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<a href="http://www.democracynow.org/2013/3/26/energy_nominee_ernest_moniz_criticized_for">http://www.democracynow.org/2013/3/26/energy_nominee_ernest_moniz_criticized_for</a>

President Obama’s pick to become the nation’s next secretary of energy

is drawing criticism for his deep ties to the fossil fuel, fracking and

nuclear industries. MIT nuclear physicist

Ernest Moniz has served on advisory boards for oil giant BP and General

Electric, and was a trustee of the King Abdullah Petroleum Studies and

Research Center, a Saudi Aramco-backed nonprofit organization. In 2011,

Moniz was the chief author of an influential study for MIT

on the future of natural gas. According to a new report by the Public

Accountability Initiative, Moniz failed to disclose that he had taken a

lucrative position at a pro-drilling firm called ICF

International just days before a key natural gas "fracking" study was

released. Reaction to his nomination has split the environmental

community. Advocacy groups such as Public Citizen and Food & Water

Watch are campaigning against Moniz’s nomination, but the Natural

Resources Defense Council has praised his work on advancing clean energy

based on efficiency and renewable power. We speak to Kevin Connor of

the Public Accountability Initiative and ProPublica reporter Justin

Elliott, who have both authored investigations into Moniz’s ties to

industry. [includes rush transcript]

<h2 class="section-header">Transcript</h2>

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          This is a rush transcript. Copy may not be in its final form.
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      <p><strong><span class="caps">AMY</span> <span class="caps">GOODMAN</span>:</strong>

President Obama’s pick to become the nation’s next energy secretary is

drawing criticism for his deep ties to the fossil fuel, fracking and

nuclear industry. Obama nominated MIT Professor Ernest Moniz last month to replace outgoing Energy Secretary Steven Chu.

PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA:

I could not be more grateful to Steve for the incredible contribution

that he’s made to this country. And now that he’s decided to leave

Washington for sunny California, I’m proud to nominate another brilliant

scientist to take his place, Mr. Ernie Moniz. So, there’s Ernie right

there.

</blockquote>

Now, the good news is that Ernie already knows his way around the

Department of Energy. He is a physicist by training, but he also served

as undersecretary of energy under President Clinton. Since then, he has

directed MIT’s Energy Initiative, which brings together prominent

thinkers and energy companies to develop the technologies that can lead

us to more energy independence and also to new jobs. Most importantly,

Ernie knows that we can produce more energy and grow our economy while

still taking care of our air, our water and our climate.

</blockquote>

AMY GOODMAN:

The Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee is scheduled to hold a

hearing on Ernest Moniz’s nomination as energy secretary on April 9th.

Reactions to his nomination has split the environmental community.

Advocacy groups such as Public Citizen and Food & Water Watch are

campaigning against his nomination, but the Natural Resources Defense

Council has praised his work on advancing clean energy based on

efficiency and renewable power.

Much of the criticism of Moniz centers on his extensive ties to

industry. He has served on advisory boards for oil giant BP and General

Electric and was a trustee of the King Abdullah Petroleum Studies and

Research Center, a Saudi Aramco-backed nonprofit organization. In 2011,

Moniz was the chief author of an influential study for MIT

on the future of natural gas. According to a new report by the Public

Accountability Initiative, Moniz failed to disclose that he had taken a

lucrative position at a pro-drilling firm called ICF International just days before the study was released.

We’re joined now by two guests. In New York, Justin Elliott, a reporter at ProPublica, he recently wrote a <a href="http://www.propublica.org/article/wealth-of-business-connections-ernest-moniz">piece</a>

called "Drilling Deeper: The Wealth of Business Connections for Obama’s

Energy Pick." And in Los Angeles, we’re joined by Kevin Connor,

director of the Public Accountability Initiative, a nonprofit watchdog

group which recently published a <a href="http://public-accountability.org/2013/03/industry-partner-or-industry-puppet/">report</a>

called "Industry Partner or Industry Puppet? How MIT’s Influential

Study of Fracking Was Authored, Funded, and Released by Oil and Gas

Industry Insiders." We invited MIT to join us on the show or send a comment to read on air, but we did not receive a response.

