Forbes: PSEHE: Where Ideology Trumps Reality

Recently a group called Physicians, Scientists and Engineers for Healthy Energy (PSEHE) organized a petition urging President Obama to delay, or entirely avoid, the prospect of exporting natural gas to friends and allies around the globe. The way PSEHE tells it, authorizing this activity would increase the use of hydraulic fracturing and thus, the public’s exposure to adverse health effects.

Being a thirty three year veteran of the oil and natural gas industry I found it odd that I hadn’t heard of this organization so I decided to indulge my curiosity by browsing their website. Upon doing so, two things made themselves readily apparent.  PSEHE focuses its efforts exclusively on shale development, and as a recent media account noted, “language on the group’s website suggests an anti-development viewpoint.” With my curiosity piqued, I continued digging.

It turns out PSEHE is funded by the Park Foundation.  The Foundation’s penchant for attacking the natural gas industry was noted by E&E News earlier this year.  In short, Park is behind nearly every anti-natural gas initiative to date. Nestled in the sleepy town of Ithaca, New York,  the foundation has supported projects ranging from Josh Fox’s Gasland to groups like Earth Justice and Earthworks, as well as efforts to “stop unsafe gas drilling” in the Empire State. I kept digging.

PSEHE was founded by Dr. Anthony Ingraffea, a professor at Cornell University, who is a co-author of a widely discredited study on lifecycle methane emissions from oil and gas development emanating from shale development.  The professor’s research has been criticized by agencies of the federal government (DOE/NETL) and multiple peer-reviewed papers, including a recent Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) study coauthored by a lead author of the IPCC Fifth Assessment Report, who noted the study used “unreasonable” assumptions to arrive at its conclusions. Dr. Ingraffea has also shown an increasing willingness to make statements refuted by experience and independent review. At a June 2012 congressional briefing, Ingraffea claimed that “hundreds if not thousands of cases of water contamination [occur], anywhere shale gas development occurs.”  MORE