affordability, contamination, flooding, drought, and aging infrastructure. For example, many Texas counties rank highest in the nation for flood risk, including coastal counties with high populations of disadvantaged communities and counties containing populations that live in persistent poverty in the Lower Rio Grande Valley. Additionally, approximately 44,000 Texans, or about 0.4% of the state population, lack access to complete plumbing facilities in their homes. The costs of water infrastructure leaks (estimated at about 51 gallons of water per day statewide) are shared across customers of all income levels, though they place a disproportionate burden on low-income customers. We then assess existing statewide and local policy and planning efforts and gaps in addressing these concerns in Texas. We focus particularly on the role of efforts to incorporate community voice—the ideas, concerns, needs, and expertise of impacted community members, dismantle causes of injustice, and improve equity in spending. If communities are not intentional with future development, new water infrastructure could continue to perpetuate existing harms. Thus, we provide a research agenda and recommendations for addressing some of the policy and planning gaps and persistent environmental justice issues. We aim to help water managers and policy makers identify and dismantle sources of inequity, particularly through including community voice.
... Much of the research on strategic communication within the context of environmental behavior has focused on areas like recycling (e.g., White and Hyde 2012), energy use (e.g., Steinhorst et al. 2015), and consumer behavior (e.g., Sachdeva, Jordan, and Mazar 2015), as well as in framing perceptions of environmental risks related to emerging biotechnologies (Freedman 2013;Lomberg 2013;Petit, Needham, and Howe 2021;Zahry and Besley 2019), watershed protection (e.g., Marquina et al. 2022), and hydraulic fracking for gas extraction (Fry, Briggle, and Kincaid 2015;Clarke et al. 2015). Within this space, emerging work is starting to examine the role that optimistic and pessimistic message framing may play in influencing environmental perceptions or behavior Morris et al. 2020;MacKinnon, Davis, and Arnocky 2022;Petit, Needham, and Howe 2021;Salazar et al. 2022). ...
Meeting the challenge of the global biodiversity crisis requires evidence-driven communication strategies to engage public and political audiences in conservation. This study used a real-world
conservation campaign to test how messages framed as pessimistic
and optimistic, emphasizing species losses or gains, affected emotional response and behavioral intent, including willingness to
donate and adopt specific conservation behaviors. We administered
a national, web-based survey to a random sample of U.S. adults
(n¼1,998). Respondents exposed to pessimistically-framed messages were significantly more willing to donate than those exposed to optimistically-framed messages, and emotions mediated effects. Intention to engage in behaviors was greatest when a respondent’s emotions aligned with the valence of the frame they received, such as when they experienced negative emotions in response to pessimistic frames or positive emotions in response to optimistic frames. These findings contribute to the growing body of evidence guiding the strategic use of communications to promote conservation.
... The anti-HEPP movement in Turkey is certainly not an isolated example. Local-mostly rural/peasant, indigenous, black, and minority-communities all around the globe are resisting various forms of land and water grabbing, fighting against contamination of water and land by toxic waste and against extractivist projects such as mining, oil sand drilling, fracking, etc. (see, e.g., Pellow 2002 andBorras Jr and Franco 2013;Fry, Briggle, and Kincaid 2015;Leifsen 2017;Engels and Dietz 2017;Ndi and Batterbury 2017). It is often assumed in the political ecology literature that rural struggles over the environmental commons-for "natural resources," as they are often called-are mainly motivated by the need to defend livelihoods "that are directly linked to the use of natural resources, such as water, fish, forests, and wild animals" (Cruz-Torres 2017). ...
... Harm to people and the environment from fossil fuels begins with the extraction of coal, oil and gas. Regions with coal, mining, or oil and gas extraction are key examples of sacrifice zones, where residents are subjected to the slow violence of pollution, but often do not fully see the benefits of the wealth created from extraction [93,94]. ...
Fossil fuels — coal, oil, and gas — lie at the heart of the interconnected crises we face, including climate change, racial injustice, and public health. Each stage of the fossil fuel life cycle — extraction, processing, transport, and combustion — generates toxic air and water pollution, as well as greenhouse gas (GHGs) emissions that drive the global climate crisis. Addressing the harmful effects of energy decisions, including unequal risk distribution across various governance levels, supply chains, and political jurisdictions, is a complex task for policymakers and society. A deeper understanding of how harms are embodied within fossil fuel life cycles is needed. This paper provides a narrative review of recent studies within the United States (U.S.) that document both public health harms and disproportionate impacts along the fossil fuel life cycle. In the U.S. the public health hazards from air and water pollution, and risks associated with climate change, fall disproportionately on Black, Brown, Indigenous, and poor communities. “Sacrifice zones” and systemic racism are deeply intertwined within the fossil-fuel based economy. We argue systemic racism subsidizes the fossil fuel industry by enabling it to externalize the costs of pollution and environmental degradation onto communities of color. We position “fossil fuel racism” as a subset of environmental racism and argue that this framing is useful because it shifts analytical and political focus to the systems and structures which are actively protecting and promoting continued production of fossil fuels. We discuss the implications of this body of research for climate policy, and outline how poorly designed “carbon-centric” policies—which focus narrowly on GHGs reduction—could fail to alleviate the racialized disparities or potentially worsen it for some communities. We emphasize the need to move beyond carbon-centric approaches to climate solutions to more integrative approaches to policy design that can improve public health, tackle the global climate crisis, and rectify our legacy of fossil fuel racism. Specifically we call for a managed phase out of fossil fuel production and the enactment of wider programs of social, economic, and democratic reforms via a Green New Deal. Adequately addressing the climate crisis and fossil fuel racism require political and policy solutions that disrupt the power and actions of the fossil fuel industry and their state allies.
... [79][80][81][82][83][84] Although domestic gas extraction generates substantial revenue, the economic benefits accrue primarily to those who own mineral rights, work in the gas industry, and enjoy cheaper electricity prices, and these benefits usually accrue to people located in places physically removed from drill sites. [85][86][87] When problems do arise, low-income households living nearby are less likely than wealthier peers to file complaints about perceived gas-related issues with their drinking water supply. 88 This reflects a power imbalance, which can result in procedural environmental injustice. ...
Energy policy decisions are driven primarily by economic and reliability considerations, with limited consideration given to public health, environmental justice, and climate change. Moreover, epidemiologic studies relevant for public policy typically focus on immediate public health implications of activities related to energy procurement and generation, considering less so health equity or the longer-term health consequences of climate change attributable to an energy source. A more integrated, collective consideration of these three domains can provide more robust guidance to policymakers, communities, and individuals. Here, we illustrate how these domains can be evaluated with respect to natural gas as an energy source. Our process began with a detailed overview of all relevant steps in the process of extracting, producing, and consuming natural gas. We synthesized existing epidemiologic and complementary evidence of how these processes impact public health, environmental justice, and climate change. We conclude that, in certain domains, natural gas looks beneficial (e.g., economically for some), but when considered more expansively, through the life cycle of natural gas and joint lenses of public health, environmental justice, and climate change, natural gas is rendered an undesirable energy source in the United States. A holistic climate health equity framework can inform how we value and deploy different energy sources in the service of public health.
... Distributive justice concerns that the costs and benefits of oil and gas production needed to be re-balanced S7* were expressed by consensus on the Polluter Pays Principle as a starting point for distributive justice S30. This mirrors empirical findings of uneven benefit/risk distribution in research into gas flaring practices [33,[80][81][82][83]. Distributive justice is also defined in relation to the challenge of global extractivism and enclaving [84][85][86] defined in S16. ...