Kevin Connor, Justin Elliott, we welcome you to Democracy Now! Justin, let’s begin with you. Talk about Ernest Moniz’ record.

JUSTIN ELLIOTT:

Right, well, I mean, and to some extent, this is kind of the classic

revolving door situation. As President Obama mentioned when he nominated

him to be energy secretary earlier this month, Moniz was an

undersecretary in the department in President Clinton’s second term.

After, he went back to MIT, but he also took a

number of positions on boards of large energy companies or advisory

councils, as you mentioned, that includes BP. It included a uranium

enrichment company called USEC.

And I think there’s sort of two reasons why

this is important. One is, some of these companies do business with the

Energy Department and seek contracts and loan guarantees from the

department. The other is, people in the environmental community think

that this may inform how Ernest Moniz sets research priorities, so

people are concerned that he’s—that he’s going to call for research on

fossil fuels to the detriment of research on renewables, for example.

AMY GOODMAN: BP. Talk about his relationship with BP.

JUSTIN ELLIOTT:

Well, there’s kind of two prongs on that front. One is, personally,

Moniz did a six-year stint—paid, although BP won’t tell me how much—on

BP’s science advisory council. It’s not really clear what he did. They

don’t—BP doesn’t have to reveal much about it in their public SEC filings. At the same time, BP is one of the main funders of the MIT

Energy Initiative. I think they have given—given or pledged a total of

$50 million over the past few years. So he’s clearly—he’s clearly close

to that company.

AMY GOODMAN: And how typical is this for a university professor?

JUSTIN ELLIOTT:

Well, I think, in the science—in sciences and, in particular, in sort

of the energy secretary, it’s increasingly—it’s increasingly common. I

mean, Steven Chu, the outgoing energy secretary, who’s also an academic,

actually also had close ties to BP. BP had given a bunch of money to

Steven Chu’s lab at the University of California, Berkeley, and Chu

picked a BP executive to be one of his undersecretaries. And Chu was

later involved in the government’s response to the Gulf oil spill. So, I

mean, I think this is—this is certainly common if you’re going to be

picking an academic who’s involved in energy, and particularly fossil

fuel research.

AMY GOODMAN: I wanted to turn to comments of the executive director the Natural Resources Defense Council, or NRDC. Earlier this month, Peter Lehner posted on the NRDC <a href="http://switchboard.nrdc.org/blogs/plehner/to-do_list_for_the_new_secreta.html">blog</a>

a "To-Do List for the New Energy Secretary." In it, he wrote, quote,

"As a scientist, Moniz is obviously a firm believer in the power of

clean energy technology. [MIT’s Energy Initiative] projects under his

tenure included windows that generate electricity, batteries built by

viruses, and a biofuel made from yeast. But he also believes that

technology must be complemented by policy in order to effect real

change. As he said at the Aspen Ideas Festival in 2006, in order to

address global warming, we must 'have the will to take more than baby

steps.'" NRDC is supporting Moniz’s nomination.

JUSTIN ELLIOTT:

Right, Amy, and it’s completely true. Moniz has spoken in favor of

renewable energy. I mean, I think the best way to sort of interpret his

nomination is that he fits in with what Obama has called his

"all-of-the-above" energy policy, which is to embrace things like

fracking, continued use of oil, nuclear energy, but also develop wind

and solar. And I think that that’s where Ernest Moniz is on energy

policy.

AMY GOODMAN: Let��s turn to our guest in Los Angeles, Kevin Connor, and what you found in your <a href="http://public-accountability.org/2013/03/industry-partner-or-industry-puppet/">report</a>.

Talk about the report that you did that looks at—well, the title of the

report is "Industry Partner or Industry Puppet? How MIT’s Influential

Study of Fracking Was Authored, Funded, and Released by Oil and Gas

Industry Insiders."

