Shale development in the US and Canada: A review of engagement practice (original) (raw)
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Seeing futures now: Emergent US and UK views on shale development, climate change and energy systems
Global Environmental Change
Shale developmentextraction of oil and gas from shale rock formations using hydraulic fracturing or 'fracking'has become a critical focus for energy debates in the US and UK. In both countries, potential industry expansion into new areas for shale extraction is expected to produce a wide range of environmental and social impacts and to change the configuration of future energy systems. To engage with emergent views on these complex, multi-scale issues, we held a series of day-long deliberation workshops (two in the US and two in the UK) designed and facilitated for diverse groups of people to discuss a range of possible consequences and meanings of shale development. Amid nuanced differences between and within national contexts, notable similarities in views were tracked across all four workshops. Concerns in common were not limited to specific risks such as water contamination. Participants also questioned whether shale development was compatible with their visions for and concerns about the longer-term futureincluding views on impacts and causes of climate change, societal dependency on fossil fuels, development of alternative energy technologies, the perceived shortterm objectives of government and industry agencies, and obligations to act responsibly toward future generations. Extending prior qualitative research on shale development and on energy systems change, this research brings open-ended and cross-national public deliberation inquiry to bear on broader issues of climate change, responsibility, and ideas about how shale development might undermine or reinforce the energy systems that people consider important for the future.
Shale development – extraction of oil and gas from shale rock formations using hydraulic fracturing or 'fracking' – has become a critical focus for energy debates in the US and UK. In both countries, potential industry expansion into new areas for shale extraction is expected to produce a wide range of environmental and social impacts and to change the configuration of future energy systems. To engage with emergent views on these complex, multi-scale issues, we held a series of day-long deliberation workshops (two in the US and two in the UK) designed and facilitated for diverse groups of people to discuss a range of possible consequences and meanings of shale development. Amid nuanced differences between and within national contexts, notable similarities in views were tracked across all four workshops. Concerns in common were not limited to specific risks such as water contamination. Participants also questioned whether shale development was compatible with their visions for and concerns about the longer-term future – including views on impacts and causes of climate change, societal dependency on fossil fuels, development of alternative energy technologies, the perceived short-term objectives of government and industry agencies, and obligations to act responsibly toward future generations. Extending prior qualitative research on shale development and on energy systems change, this research brings open-ended and cross-national public deliberation inquiry to bear on broader issues of climate change, responsibility, and ideas about how shale development might undermine or reinforce the energy systems that people consider important for the future.
Changes to the material and social systems that underpin energy infrastructures are inextricably linked to energy justice concerns, and the timeframes of those changes significantly affect their outcomes. Temporal aspects of energy initiatives and their impacts are thus an important site for examining emergent public views on new energy proposals, inequality, and energy justice. We propose urgency is a particularly rich concept through which to study (i) the justice and socioenvironmental implications of energy systems and technological change and (ii) how people make sense of contested energy timeframes. Here, we present findings from a series of public deliberation workshops held in the United States and United Kingdom to discuss projected impacts of shale oil and gas extraction by hydraulic fracturing. We encountered critical similarities across sites, as in widespread public resistance to issue framings that foreground urgency-based claims in support of their objectives. Participants assessed energy initiatives with particular reference to temporality and urgency, and we argue these views raise justice concerns regarding distribution, the creation of environmental inequalities, public participation, and recognition. We also suggest a focus on urgency provides fresh perspectives on justice issues surrounding the speed and direction of technological development in general and of energy transitions in particular.
Lessons on public participation from the UK shale gas controversy
Policy@Sussex Policy Brief, 2022
The tensions that emerged between delivering energy infrastructure and giving the public and local communities a say in decision-making during the UK shale gas controversy offer a number of important lessons both for any renewed attempt to develop a domestic shale gas industry and as the UK looks toward the infrastructure required for Net Zero. University of Sussex researchers investigated formal public participation in UK shale gas decision-making in order to understand the nature and extent of the participatory opportunity on offer and learn what participants thought about these exercises. This policy brief summarises the findings of this work and makes four recommendations to institutions that oversee formal participatory processes on energy infrastructure.