Global gas flaring harms human and non-human health and well-being while contributing to climate change. Flaring activity in the global oil and gas sector is a significant matter of energy justice-concerning the distribution of risks, benefits and harms, recognition of rights, and decision-making influence within gas-flaring-affected communities. This mixed method empirical ethical analysis of gas flaring and energy justice combines Q-methodology and stakeholder interviews with representatives of 14 gas-flaring-affected countries (n = 35) to evaluate the context-sensitivity of distributive, procedural, recognition, and cosmopolitan justice principles to gas-flaring governance. Four dominant normative perspectives emerge around this topic. These perspectives concern: a) government-led zero flaring policy; b) multi-scalar economic governance; c) business responsibility and social license; and d) localism and community empowerment. We find that: first, there is strong stakeholder support for zero-flaring globally. Second, coordinated multi-scalar governance from international-national-local regulatory authorities is desired to protect marginalised communities. Third, egalitarian rights-based approaches are prioritised over utilitarian approaches in planning for oil and gas extraction. Fourth, business responsibility necessitates transparent communication of flaring activities and impacts and the Polluter Pays Principle of environmental redress to affected communities. Finally, stakeholder disagreement centres upon the practical mechanisms to achieve just outcomes-including compensation, the role of local authorities, regulatory agencies, Environmental Impact Assessment, and efforts to tackle rent-seeking and corruption. We conclude that further stakeholder engagement is needed on the implementation processes for gas flaring elimination, rather than the goal itself, through carefully facilitated dialogue and negotiation.
... Spatial datasets have been used in the past to study the characteristics of the localities around unconventional gas wells, especially in North America (e.g. Fry and Briggle A, 2015;Ogneva-Himmelberger and Huang, 2015;Zwickl, 2019). As in other studies conducted in Australia (Fleming and Measham, 2015;Marcos-Martinez et al., 2019), in this paper, georeferenced data concerning the location of the wells are used to determine the areas affected by CSG extraction. ...
... In Denton, Texas, an exploration of mineral-rights ownership reported that the majority (61.4%) of those who owned mineral rights for drilling and received these financial benefits were not residents of the city. 74 We identified a potential issue of benefit-sharing environmental injustice measured by discordance among those who own oil and gas rights and those who live near these leased areas. Impacts on home value are another way OGD can unequally affect those living close to wells. ...
Background
Community socioeconomic deprivation (CSD) may be related to higher oil and natural gas development (OGD) exposure. We tested for distributive and benefit-sharing environmental injustice in Pennsylvania's Marcellus Shale by examining (1) whether OGD and waste disposal occurred disproportionately in more deprived communities and (2) discordance between the location of land leased for OGD and where oil and gas rights owners resided.
Materials and Methods
Analyses took place at the county subdivision level and considered OGD wells, waste disposal, and land lease agreement locations from 2005 to 2019. Using 2005–2009 American Community Survey data, we created a CSD index relevant to community vulnerability in suburban/rural areas.
Results
In adjusted regression models accounting for spatial dependence, we observed no association between the CSD index and conventional or unconventional drilled well presence. However, a higher CSD index was linearly associated with odds of a subdivision having an OGD waste disposal site and receiving a larger volume of waste. A higher percentage of oil and gas rights owners lived in the same county subdivision as leased land when the community was least versus most deprived (66% vs. 56% in same county subdivision), suggesting that individuals in more deprived communities were less likely to financially benefit from OGD exposure.
Discussion and Conclusions
We observed distributive environmental injustice with respect to well waste disposal and benefit-sharing environmental injustice related to oil and rights owner's residential locations across Pennsylvania's Marcellus Shale. These results add evidence of a disparity between exposure and benefits resulting from OGD.
... Murshed and Serino [32] consider poor industry diversification and export structures to be a causal mechanism for lower growth. Local concerns that are associated with oil and gas development include road noise and congestion, earthquakes, and air and water pollution [33][34][35][36]. Some studies focus on possible social problems resulting from rural communities' being overwhelmed by significant changes to the population, which may magnify such social problems as drug and alcohol abuse, domestic violence, mental health problems, and crime [37,38]. ...
This paper is designed to determine whether producing oil and gas via shale has an economically significant effect on population migration dynamics and on the labor market in terms of the number of employed individuals, the number of establishments, total wages, and average annual pay per person in twenty-six counties in Ohio and Pennsylvania, USA. The analysis incorporates migration inflow and outflow between producing and nonproducing counties. The results of the analysis show that the counties that engage in shale gas extraction saw a negative impact on net migration but a much larger positive impact on labor market outcomes. Specifically, the number of jobs is higher by 2.4%, the number of establishments is higher by 1.1%, total wages are 3% more and the average annual pay is 1.5% more in producing counties after shale. The analysis reveals a small but statistically significant negative impact on migration, as shale regions experienced some migration outflows.
... However, many financial gains are experienced at municipal, regional, and corporate rather than individual levels because of arrangements such as split estates (i.e., separation of surface and subsurface property or mineral rights). For example, in Texas, 61% of mineral rights owners did not experience environmental burdens as they lived far from the site of drilling (Fry et al. 2015). ...
With growing evidence of widespread health and environmental impacts from oil and gas activity, localities and states are beginning to develop protective measures. Interdisciplinary approaches that integrate across human, wildlife, domesticated animal, and land health are likely to provide more just and comprehensive solutions than would be possible with siloed approaches. However, this is not common practice, and there is little guidance on how to apply such a strategy. In the present article, we summarize the state of knowledge on the impacts of terrestrial unconventional oil and gas development from the fields of ecology and public health. We then discuss synergies and trade-offs regarding impacts and mitigation strategies emerging from these two literatures. Finally, we provide recommendations for research and practice to fill knowledge gaps and better inform integrated decision-making to achieve multiple benefits and minimize impacts on human, wildlife, domesticated animals, and land health from energy development.
... Moreover, these rural communities are more likely to be Indigenous communities or agricultural towns who have greater dependency on the land, and are more vulnerable to damages resulting from UNG (O'Brien and Hipel, 2016;Sangaramoorthy et al., 2016). In fact, several studies have pointed to the environmental injustices surrounding UNG development and operations whereby UNG sites are more likely to be situated near communities with predominantly racialized individuals or living in poverty, and more likely to conduct flaring in such communities (Clough, 2018;Fry et al., 2015;Johnston et al., 2016Johnston et al., , 2020Ogneva--Himmelberger and Huang, 2015). The increase in these psychosocial stressors that accompany UNG operations coupled with the psychosocial stressors specific to the environmental injustices could explain the increased prevalence of maternal depression we observed, particularly given the greater opposition to UNG among women versus men (Boudet et al., 2014;Mayer, 2016). ...
Background
Hydraulic fracturing (fracking) is a method used to extract unconventional natural gas (UNG). Living near UNG operations has been associated with various health outcomes, but few have explored the association between UNG and mental health and substance use. Our objective was to evaluate the association between metrics of residential UNG well density/proximity and mental illness and substance use among pregnant individuals in Northeastern British Columbia, Canada.
Methods
Individuals who gave birth at the Fort St John hospital between December 30, 2006 and December 29, 2016 (n = 6278) were included in the study. Exposure was determined using inverse distance weighting (IDW) to calculate the density and proximity of UNG wells to the postal code centroid ofindividual's residential address at delivery. Four exposure metrics, categorized by quartiles, were calculated based on 50, 10, 5 and 2.5 km buffer zones around each postal code centroid. Logistic regression was used to separately evaluate associations between IDW quartiles of each metric and diagnosis of depression and anxiety prior to or during pregnancy, and self-reported substance use during pregnancy, controlling for relevant and available confounders.
Results
The second and third quartile (Q) of the 10 km IDW were associated with greater odds of depression (Q2: adjusted (aOR) 1.30, 95% (confidence interval) CI 1.03–1.64; Q3: aOR 1.35, 95% CI 1.07–1.70) compared to the first quartile, but not the fourth. Using the 5 km IDW, we observed a suggestive positive association with depression in the second and third quartile (aOR Q2: 1.21, 95% CI 0.96–1.53; aOR Q3: 1.24, 95% CI 0.98–1.57) compared to the first quartile. No statistically significant association was observed using the 2.5 km IDW exposure metric.
Conclusion
We observed some evidence of greater odds of mental illness prior to or during pregnancy, and substance use during pregnancy in pregnant individuals living in postal codes with increased UNG well density/proximity, although associations were not observed in smaller buffer zones. This study adds to the growing literature on the adverse health outcomes surrounding living in proximity to UNG operations.