KEVIN CONNOR: Sure. Moniz’s nomination prompted us at the Public Accountability Initiative to take a closer look at an influential <a href="http://mitei.mit.edu/publications/reports-studies/future-natural-gas">study</a> that MIT

did on "The Future of Natural Gas," as it was called, in 2011. It was

issued by the Energy Initiative, which Moniz was the director of. And it

gave a very pro-gas—put a very pro-gas spin on fracking and shale gas

extraction, said that natural gas was a bridge or will be a bridge to a

low-carbon future, said that the environmental impacts related to

fracking are challenging but manageable, and also endorsed natural gas

exports, which is a very industry-friendly position to take.

It immediately, you know, prompted some

criticism from people who pointed to the fact that the report was

actually industry-funded, much like the initiative itself. But it was

extremely influential. It was designed to influence policymakers. Moniz

testified before Congress on the report. It had immediate impact, as

well. And it came at a critical time for the industry, which was facing

significant questions about the safety of fracking, the relative

environmental impacts of fracking. And we took a closer look at the

study and found that beyond just the industry funding of the study,

there were significant conflicts of interest that went undisclosed in

the report itself and in presentations of the report, and those involved

Moniz and several other key authors of the study. So, as it turns out,

it was not only just funded by industry, it was also authored by

industry representatives.

AMY GOODMAN: Kevin Connor, I wanted to turn to a 2011 press conference at the MIT

Energy Initiative, where Ernest Moniz introduced the study now under

contention, "The Future of Natural Gas." In his opening remarks,

Professor Moniz emphasized the report’s independent of its sponsors and

advisers.

ERNEST MONIZ:

I do want to emphasize a disclaimer, if you like, that while their

advice was absolutely critical, they are not responsible for the

recommendations and the findings. We have not asked for endorsement. We

asked for their advice; we received it. But the results, then, are our

responsibility.

</blockquote>

AMY GOODMAN: Later in the presentation, co-chair Anthony Meggs introduces the MIT

report’s findings, saying environmental impacts associated with

fracking are, quote, "challenging but manageable." However, Meggs failed

to disclose he had joined the gas company Talisman Energy prior to the

release of the study.

ANTHONY MEGGS:

... messages are very simple. First of all, there’s a lot of gas in the

world, at very modest cost. As you will see, gas is still, globally

speaking, a very young industry with a bright future ahead of it.

Secondly, and perhaps obviously at this stage, although not so obvious

when we started three years ago, shale gas is transformative for the

economy of the United States, North America, for the gas industry, in

particular, and potentially on a global scale. Thirdly, the

environmental impacts of shale development, widely discussed and hotly

debated, are—and we use these words carefully—challenging but

manageable.

</blockquote>

AMY GOODMAN: Kevin Connor, your response?

KEVIN CONNOR: It’s absolutely outrageous for the Energy Initiative, for Moniz and MIT

to pretend this is independent of industry, well, first of all, given

the fact that the sponsors of the report are all, you know, industry

organizations and companies like Chesapeake Energy. Moniz was attempting

to say that it was somehow insulated from the influence of these gas

companies, when in fact authors of the study, such as Moniz and Meggs,

were—had industry positions at the time.

Meggs’s quote there is particularly insidious,

the fact that he is saying that fracking is safe for the environment,

when he had actually joined Talisman Energy, a gas company, one of the

most active frackers in the Marcellus Shale, a month before the study

was released. So he is speaking to a roomful of journalists there,

presenting a report designed to influence policy, and not disclosing

that he is on the industry payroll. That is perhaps the last person in

that room who should be presenting that finding or having anything to do

with authoring that kind of report. And yet MIT and Moniz thought it was appropriate to put that spokesperson forward. So, it just goes to the fact that MIT

was really sort of presenting an industry brochure here with a lot of

pro-gas, industry advocacy talking points, and not revealing that there

were significant conflicts of interest here.

AMY GOODMAN: Justin Elliott, would you like to weigh in?

JUSTIN ELLIOTT:

Yeah, I mean, one thing to note is, Ernest Moniz is getting a

confirmation hearing next month, and as part of that, he has to release a

personal financial disclosure, and also, at some point later, he’ll

have to—an ethics agreement will become public. So we should actually

learn more about his current and recent involvement in these companies

and possibly also stock holdings and that sort of thing, so it should be

interesting. I think this story isn’t over yet.