Public Engagement and Sustainable Energy Development
Geo-Resources Environment and Engineering
Public engagement is increasingly important in ensuring the success of projects related to energy development, particularly with regard to issues of environmental protection, public health, and socioeconomic impacts. This is due to concurrent trends in public behavior, including a rise in public interest in these projects that is not matched by a rise in science literacy, and increasing organization and participation of the public through social media, citizen science, and grassroots initiatives. In recent years, several high-profile incidents have demonstrated that when public concern is ignored or met with a passive response from industry, it can rapidly grow into organized opposition that negatively impacts or wholly derails a project. Engaging, listening to, and educating stakeholders during early planning and development phases are therefore essential to earning credibility and trust. Moreover, maintaining two-way lines of communication throughout the lifespan of a project demonstrates social responsibility and facilitates cooperation, acceptance, and even support from communities and others. Positive experiences with specific projects at a local, community level can influence the larger public opinion of an entire industry sector. This paper presents cases studies of public engagement related to shale gas development (including hydraulic fracturing and pipeline construction), mountaintop removal mining, and management of mixed-use watersheds near surface mining operations. The experiences highlighted in these case studies are used to draw best practices of public engagement for sustainable energy development.
Nature Energy
Shale gas and oil production in the US has increased rapidly in the last decade, while interest in prospective development has also arisen in the UK. In both countries, shale resources and the method of their extraction (hydraulic fracturing, or 'fracking') have been met with opposition amid concerns about impacts on water, greenhouse gas emissions, and health effects. Here we report the findings of a qualitative, cross-national deliberation study of public perceptions of shale development in UK and US locations not yet subject to extensive shale development. When presented with a carefully calibrated range of risks and benefits, participants' discourse focused on risks or doubts about benefits, and potential impacts were viewed as inequitably distributed. Participants drew on direct, place-based experiences as well as national contexts in deliberating shale development. These findings suggest that shale gas development already evokes a similar 'signature' of risk across the US and UK.
Energy Research & Social Science
Changes to the material and social systems that underpin energy infrastructures are inextricably linked to energy justice concerns, and the timeframes of those changes significantly affect their outcomes. Temporal aspects of energy initiatives and their impacts are thus an important site for examining emergent public views on new energy proposals, inequality, and energy justice. We propose urgency is a particularly rich concept through which to study (i) the justice and socioenvironmental implications of energy systems and technological change and (ii) how people make sense of contested energy timeframes. Here, we present findings from a series of public deliberation workshops held in the United States and United Kingdom to discuss projected impacts of shale oil and gas extraction by hydraulic fracturing. We encountered critical similarities across sites, as in widespread public resistance to issue framings that foreground urgency-based claims in support of their objectives. Participants assessed energy initiatives with particular reference to temporality and urgency, and we argue these views raise justice concerns regarding distribution, the creation of environmental inequalities, public participation, and recognition. We also suggest a focus on urgency provides fresh perspectives on justice issues surrounding the speed and direction of technological development in general and of energy transitions in particular.
Civil society research and Marcellus shale natural gas development
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Environmental Values
Hydraulic fracturing ('fracking') has enabled the recovery of previously inaccessible resources and rendered new areas of the underground 'productive'. While a number of studies in the US and UK have examined public attitudes toward fracking and its various impacts, how people conceptualise the deep underground itself has received less attention. We argue that views on resources, risk and the deep underground raise important questions about how people perceive the desirability and viability of subterranean interventions. We conducted day-long deliberation workshops (two in each country), facilitating discussions among diverse groups of people on prospective shale extraction in the US and UK. Themes that emerged in these conversations include seeing the Earth as a foundation; natural limits (a greater burden than the subsurface can withstand versus simply overuse of natural resources); and ideas about the fragility, instability and opacity of the deep underground. We ...