... Much previous research has focused on fracking in the United States and Australia (Bubna-Litic, 2015;Inman, 2014) with little attention given to Latin America. Studies have explored place-specific social and ecological impacts of fracking highlighting increasing environmental and public health concerns (Bamberger & Oswald, 2016;Sovacool, 2014;Vengosh et al., 2014), and more recently, the social and political dimensions of fracking in domestic contexts, including social conflicts in Australian communities (De Rijke, 2013), perceptions of risk and opportunity in US communities (Ladd, 2013) as well as fracking as an environmental justice issue (Clough & Bell, 2016;Fry et al., 2015;Short et al., 2015). However, few studies have examined the use of social media by anti-fracking movements despite the increasing use of such platforms within global activism (Hopke, 2016). ...
This article explores how the anti-fracking movements in the province of Mendoza, Argentina, have used Twitter to shape narratives around anti-fracking. Adopting a dynamic view of collective action frames, the article shows that the anti-fracking movements have developed multiple frames to articulate their struggle and justify their grievances, and how procedural injustice and environmental values have been motivational factors for local citizens. The article also demonstrates that Twitter is principally being used as a broadcast platform rather than being used to create online collective action, but that the strong framing means that disparate groups have been united behind the common cause.
... Environmental concerns regarding air quality, water contamination, traffic impacts, noise levels, human and animal health, and wider social impacts of shale gas development have advanced particularly in the US context (see Davis and Fisk, 2017;Dunlop et al., 2021;Evensen and Stedman, 2017;Kinchy et al., 2014;Szolucha, 2021). There continues to be public distrust of the industry, as well as a series of studies examining the negative impacts for local residents living near shale gas sites or affected by the wider industry (Burbidge and Adams, 2020;Fry et al., 2015;Litovitz et al., 2013;Meng, 2015). The anti-fracking protests themselves have drawn increasing attention from scholars with studies have focused on motivations for opposition and the experiences of residents, adding to existing work on environmental activism (see Beebeejaun, 2019;Cotton and Charnley-Parry, 2018;Muncie, 2020). ...
The expansion of fracking, an intensive form of hydrocarbon extraction, has been met with increasing public hostility, spanning a diverse range of interests and political allegiances. However, to date, few authors have engaged with the role of gender and women activists. In this paper, I consider how gender and gendered ideas have been used as a resource to underpin fracking protests in the USA and UK. I find that a problematic gendered binary has emerged that undermined the veracity of anti-fracking protestors’ opposition and aligns with modes of planning governance that valorize universal and objective forms of knowledge. Drawing upon a feminist epistemological stance, I turn to a planning dispute over noise levels in Lancashire, England, to explore the limits to current forms of knowledge production. I argue that specific actors, behaviours, and forms of knowledge become framed as gendered and unreliable in the sphere of technical decision making, diminishing our understanding of the complexities of human experience and subjectivity within spatial planning.
... Despite the efforts of the sector, regulatory agencies, and other stakeholders in the search for a common ground on the issues. The rising ecological risks has on many occasions aggravated tensions between affected communities and the oil sector [37][38][39][40]. Yet, very little studies exist on the vulnerability of the study area to the impacts of fracking using mix scale approach integrated with temporal-spatial techniques of GIS and energy statistics [41,42,43]. ...
... In Colorado, large discrepancies between the owners of surface rights and mineral rights for the same land have been observed, with only 36-57% of mineral rights being owned by the surface owner in the three regions [42]. In a similar study in Texas, 61% of mineral rights owners did not experience environmental burdens as they lived far from the drilling sites [44]. This literature, considered together with the limited epidemiologic literature, suggests that those living near UOGD sites may bear significant environmental and health burdens while reaping fewer benefits. ...
Oil and gas development has led to environmental hazards and community concerns, particularly in relation to water supply issues. Filing complaints with state agencies enables citizens to register concerns and seek investigations. We evaluated associations between county-level socio-economic and demographic factors, oil and gas drilling, and three outcomes in Pennsylvania between 2004 and 2016: number of oil and gas complaints filed, and both the number and proportion of state investigations of water supply complaints yielding a confirmed water supply impairment (i.e., “positive determination”). We used hierarchical Bayesian Poisson and binomial regression analyses. From 2004 to 2016, 9,404 oil and gas-related complaints were filed, of which 4,099 were water supply complaints. Of those, 3,906 received investigations, and 215 yielded positive determinations. We observed a 47% increase in complaints filed per 10,000 increase in MHI: 0.35, 95% CI: 0.09–0.96). Our results suggest these relationships are complex and may indicate potential environmental and procedural inequities, warranting further investigation.
... This includes questions around the conflicts which changes to energy production and distribution will create and the unequal impacts that they will have on the people that live in the places affected. Recent cases on anti-fracking protests in cities have provided important groundwork towards engaging with urban siting struggles and examining their connection with issues of climate change and neoliberalisation (Kinniburgh 2015;Simonelli 2014;Fry et al. 2015). The following section examines the research on urban anti-fracking struggles in more detail. ...
This thesis is the first to focus on grassroots political opposition to fracking development in a city-region. It examines the political space opened by activists in Greater Manchester between 15th November 2013 and 12th April 2014, situating their political struggle in a broader urban terrain of protest. Data collection was conducted between 28th August 2013 and 20th October 2014. The thesis looks beyond simple interpretations of community opposition, toward theoretically grounded understandings of anti-fracking dissent. Paradoxically, in this case a local struggle emerged primarily from social movements unrelated to the development site itself, whose actors converged on the issue of stopping fracking in the cityregion and engaged disadvantaged communities neighbouring the exploratory well. Research illustrates how activists drew on the tactics and organisational practices of radical urban uprisings to open-up and sustain an anti-fracking camp outside the exploratory well for five months, and examines ways that their dissent challenged what was being contested, who could engage in the struggle and which grievances were recognised as legitimate. Understanding the complexities of the struggle contributes to existing research on the politics of contemporary urban environmental movements by examining how solidarity and an emancipatory politics can emerge from disparate groups that have seemingly discordant perspectives. This has practical as well as theoretical relevance, because the Greater Manchester anti-fracking movement successfully presented a united front against 'fracking', despite internal conflict between actors. Using ostensibly horizontal and less-obvious vertical organisational modes of practice to organise the anti-fracking movement, activists sustained a protest camp and limited access to the exploratory well while it was in operation, before leaving of their own volition. This means that analysis contributes to a politics of hope, offering lessons for similar struggles that emerge from disparate, autonomous groups.
... 64 However, it is worth noting that our conventional drilling exposure model yields inconclusive risk estimates among our communities with high non-White populations. Previous work shows that unconventional NGD occurs in Texas communities with high populations of racial and ethnic minorities as well as low income status, [65][66][67][68] though little work has been done on conventional drilling exposures. The U.S. Department of Energy is specifically instructed to monitor the impact of the energy sector on these communities, and the current study provides evidence that drilling exposures seem to be inequitably distributed in Texas. ...
Background:
Recent advancements in drilling technology led to a rapid increase in natural gas development (NGD). Air pollution may be elevated in these areas and may vary by drilling type (conventional and unconventional), production volume and gas flaring. Impacts of NGD on paediatric asthma are largely unknown. This study quantifies associations between specific NGD activities and paediatric asthma hospitalizations in Texas.
Methods:
We leveraged a database of Texas inpatient hospitalizations between 2000 and 2010 at the zip code level by quarter to examine associations between NGD and paediatric asthma hospitalizations, where our primary outcome is 0 vs ≥1 hospitalization. We used quarterly production reports to assess additional drilling-specific exposures at the zip code-level including drilling type, production and gas flaring. We developed logistic regression models to assess paediatric asthma hospitalizations by zip code-quarter-year observations, thus capturing spatiotemporal exposure patterns.
Results:
We observed increased odds of ≥1 paediatric asthma hospitalization in a zip code per quarter associated with increasing tertiles of NGD exposure and show that spatiotemporal variation impacts results. Conventional drilling, compared with no drilling, is associated with odds ratios up to 1.23 [95% confidence interval (CI): 1.13, 1.34], whereas unconventional drilling is associated with odds ratios up to 1.59 (95% CI: 1.46, 1.73). Increasing production volumes are associated with increased paediatric asthma hospitalizations in an exposure-response relationship, whereas associations with flaring volumes are inconsistent.
