The University of Colorado Boulder gets $12M grant to study natural gas development, impacts

The University of Colorado Boulder gets $12M grant to study natural gas development, impacts by Cathy Proctor, October 2, 2012, Denver Business Journal
The University of Colorado Boulder has landed a five-year, $12 million grant from the National Science Foundation to study ways to maximize the benefits of natural gas development while minimizing negative impacts on ecosystems and communities, the university said Tuesday. The CU-led research team, and a second team led by Pennsylvania State University, were chosen from the more than 200 proposals submitted to the NSF. The research is part of the NSF’s Sustainability Research Network initiative. CU’s team will examine social, ecological and economic aspects of the development of natural gas resources and the protection of air and water resources. The project will focus on the Rocky Mountain region, which has had natural gas drilling and production for decades.

Worries have risen in the last few years among Colorado’s Front Range residents as the state’s oil and gas activity has shifted from the Western Slope to the urban corridor east of the Rockies. CU’s team will be led by Professor Joseph Ryan of the environmental and architectural engineering department. “We all create demand for natural gas so we have to accept some of the outcomes of its extraction,” Ryan said in a statement. “Our goal is to provide a framework for society to evaluate the trade-offs associated with the benefits and costs of natural gas development.” … Partners on the CU-led NSF project include the Colorado School of Mines, Colorado State University, the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the University of Michigan and California State Polytechnic University Pomona. [Emphasis added]

[Refer also to: Fired researcher paints pattern of pressure from oil and gas industry

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Human Health Risk Assessment of Air Emissions from Development of Unconventional Natural Gas Resources ]

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