Implications of Hydraulic Fracturing for Creating Sustainable Communities

The Implications of Hydraulic Fracturing for Creating Sustainable Communities
SUNY Conversations in the Disciplines
April 10 -11, 2014
Binghamton University

Call for Proposals

The Conversations in the Disciplines (SUNY CID) grant program is designed to bring together SUNY faculty and visiting scholars from non-SUNY institutions to examine new trends, address changes and challenges, review promising research findings, and become acquainted with professional developments in their fields and on other campuses.

The advent of new hydraulic fracturing (aka hydrofracking or just fracking) technologies for natural gas development has required many communities across the United States to wrestle with challenging scientific, managerial, and political issues as they try to manage the local impacts the industry generates. Whether or not the State of New York lifts its current moratorium on drilling, these issues command public attention and demand policy outcomes that enhance the well-being of the residents who are most directly affected. The goal of the CID is to provide a forum for clarifying what we currently know about the impacts of the industry on local communities, and to develop interdisciplinary research agendas that address the most pressing questions that remain. An outcome of the conference will be an edited volume and/or on-line materials that will disseminate the participants’ essential findings to a wider audience.

Binghamton University is seeking proposals for individual presentations on the implications of hydraulic fracturing at the community level. Please note that the purpose of this CID is not to either promote or discourage hydraulic fracturing but to understand the impacts, both positive and negative, and provide communities with the knowledge and tools that they need to decide what is in their own best interest.

Presentations should be 15-20 minutes each. In addition to presentations, conference organizers will provide additional scholars with opportunities to share their research and projects in a poster session. The purposes of this conference are:

1. Identify what is known about the community impacts of hydraulic fracturing including the economic, environmental, health, and social conditions of the communities in which it occurs.
2. Identify strategies that communities have used to respond to hydraulic fracturing including ways to increase the economic benefits while minimizing any negative costs to the environment, health of community members, or social conditions.
3. Identify gaps in knowledge regarding community impacts of hydraulic fracturing and establish interdisciplinary research collaborations to address these gaps.
4. Identify gaps in knowledge regarding strategies that communities have used to respond to hydraulic fracturing and establish interdisciplinary research collaborations to address these gaps.
5. Publish the best papers from the Conversation in an edited volume.

To submit a proposal, email the following to Tom Sinclair, Associate Professor of Public Administration (sinclair@binghamton.edu), by December 15, 2013:

1. Name(s) of presenter(s) and departmental/organizational affiliation of each
2. Are you proposing a presentation or poster? If not chosen to give a presentation, would you be willing to prepare a poster?
3. A maximum 250 word abstract for your presentation/poster
4. Indicate whether your abstract(s) refer(s) to:
• Proposed research
• An active research project
• A published (or forthcoming) work
5. A list of recent publications related to the local impacts of hydraulic fracturing, or related issues, for each presenter.

In the subject line of your email, please indicate that you are submitting a SUNY Conversations in the Disciplines Proposal.