Conclusions:
We found evidence of associations between paediatric asthma hospitalizations and NGD, regardless of drilling type. Practices related to production volume may be driving these positive associations.
... Policy debates regarding setbacks and related oil and gas regulations have primarily occurred at the state and local level, where proponents of increased setback distances have highlighted health benefits, while opponents point to the rising costs of resource unavailability and associated loss of high-paying jobs and tax revenues (Fry, 2013;Maniloff and Mastromonaco, 2017;Weber et al., 2016;Fry et al., 2015;Fry and Brannstrom, 2017). This conflict between human health impacts and resource extraction came to a head in a 2018 Colorado state referendum, where a ballot initiative (Proposition 112) to increase setbacks from 500 feet to 2500 feet was defeated 45-55 22 . ...
Spatial setback rules are a common form of oil and gas regulation worldwide - they require minimum distances between oil and gas operations and homes and other sensitive locations. While setbacks can reduce exposure to potential harms associated with oil and gas production, they can also cause substantial quantities of oil and gas resources to be unavailable for extraction. Using both theoretical modeling and spatial analysis with GIS tools on publicly available data, we determine oil and gas resource loss under different setback distances, focusing on Colorado counties as a case study. We show that increasing setbacks results in small resource loss for setbacks up to 1500 feet, but resource loss quickly increases with longer setbacks. Approximately $4.5 billion in annual resource revenues would be lost in Colorado under 2500-foot setbacks, a distance recently proposed in Colorado Proposition 112 and California AB 345.
Türkiye’de çevre sorunlarından dolayı binlerce insan ölümcül hastalıklara yakalanıyor ve hayatını kaybediyor. Önümüzdeki yıllarda bu sayıların milyonlara ulaşmasının kaçınılmaz bir sonuç olduğunu söylemek acı ama su götürmez bir gerçek. Ülkemizde yaşanan çevre krizi, ulusal güvenlik sorununa doğru dönüşüyor. Çevre sorunlarının bir beka meselesine evrilmesinin arifesinde yeşil siyaset Türkiye’nin ulusal güvenliğini sağlayabilmesinin asgari koşuludur. Yeşil siyaset, bu topraklarda torunlarımızın, yani gelecek kuşakların özgür, adil ve kendi kendine yetebilecek şekilde yaşayabilmesinin garantisidir. Bu kitap, çevre dostu politikaların manifestosunu ortaya koyarak yeşil siyasetin şifrelerini kamuoyu ile paylaşmaktadır.
Temiz çevre, insanların varlıklarını sürdürebilmesi için asgari bir koşuldur İnsanlar tüm temel ihtiyaçlarını doğanın fiziksel ve biyolojik unsurlarından karşılamaktadır. Doğada olup yararlandığımız hava, su, toprak olmadan varlığımızı sürdürebilmemiz mümkün değildir. Çevrenin insan yaşamındaki önemine rağmen insan eylemlerinden dolayı ekolojik denge bozulma aşamasına gelmiştir. Her yıl milyonlarca insan çevre sorunlarından dolayı kanser, diyabet, kalp hastalıkları gibi sağlık sorunlarıyla mücadele etmektedir. Bu hastalıkların bir kısmı ölümle sonuçlanmaktadır. Çevre sorunlarından dolayı her yıl milyonlarca insan yaşamını yitirmektedir.
Milyonlarca insanın ölümüne neden olan çevre sorunlarının adil bir şekilde bölüşüldüğünü söylemek pek mümkün değildir. Özellikle gelecek kuşaklar, ekonomik açıdan dezavantajlı gruplar, kadınlar ve hayvanlar çevresel sorunlardan daha fazla etkilenmektedir. Aynı zamanda bu gruplar doğal kaynaklardan da daha az pay alabilmektedir. Çevresel sorunların ve kaynakların insanlar arasında adil bölüşülmemesi çevresel adaletsizlik adı verilen bir sorunun ortaya çıkmasına neden olmaktadır. Çevresel adaletsizlik, içinde yaşadığımız dönemin en önemli toplumsal meselelerinden bir tanesi olmasına rağmen bu konunun Türkiye’de akademi dünyasında yeterince ilgi görmediğini söylemek yanlış olmayacaktır.
Çevresel adaletsizliğin birçok nedeni bulunmaktadır. Bunların başında enerji kaynakları gelmektedir. Çevre ve toplum sağılığı üzerinde olumsuz etkileri olan enerji kaynaklarının kullanımı kimi durumlarda çevresel adaletsizliğe neden olmaktadır. Temel ihtiyaçlarımızı karşılamak için her gün kullandığımız enerji kaynakları aslında başka insanların çevre sorunlarına daha fazla maruz kalmasına neden olarak bir adaletsizlik teşkil etmektedir. Buna rağmen insanların kullandıkları enerji kaynaklarını çevresel adalet perspektifinden ele alan kapsamlı bilimsel çalışmalar yeterli seviyede bulunmamaktadır.
“Çevresel Adalet ve Enerji” başlıklı bu çalışma hem Türkiye'de hem de dünyada farklı enerji kaynaklarının neden olduğu çevresel adaletsizlikleri analiz etmeyi amaçlamaktadır. Bu çalışma Türkiye'de daha önce bilimsel bir çalışmanın yapılmadığı çevresel adalet ve enerji arasındaki ilişkiyi okuyucularına sunmaktadır.
Doç. Dr. Emrah AKYÜZ
02/06/2023
Unconventional oil and gas (UOG) production has reinvigorated US production while creating conflicts over governance and environmental injustices. Here, we focus on relationships among power, regulatory conflict, and procedural justice around UOG by examining the Colorado Oil and Gas Task Force (TF) and its decision‐making processes. Instead of statewide voting on UOG ballot measures, Colorado convened a 21‐member TF tasked with making regulatory recommendations. We draw on interviews, participant observation, and policy ethnography to examine: who sets the rules of the game, how players are chosen, and by whom. We ask the following questions: (1) How did TF members and other political actors exert state and institutional power, and how did that shape the structure, composition, processes, and outcomes of the TF?; (2) As a state‐created body, how did the TF and its internal processes disrupt or reinforce power relations favoring industry and fossil fuel development?; and (3) What were the procedural justice implications of TF processes? We advance scholarship on procedural justice by demonstrating how people operate at institutional scales to shape decision‐making structures, processes, and outcomes. We show how nonelected bodies can work as state interventions for industry, reinforcing industry power and procedural injustices rather than disrupting them .
This chapter demonstrates how to integrate geographic information systems (GIS) data into environmental justice (EJ) research in Latin America’s oil and natural gas extraction regions. It discusses two forms of distributional justice analysis: traditional and benefit sharing. Two recent GIS-based EJ studies conducted in a major oil and gas production area in Mexico demonstrate the challenges, workarounds, and types of geospatial data that can be used to conduct distributional environmental justice studies. We also evaluate the availability of open-access oil and natural gas, and demographic data among six hydrocarbon-producing countries in the region and provide guidelines and suggestions for conducting GIS-based EJ studies in Latin America. Finally, this chapter contends that integrating geospatial and empirical EJ analysis with qualitative EJ approaches not only strengthens EJ analysis in oil and natural gas production zones in Latin America, but also can be used to legitimize political claims and increase community engagement, as well as facilitate interdisciplinary dialog.KeywordsEnvironmental justiceExtractionNatural gasOil
Extractive industry disasters are events of varying magnitude that inexorably jeopardize the safety and livelihoods of surrounding communities and natural environments. As states and industries commit to further extraction of minerals and oil resources, it is increasingly important to understand the factors that compound community vulnerability and influence capacities to respond. A disaster refers to an exogenous shock that disrupts normal patterns and standards of living, which may cause suffering beyond a community’s capacity to respond and lead to human or environmental losses. The social vulnerability of a community involves the biophysical, social, economic, political, and legal characteristics that influence its sensitivity to disasters. Resilience refers to a community’s ability to prepare for, respond to, and recover from the impacts of a disaster. Resilience enables communities to direct available resources towards absorbing disturbances, organizing local responses to disasters, and preventing further harm. Mobilization efforts to resist hazard exposures through acts of civil disobedience, awareness-raising campaigns in partnership with external allies, shareholder activism, or legal challenges are examples of strategies deployed by resilient communities. However, factors such as economic dependence on extractive industries, community polarization, psychological distress, and limited local knowledge of extractive industry disasters can hinder resilience.
