[xoxoxoBruce]

Seem there might be a problem with credibility.

The original report by UT Austin’s Energy Institute, ‘Fact-Based Regulation for Environmental Protection in the Shale Gas Development,’ was released early this year, and claimed that there was no link between fracking and water contamination. But this summer, the Public Accountability Initiative, a watchdog group, reported that the head of the study, UT professor Chip Groat, had been sitting on the board of a drilling company the entire time. His compensation totaled over $1.5 million over the last five years. That prompted the University to announce an independent review of the study a month later, which was released today.

The industry tie-in doesn't look good, but it doesn't mean the report is bad. However further down,

Aside from that conflict of interest, the review finds many other errors and missteps in both the study and University policies:
•Because of “inadequacy” in conflict of interest policies at UT at the time, “conflict of interest and disclosure policies were largely ignored.”
•The report itself was presented as having scientific findings, but much of it was in fact “based on literature surveys, incident reports and conjecture.” The review goes so far as to say that “the term ‘fact-based’ would not apply to such an analysis” and it lacked a “rigorous, independent review” of its findings.
•The summary of the study, which was widely distributed and trumpeted by a UT press release, failed to include many of the caveats within the actual report. Some of the conclusions were “tentative,” the review says, and the press release and presentation of the report at a scientific conference in February was “inappropriately selective” and “seemed to suggest that public concerns were without scientific basis and largely resulted from media bias.”
•The study was also not ready for distribution, as Public Accountability Initiative noted in July. The drafts in the study “were not subjected to serious peer review and therefore were not ready to be considered for public release as fact-based work.”

More here.