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RDA general membership meeting this week!

Wednesday, September 15th
7:00 PM
Pajama Factory in Williamsport’s west end
Click here for details.

Lies and Broken Promises:

An Emerging Giant

Pennsylvania State University’s economic report on gas exploration in the Marcellus Shale

Pennsylvania State University permitted two of its former professors to use the university’s research reputation to give authority to a blatant piece of gas industry propaganda entitled “An Emerging Giant”.

The paper, commissioned by the industry, and published in 2009, wildly overstates the economic impact of gas drilling on the state’s economy. The energy industry historically uses this well-worn strategy to manipulate and control government regulation and taxation. This plan has worked well in other states and is working equally well here.

The industry makes it a practice to give one set of facts to investors and industry analysts and different (and often contradictory) information to legislators, lessees, citizens, and environmentalists. The authors of the Penn State report, Tim Considine and Robert Watson, slavishly adhered to gas industry talking points in developing their arguments. Several times they made gross misstatements to premise an argument, each time in favor of the industry.

In the full critique linked below, I have used information from the gas industry, gas industry analysts, the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry, Pennsylvania Budget and Policy Center, and reliable research from within the Pennsylvania State University system.

The intent of the “Penn State Report”, as the industry dubbed it, was to substantially tip the statewide debate on new gas drilling technologies in the gas industry’s favor. This effort was extremely successful, and the report’s unjustifiable claims continue to be fronted by its patrons, the Marcellus Shale Coalition.

Read more of this critique by clicking here.

Jon Bogle
Board of Directors, founding member,
Responsible Drilling Alliance
Professor Emeritus, Lycoming College, Art/Sculpture

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