Child food security is a longstanding concern to policymakers, exacerbated by economic slack and instability. We use the fracking era oil and gas boom of the early 2000s as a natural experiment to examine the importance of state economic conditions for child food security. The fracking boom was a large and unexpected economic shock that substantially improved labor market conditions in states with oil and gas resources but not elsewhere. We find that increases in oil and gas labor income improve child food security, especially for children with less educated parents and those residing in single‐mother households.
We examine how contracts mediate private industry access to state-owned subterranean resources. Using a case study from one of Mexico’s most productive onshore natural gas fields, the Burgos Basin, we link contract literatures in geography and critical legal scholarship to answer the following two questions: Does the contract text correspond to how private companies access state-owned subsurface resources, and what purposes do the contracts serve for the contract signatories beyond resource production? The data suggest that contract winners have, so far, limited their drilling activities on the Burgos Basin. This situation draws attention to a puzzle wherein natural gas reserves are not being produced, but the contracts remain active and important to both the contractors and the government. Putting semi-structured interview data into direct conversation with contract text to answer our research questions, we encourage a deeper engagement with how extractive contracts are used to access state-owned resources. First, we uncover how the contract text is not instructive of how or why a private firm will access the resource or why the state enters the contract. Second, we highlight the ways that the contract fails to actualize resource production using a mechanisms of access approach to guide our analysis. Third, we show that resource contracts facilitate relationships and advance the interests of the contract parties regardless of what the actual text purports to do. We finally describe how state-firm resource contracts offer a fruitful area of exploration for geographers interested in resource production.
Natural gas leaks in local distribution systems can develop as underground pipeline infrastructure degrades over time. These leaks lead to safety, economic, and climate change burdens on society. We develop an environmental justice analysis of natural gas leaks discovered using advanced leak detection in 13 U.S. metropolitan areas. We use Bayesian spatial regression models to study the relationship between the density of leak indications and sociodemographic indicators in census tracts. Across all metro areas combined, we found that leak densities increase with increasing percent people of color and with decreasing median household income. These patterns of infrastructure injustice also existed within most metro areas, even after accounting for housing age and the spatial structure of the data. Considering the injustices described here, we identify actions available to utilities, regulators, and advocacy groups that can be taken to improve the equity of local natural gas distribution systems.
In the United States, unconventional oil and gas (UOG) production has elicited strong public response. As production occurs amid residential and commercial spaces, environmental, social, economic, regulatory, and mental health impacts have been documented across locations. Some community groups have mobilized against this activity, whereas others have not. We examine how and why UOG production becomes normalized despite its disruptions and risks. Through years of fieldwork, we have observed limited organized mobilization. Even activists express hesitation to demand transformative changes or complete stoppage of UOG production. Yet the drivers of these dynamics need to be better understood. We argue that these passive “sites of acceptance” emerge through a two‐part influence of neoliberalism. First, a mosaic of ideas and policy measures privileging deregulation and free markets manifests itself in a unique discourse we call collective neoliberalism. Second, neoliberalism as a system of governance creates a fractured, devolved regulatory environment ripe for regulatory capture and lacking sufficient resources. This, in turn, can discourage local efforts to limit or regulate UOG production as regulators seem unresponsive, poorly resourced, or tacitly more supportive of industry than the public. We use ethnographic data collected amid dense, widespread UOG production in Colorado to illustrate these patterns.
Revenues from oil and gas development play a key role in the economies of many states in the United States, but there are environmental concerns such as local air and water pollution, land cover changes and fragmentation, and negative effects on wildlife. These concerns were exacerbated as oil and gas production reached historic highs due to the expanded use of hydraulic fracturing technology beginning in the mid-2000s. This paper examines the influence of oil and gas development on breeding bird communities in the High Plains ecoregion of Colorado between 2003 and 2018. Specifically, we investigated whether oil and gas drilling or production affected species richness or evenness of bird communities. Our findings indicate that a decrease in producing well density or the number of producing fracking wells were associated with an increase in evenness of the overall bird community and grassland species richness, but disturbances from well drilling generally did not have a statistically significant influence on bird communities. We also found that a decrease in tree cover was associated with an increase in species richness and evenness of the overall bird community.
The greenhouse gases and ultrafine dust generated by ports degrade the environmental quality of life of local residents in port hinterlands. Nevertheless, the hinterland has rarely been considered a major target in maritime policy. Our study aims to suggest a practical policy direction for designing a sustainable port hinterland policy from an environmental justice perspective. To explore the possibilities, we used the analytic hierarchy process methodology to examine 20 policymakers who are involved in the port policymaking process and conducted additional interviews. The results show that procedural justice should prioritize the pursuit of sustainable port hinterlands. More precisely, the most urgent task is the institutionalized participation of residents in the hinterland; constructing eco-friendly infrastructure is scored as the next-most important task. Our study highlights the importance of focusing on the hinterland where local residents encounter environmental injustice, suggesting possible and practical policy implications.
En la integración energética de América del Norte, Estados Unidos impulsa la expansión geográfica del fracking hacía Canadá y México para extraer gas shale, aprovechando los yacimientos transfronterizos compartidos con ambos países. Aunque, el agua subterránea transfronteriza podría ser un insumo estratégico para dicho proceso, suele considerársele como un asunto estrictamente técnico. Este trabajo analiza desde el enfoque del ciclo hidrosocial, el conjunto de datos relativos a tres componentes clave que indicen en el aprovechamiento del gas shale: los shale play transfronterizos (como yacimientos de hidrocarburos), el fracking (como método extractivo) y los acuíferos transfronterizos (como supuesto “reservorio” hídrico). Los hallazgos refieren distintos niveles de conocimiento, persiste todavía una comprensión espacial fragmentada del fenómeno fracking, como problema escalar regional y transfronterizo que exige una visión que articule distintos saberes y partes interesadas a fin de proteger y conservar el agua subterránea.
For decades, the governance regimes of the United States and many other nations have increasingly devolved authority from central federal governments to substantially weaker state and local governments and even private industry. This trend produces uneven results for affected spaces and modes of governance. At the same time, industries have been re‐regulated under neoliberalization to maximize corporate profitability. Conterminous to the trend of neoliberal deregulation is the global energy transition. The U.S. energy system has shifted away from coal toward natural gas and has become the world’s top producer of hydrocarbons due to the widespread deployment of drilling techniques that allow access to unconventional resources. We evaluate the ways that neoliberal governance structures can create uneven socio‐economic impacts from oil and gas development across U.S. states using a multi‐level modeling framework with random slopes and cross‐level interactions. We utilize a multi‐level state and county data set that covers 2000–2016 to examine different outcomes across scales and places. We find evidence that state political economies—reflected in the ideological composition of state legislatures as well as the political spending of the energy sector—condition the effects of oil and gas development on well‐being. These findings are discussed in reference to theories of neoliberalism, growth machine politics, energy boomtowns, and natural resource‐dependent communities.
Unconventional oil and gas development (UOGD) expanded rapidly in the United States between 2004-2019 with resultant industrial change to landscapes and new environmental exposures. By 2019, West Texas' Permian Basin accounted for 35% of domestic oil production. We conducted an online survey of 566 Texans in 2019 to examine the implications of UOGD using three measures from the Environmental Distress Scale (EDS): perceived threat of environmental issues, felt impact of environmental change, and loss of solace when valued environments are transformed ("solastalgia"). We found increased levels of environmental distress among respondents living in counties in the Permian Basin who reported a 2.75% increase in perceived threat of environmental issues (95% CI = -1.14, 6.65) and a 4.21% increase in solastalgia (95% CI = 0.03, 8.40). In our subgroup analysis of women, we found higher EDS subscale scores among respondents in Permian Basin counties for perceived threat of environmental issues (4.08%, 95% CI= -0.12, 8.37) and solastalgia (7.09%, 95% CI= 2.44, 11.88). In analysis restricted to Permian Basin counties, we found exposure to at least one earthquake of magnitude ≥ 3 was associated with increases in perceived threat of environmental issues (4.69%, 95% CI = 0.15, 9.23), and that county-level exposure to oil and gas injection wells was associated with increases in felt impact (4.38%, 95% CI = -1.77, 10.54) and solastalgia (4.06%, 95% CI = 3.02, 11.14). Our results indicate increased environmental distress in response to UOGD-related environmental degradation among Texans and highlight the importance of considering susceptible sub-groups.
Despite the current moratorium, shale gas has been posited by the United Kingdom’s government as an important indigenous source of natural gas, a result of heightened concerns over national energy security and dwindling conventional fossil fuel reserves. Although several petroleum development licenses were awarded in the Vale of Pickering area of North Yorkshire in 2015, little research exists at the nexus of social and natural sciences on shale gas developments, particularly on potential risks to communities and the environment in the UK. This study uses the concept of energy justice and an interdisciplinary spatial assessment of potential environmental risks arising from shale gas developments, to evaluate where injustices may emerge, using the Vale of Pickering as a case study.
A novel methodology was used to model a possible scenario of shale gas developments, including the spatial dimensions of air and water pollution, seismicity and traffic flows, which were combined to generate an overall environmental risk assessment. This was analysed with a metric of socio-economic vulnerability, to highlight social groups which may be disproportionately at risk from fracking. Overall, modelled proximity-based risk under this scenario did not disproportionately increase in areas with higher populations of socio-economically vulnerable groups, however potential areas for other forms of energy injustices to emerge, such as benefit-sharing injustice were found.
This study offers a holistic method for identifying and understanding the local socio-environmental justice dimensions of national energy projects, such as shale gas developments, considerations which can be integrated into future planning processes.
The United States has experienced a boom in natural gas production due to recent technological innovations that have enabled this resource to be produced from shale formations.
This review discusses the body of evidence that focuses on exposure pathways to evaluate the potential environmental public health impacts of shale gas development. It highlights what is currently known and identifies data gaps and research limitations by addressing matters of toxicity, exposure pathways, air quality, and water quality.
There is evidence of potential environmental public health risks associated with shale gas development. A number of studies suggest that shale gas development contributes to levels of ambient air concentrations known to be associated with increased risk of morbidity and mortality. Similarly, an increasing body of studies suggest water contamination risks exist through a variety of environmental pathways, most notably during wastewater transport and disposal and via poor zonal isolation of gases and fluids due to structural integrity impairment of cement in gas wells.
Despite a growing body of evidence, a number of data gaps persist. Most importantly, there is a need for more epidemiological studies to assess associations between risk factors, such as air and water pollution and health outcomes among populations living in close proximity to shale gas operations.
Birth defects are a leading cause of neonatal mortality. Natural gas development (NGD) emits several potential teratogens and US production is expanding.
We examined associations between maternal residential proximity to NGD and birth outcomes in a retrospective cohort study of 124,842 births between 1996 and 2009 in rural Colorado.
We calculated inverse distance weighted natural gas well counts within a 10-mile radius of maternal residence to estimate maternal exposure to NGD. Logistic regression, adjusted for maternal and infant covariates, was used to estimate associations with exposure tertiles for congenital heart defects (CHDs), neural tube defects (NTDs), oral clefts, preterm birth, and term low birth weight. The Association with term birth weight was investigated using multiple linear regression.
Prevalence of CHDs increased with exposure tertile, with an odds ratio (OR) of 1.3 for the highest tertile (95% CI: 1.2, 1.5) and NTD prevalence was associated with the highest tertile of exposure (OR = 2.0, 95% CI: 1.0, 3.9, based on 59 cases), compared to no gas wells within a 10-mile radius. Exposure was negatively associated with preterm birth and positively associated with fetal growth, though the magnitude of association was small. No association was found between exposure and oral clefts.
In this large cohort, we observed an association between density and proximity of natural gas wells within a 10-mile radius of maternal residence and prevalence of CHDs and possibly NTDs. Greater specificity in exposure estimates are needed to further explore these associations.
The rapid rise in natural gas extraction utilizing hydraulic fracturing increases the potential for contamination of surface and ground water from chemicals used throughout the process. Hundreds of products containing more than 750 chemicals and components are potentially used throughout the extraction process, including over one hundred known or suspected endocrine disrupting chemicals. We hypothesized that a selected subset of chemicals used in natural gas drilling operations and also surface and ground water samples collected in a drilling-dense region of Garfield County, CO would exhibit estrogen and androgen receptor activities. Water samples were collected, solid-phase extracted, and measured for estrogen and androgen receptor activities using reporter gene assays in human cell lines. Of the 39 unique water samples, 89%, 41%, 12%, and 46% exhibited estrogenic, anti-estrogenic, androgenic, and anti-androgenic activities, respectively. Testing of a subset of natural gas drilling chemicals revealed novel anti-estrogenic, novel anti-androgenic, and limited estrogenic activities. The Colorado River, the drainage basin for this region, exhibited moderate levels of estrogenic, anti-estrogenic, and anti-androgenic activities, suggesting that higher localized activity at sites with known natural gas related spills surrounding the river might be contributing to the multiple receptor activities observed in this water source. The majority of water samples collected from sites in a drilling-dense region of Colorado exhibited more estrogenic, anti-estrogenic, or anti-androgenic activities than reference sites with limited nearby drilling operations. Our data suggest that natural gas drilling operations may result in elevated EDC activity in surface and ground water.
This letter provides a first-order estimate of conventional air pollutant emissions, and the monetary value of the associated environmental and health damages, from the extraction of unconventional shale gas in Pennsylvania. Region-wide estimated damages ranged from 32 million dollars for 2011. The emissions from Pennsylvania shale gas extraction represented only a few per cent of total statewide emissions, and the resulting statewide damages were less than those estimated for each of the state's largest coal-based power plants. On the other hand, in counties where activities are concentrated, NOx emissions from all shale gas activities were 20–40 times higher than allowable for a single minor source, despite the fact that individual new gas industry facilities generally fall below the major source threshold for NOx. Most emissions are related to ongoing activities, i.e., gas production and compression, which can be expected to persist beyond initial development and which are largely unrelated to the unconventional nature of the resource. Regulatory agencies and the shale gas industry, in developing regulations and best practices, should consider air emissions from these long-term activities, especially if development occurs in more populated areas of the state where per-ton emissions damages are significantly higher.
Environmental concerns surrounding drilling for gas are intense due to expansion of shale gas drilling operations. Controversy surrounding the impact of drilling on air and water quality has pitted industry and lease-holders against individuals and groups concerned with environmental protection and public health. Because animals often are exposed continually to air, soil, and groundwater and have more frequent reproductive cycles, animals can be used as sentinels to monitor impacts to human health. This study involved interviews with animal owners who live near gas drilling operations. The findings illustrate which aspects of the drilling process may lead to health problems and suggest modifications that would lessen but not eliminate impacts. Complete evidence regarding health impacts of gas drilling cannot be obtained due to incomplete testing and disclosure of chemicals, and nondisclosure agreements. Without rigorous scientific studies, the gas drilling boom sweeping the world will remain an uncontrolled health experiment on an enormous scale.
Technological advances (e.g. directional drilling, hydraulic fracturing), have led to increases in unconventional natural gas development (NGD), raising questions about health impacts.
We estimated health risks for exposures to air emissions from a NGD project in Garfield County, Colorado with the objective of supporting risk prevention recommendations in a health impact assessment (HIA).
We used EPA guidance to estimate chronic and subchronic non-cancer hazard indices and cancer risks from exposure to hydrocarbons for two populations: (1) residents living >½ mile from wells and (2) residents living ≤ ½ mile from wells.
Residents living ≤ ½ mile from wells are at greater risk for health effects from NGD than are residents living >½ mile from wells. Subchronic exposures to air pollutants during well completion activities present the greatest potential for health effects. The subchronic non-cancer hazard index (HI) of 5 for residents ≤ ½ mile from wells was driven primarily by exposure to trimethylbenzenes, xylenes, and aliphatic hydrocarbons. Chronic HIs were 1 and 0.4. for residents ≤ ½ mile from wells and >½ mile from wells, respectively. Cumulative cancer risks were 10 in a million and 6 in a million for residents living ≤ ½ mile and >½ mile from wells, respectively, with benzene as the major contributor to the risk.
Risk assessment can be used in HIAs to direct health risk prevention strategies. Risk management approaches should focus on reducing exposures to emissions during well completions. These preliminary results indicate that health effects resulting from air emissions during unconventional NGD warrant further study. Prospective studies should focus on health effects associated with air pollution.
Extracting gas from shale increases the availability of this resource, but the health and environmental risks may be too high.
Directional drilling and hydraulic-fracturing technologies are dramatically increasing natural-gas extraction. In aquifers overlying the Marcellus and Utica shale formations of northeastern Pennsylvania and upstate New York, we document systematic evidence for methane contamination of drinking water associated with shale-gas extraction. In active gas-extraction areas (one or more gas wells within 1 km), average and maximum methane concentrations in drinking-water wells increased with proximity to the nearest gas well and were 19.2 and 64 mg CH(4) L(-1) (n = 26), a potential explosion hazard; in contrast, dissolved methane samples in neighboring nonextraction sites (no gas wells within 1 km) within similar geologic formations and hydrogeologic regimes averaged only 1.1 mg L(-1) (P < 0.05; n = 34). Average δ(13)C-CH(4) values of dissolved methane in shallow groundwater were significantly less negative for active than for nonactive sites (-37 ± 7‰ and -54 ± 11‰, respectively; P < 0.0001). These δ(13)C-CH(4) data, coupled with the ratios of methane-to-higher-chain hydrocarbons, and δ(2)H-CH(4) values, are consistent with deeper thermogenic methane sources such as the Marcellus and Utica shales at the active sites and matched gas geochemistry from gas wells nearby. In contrast, lower-concentration samples from shallow groundwater at nonactive sites had isotopic signatures reflecting a more biogenic or mixed biogenic/thermogenic methane source. We found no evidence for contamination of drinking-water samples with deep saline brines or fracturing fluids. We conclude that greater stewardship, data, and-possibly-regulation are needed to ensure the sustainable future of shale-gas extraction and to improve public confidence in its use.
Gas drillers are using a powerful legal tool to force reluctant landowners to cooperate.
Part 1 addresses the underlying reason for the current wave of royalty litigation, especially gas royalty disputes, and offers a legal history on the meaning of "royalty." This portion concludes that a major underlying reason for the current wave of royalty litigation lies in the "reform" of the federal oil and gas income tax depletion allowance. This portion also shows that royalty obligations were always set by contract or ordinance and did not arise from property law. Part 2 will address whether oil and gas lessees must pay royalty on gas values attributable to so-called "post-production" activities.
Informed consent is a central topic in contemporary biomedical ethics. Yet attempts to set defensible and feasible standards for consenting have led to persistent difficulties. In Rethinking Informed Consent in Bioethics Neil Manson and Onora O'Neill set debates about informed consent in medicine and research in a fresh light. They show why informed consent cannot be fully specific or fully explicit, and why more specific consent is not always ethically better. They argue that consent needs distinctive communicative transactions, by which other obligations, prohibitions, and rights can be waived or set aside in controlled and specific ways. Their book offers a coherent, wide-ranging and practical account of the role of consent in biomedicine which will be valuable to readers working in a range of areas in bioethics, medicine and law.
Management - This is an excerpt from SPE 152596.
The use of horizontal wells and hydraulic fracturing is so effective that it has been called “disruptive.” That is, it threatens the profitability and continued development of other energy sources, such as wind and solar, because it is much less expensive and far more reliable. Not only that, but compared with coal, natural gas produces only half the carbon dioxide and almost no sulfur, nitrous oxides, or mercury.
Those demonstrable benefits over both traditional and alternative energy draw monetary and political attacks. Some university and media reports have focused on two main environmental concerns about using hydraulic fracturing to recover shale gas:
Groundwater and/or surface-water contamination by methane or chemicals
Escape of methane gas to the atmosphere
These risks come from well construction, transportation of chemicals and fluids to the well site, and operation of the wells and the gas-transport system. This paper is an abbreviated analysis of a larger document on factual information about the purported risks of hydraulic fracturing:
1. Deep-well hydraulic fracturing does not travel through the rock far enough to harm fresh-water supplies. Thousands of field-monitoring tests and millions of fracturing jobs have confirmed this point.
2. In the deep, properly constructed wells that produce most US shale gas, the chance of even minor water contamination from fracturing chemicals is less than one event in a million fracture treatments, based on statistical analysis. When compared with the frequency of pollution from chemical dumps, acid mine drainage, general manufacturing, oil refining, and other energy- or product-producing activities, natural gas from conventional and unconventional sources generates more energy with the least impact and fewest problems.
3. Even as underground fractures grow (mostly outward with limited upward and downward growth), the total fracture extent remains thousands of feet below the deepest fresh water sands. The height of any fracture is limited by rock stresses, leakage of fracturing fluids within the target fracturing zone, and the hundreds of natural rock barriers that border the shale zone. Typical fracture height is 100 to 300 ft and separation between the top of the fracture and the deepest fresh water sands ranges from 3000 to over 5000 ft.
4. Water contamination due to spilled industrial chemicals occurs rarely and even less so for fracturing chemicals and comes exclusively from careless road transport, on-site storage and surface mixing, or well construction. These failings can be addressed successfully with existing technology and effective regulations. It is interesting to note that the states with the fewest problems are those with strong state regulations. Appropriate regulations already exist in most producing states and work very effectively to protect the environment.
This volume provides a historical and conceptual review of informed consent with particular attention to the special conditions under which such consent is obtained. Topics covered by the books 10 chapters are: foundations in moral theory foundations in legal theory pronouncement and practice in clinical medicine the emergence of legal doctrine the development of consent requirements in research ethics the evolution of federal policy governing human research in the US the concept of autonomy the concepts of informed consent and competence standards of understanding and coercion manipulation and persuasion. A distinction is made between 2 concepts of informed consent--informed consent defined in terms of the conditions of a particular kind of autonomous authorization and informed consent where the nature and acceptability of effective authorizations are established by operative informed consent rules in a particular policy system. Required is a complex balancing of policy objectives moral considerations and the interests of various parties in the setting of consent requirements.
Extracting natural gas from shale formations can create local economic benefits such as public revenues but also disamenities such as truck traffic, both of which change over time. We study how shale gas development affected zip code level housing values in Texas’ Barnett Shale, which splits the Dallas-Fort Worth region in half and is the most extensively developed shale formation in the U.S. We find that housing in shale zip codes appreciated more than nonshale zip codes during peak development and less afterwards, with a net positive effect of five to six percentage points from 1997 to 2013. The greater appreciation in part reflects improved local public finances: the value of natural gas rights expanded the local tax base by $82,000 per student, increasing school revenues and expenditures. Within shale zip codes, however, an extra well per square kilometer was associated with a 1.6 percentage point decrease in appreciation over the study period.
Procedural justice, or the ability of people affected by decisions to participate in making them, is widely recognized as an important aspect of environmental justice (EJ). Procedural justice, moreover, requires that affected people have a substantial understanding of the hazards that a particular decision would impose. While EJ scholars and activists point out a number of obstacles to ensuring substantial understanding—including industry's nondisclosure of relevant information and technocratic problem framings—this article shows how key insights from Science and Technology Studies (STS) about the nature of knowledge pose even more fundamental challenges for procedural justice. In particular, the knowledge necessary to inform participation in decision making is likely not to exist at the time of decision making, undermining the potential for people to give their informed consent to being exposed to an environmental hazard. In addition, much of the local knowledge important to understanding the consequences of hazards will develop only after decisions have been made, and technoscientific knowledge of environmental effects will inevitably change over the period during which people will be affected by a hazard. The changing landscape of knowledge calls into question the idea that consent or participation during one decision-making process can by itself constitute procedural justice. An STS-informed understanding of the nature of knowledge, this article argues, implies that procedural justice should include proactive knowledge production to fill in knowledge gaps, and ongoing opportunities for communities to consent to the presence of hazards as local knowledge emerges and scientific knowledge changes.
Improvements in technology have made it profitable to tap unconventional gas reservoirs in relatively impermeable shale and sandstone deposits, which are spread throughout the U.S., mostly in rural areas. Proponents of gas drilling point to the activity's local economic benefits yet no empirical studies have systematically documented the magnitude or distribution of economic gains. I estimate these gains for counties in Colorado, Texas, and Wyoming, three states where natural gas production expanded substantially since the late 1990s. I find that a large increase in the value of gas production caused modest increases in employment, wage and salary income, and median household income. The results suggest that each million dollars in gas production created 2.35 jobs in the county of production, which led to an annualized increase in employment that was 1.5% of the pre-boom level for the average gas boom county. Comparisons show that ex-ante estimates of the number of jobs created by developing the Fayetteville and Marcellus shale gas formations may have been too large.
New energy practices may threaten public health.
As hydraulic fracturing unlocks new gas reserves, researchers struggle
to understand its health implications.
Hydraulic fracturing, commonly called fracking, allows access to previously inaccessible natural gas reserves. Fracking in the United States is being touted as a panacea, creating much-needed jobs following a brutal recession, reducing dependence on foreign energy supplies, and lowering emissions of greenhouse gases that might contribute to global warming. As this natural gas production ramps up, however, there are few scientific findings on the effects of fracking on the environment and animal and human health. Moreover, anecdotal evidence suggests it may cause harm by contaminating well and ground water and releasing gases into the air.
Recent advances in drilling technology have allowed for the profitable extraction of natural gas from deep underground shale rock formations. Several reports sponsored by the gas industry have estimated the economic effects of the shale gas extraction on incomes, employment, and tax revenues. None of these reports has been published in an economics journal and therefore have not been subjected to the peer review process. Yet these reports may be influential to the formation of public policy. This commentary provides written reviews of several studies purporting to estimate the economic impact of gas extraction from shale beds. Due to questionable assumptions, the economic impacts estimated in these reports are very likely overstated.
Tilting at Gas Wells. Truthout
- A Briggle
Briggle, A., 2013. Tilting at Gas Wells. Truthout (November 27. http://truth-out.org/
opinion/item/20183-tilting-at-gas-wells-whats-the-best-way-to-defend-yourcommunity-from-fracking).
Proaction and the Politics of Fracking. The Guardian
- Adam Briggle
Briggle, Adam, 2014. Proaction and the Politics of Fracking. The Guardian (January 28.
http://www.theguardian.com/science/political-science/2014/jan/28/proaction-policyfracking).
Tests at Well Show Toxins
- L Brown
Brown, L., 2010. Tests at Well Show Toxins. Dallas Morning News (March 20: http://
www.dallasnews.com/incoming/20100320-Tests-at-well-show-toxins-7844.ece).
Open government, budget documents
- City Of Denton
City of Denton, 2014a. Open government, budget documents Accessed April 15, 2014.
www.cityofdenton.com.
Vested Rights White Paper Accessed 25
- City
- Denton
City of Denton, 2014b. Vested Rights White Paper Accessed 25 November 2014. http://
newsgatheringblog.dentonrc.com/2014/11/citys-position-paper-on-vested-rights.
html/.
Fracking Hell: What It's Really Like to live Next to a Shale Gas Well. The Guardian (Accessed online
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Goldenberg, S., 2013. Fracking Hell: What It's Really Like to live Next to a Shale Gas Well.
The Guardian (Accessed online; http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/
dec/14/fracking-hell-live-next-shale-gas-well-texas-us).
Texas Oil, American Dreams: A Study of the Texas Independent Producers and Royalty Owners Association
- L Goodwyn
Goodwyn, L., 1996. Texas Oil, American Dreams: A Study of the Texas Independent Producers and Royalty Owners Association. Texas State Historical Association and the
University of Texas at Austin, Austin.
The environmental justice misfit: public participation and the paradigm paradox
- Guana
Guana, E., 1998. The environmental justice misfit: public participation and the paradigm
paradox. Stanf. Environ. Law J. 17 (3), 4-72.
Lawsuits Follow Fracking Outcome
- P Heinkel-Wolfe
Heinkel-Wolfe, P., 2014. Lawsuits Follow Fracking Outcome. Denton Record Chronicle (5
November. http://www.dentonrc.com/local-news/local-news-headlines/20141105-lawsuits-follow-fracking-outcome.ece).
Unconventional natural gas development and infant health: evidence from Pennsylvania. Charles H. Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management Working Paper
- E L Hill
Hill, E.L., 2013. Unconventional natural gas development and infant health: evidence from
Pennsylvania. Charles H. Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management
Working Paper 2012-12.
The economic and employment contributions of shale gas in the United States. Prepared for America's Natural Gas Alliance by IHS Global Insight (USA). America's Natural Gas Alliance
- Insight
Insight, IHS Global, 2011. The economic and employment contributions of shale gas in the
United States. Prepared for America's Natural Gas Alliance by IHS Global Insight
(USA). America's Natural Gas Alliance, Washington, DC.
University of Houston Law Foundation Advanced Oil and Gas Short Course
- J C King
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King, J.C., Bryan, J.L., 2004. Land use and zoning: Production issues affected by urban
sprawl. University of Houston Law Foundation Advanced Oil and Gas Short Course,
Houston, Texas, January 22-23 2004 and Cityplace Conference Center, Dallas, Texas,
February 5-6 2004.
The oil and gas industry's exclusions and exemptions to major environmental statutes
- R L Kosnik
Kosnik, R.L., 2007. The oil and gas industry's exclusions and exemptions to major environmental statutes. www.earthworksaction.org/pubs/PetroleumExemptions1c.pdf.
A Decade of Drilling: The Impact of the Barnett Shale on Business Activity in the Surrounding Region and Texas; An Assessment of the First Decade of Extensive Development
- Perryman Group
Perryman Group, 2011. A Decade of Drilling: The Impact of the Barnett Shale on Business
Activity in the Surrounding Region and Texas; An Assessment of the First Decade of
Extensive Development. Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce (http://www.
fortworthchamber.com/am-site/media/barnett-shale-study.pdf).
The adverse impact of banning hydraulic fracturing in the City of Denton on business activity and tax receipts in the city and state
- Perryman Group
Perryman Group, 2014. The adverse impact of banning hydraulic fracturing in the City of
Denton on business activity and tax receipts in the city and state. http://
energyindepth.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/07/Perryman-Denton-Fracking-Ban-Impact.pdf.
Wrangling with urban wildcatters: defending Texas municipal oil and gas development ordinances against regulatory takings challenges
- Riley
Riley, T., 2007. Wrangling with urban wildcatters: defending Texas municipal oil and gas
development ordinances against regulatory takings challenges. Vt. Law Rev. 32 (349).
Denton homeowners file $25M lawsuit over Neighborhood fracking
- Sakelaris
Sakelaris, N., 2014. Denton homeowners file $25 M lawsuit over Neighborhood fracking.
Dallas Bus. J. (March 12). http://www.bizjournals.com/dallas/news/2014/03/12/
denton-homeowners-file-25m-lawsuit-over.html?page=all).
Defining Environmental Justice: Theories, Movements, and Nature
- D Scholsberg
Scholsberg, D., 2007. Defining Environmental Justice: Theories, Movements, and Nature.
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Environmental Justice: Creating Equality, Reclaiming Democracy
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Shrader-Frechette, K., 2002. Environmental Justice: Creating Equality, Reclaiming Democracy. Oxford University Press, Oxford.
The Barnett Shale Play: Phoenix of the Fort Worth Basin: A History
- D Steward
Steward, D., 2007. The Barnett Shale Play: Phoenix of the Fort Worth Basin: A History. Fort
Worth Geological Society, Fort Worth, TX.
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Welch, T., 2012. Municipal regulation of natural gas drilling in Texas. The University of
Texas at Austin Land Use Planning Law Conference, March 23, 2012.