AMY GOODMAN:

We’re going to break and come back to this discussion. Our guests are

Justin Elliott—he’s a reporter with ProPublica—and Kevin Connor, who has

put out a report on—from the Public Accountability Project called

"Industry Partner or Industry Puppet? How MIT’s Influential Study of

Fracking Was Authored, Funded, and Released by Oil and Gas Industry

Insiders." This is Democracy Now! We’ll be back in a minute.

[break]

AMY GOODMAN: In October of 2009, Obama’s energy secretary nominee, Ernest Moniz, introduced Tony Hayward, CEO of BP, before he delivered a speech at the MIT Energy Initiative. This took place six months before the BP Deepwater Horizon spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

ERNEST MONIZ:

Tony, I think it’s fair to say, without getting into great details,

faced a significant number of challenges at that time of transition and

is, these days, getting quite good press, I might say, in terms of

having the company operating well, producing and maintaining, I think,

its stance, taken quite early, in terms of recognizing the need and

acting on the need to address climate risk mitigation, for example, with

its diversified portfolio. We are very pleased to have BP here as a

member of the Energy Initiative—in fact, the founding—founding member of

the MIT Energy Initiative. And in fact, as

President Hockfield said just a few minutes ago to Tony, that that

confidence shown in where we were going here at MIT,

in terms of our focus on energy and environment, was very, very

important, and we really appreciate that early support and the

continuing relationship. In fact, many of you may know that besides the

Energy Initiative, BP has a major presence in terms of a Projects

Academy and Operations Academy with the Sloan School of Engineering. And

in fact, I just heard, again, in the discussion a few moments ago, that

300 of BP’s 500 senior executives have, one way or another, interacted

with MIT, so it’s really quite a substantial relationship.

</blockquote>

AMY GOODMAN: That’s energy secretary nominee Ernest Moniz speaking in October 2009, praising BP CEO Tony Hayward six months before the BP oil spill. Justin Elliott of ProPublica?

JUSTIN ELLIOTT: I mean, one of the things that surprised me, actually, as I was researching this story, is the extent to which the MIT

Energy Initiative is working with industry. I mean, it’s well known

that they and other energy research projects get industry funding. But

if you look at their annual reports and even their website, they say, if

you give us money as a company, we will help you achieve specific

business goals. So, I mean, in a lot of the coverage of Moniz, he has

been presented as an academic, which he is, but in some ways I think the

traditional categories are sort of failing us—sort of academic versus

business executive. I mean, this really is a part of—I mean, it’s not

formally part of BP, but they’re working as essentially a subcontractor

for BP. So I think that’s really—and again, I mean, President Obama

specifically praised Ernest Moniz’s ties with business when he

introduced him. So, I mean, it’s up for interpretation whether or not

these ties are a good thing, but I think that’s really the proper way to

see his background and who he is.

AMY GOODMAN: Kevin Connor, I wanted to ask you about the broader issue of what some call

"frackademia," gas-industry-funded academic research. In February of

2012, a year ago, University of Texas Professor Charles Groat published a

study that suggested fracking did not lead to groundwater

contamination. However, the study did not disclose Groat’s seat on the

board of major Texas fracker Plains Exploration and Production Company,

for which he was reportedly given $400,000 in 2011. That’s more than

double his university salary. I want to go to a clip of Professor Groat

explaining his study’s finding.

CHARLES GROAT:

The immediate concern with shale gas development and hydraulic

fracturing was that fracturing at several thousand feet below the

surface would put chemicals into groundwater that people drank that

would be very bad for your health, and so people were very much opposed

to hydraulic fracturing from that point of view. So, an important part

of our study was to determine whether or not there is any direct,

verified evidence that hydraulic fracturing itself was producing

contaminated waters that ended up in that process in groundwater. Our

preliminary finding is we have found no demonstrated evidence that

that��demonstration that that has happened.

</blockquote>

AMY GOODMAN: Kevin Connor, your response?

KEVIN CONNOR: Well, as you noted, Groat, when he was saying this, had a serious stake in a gas company called PXP,

$1.6 million stake, made several hundred thousand dollars a year, over

$400,000 a year in 2011, and was going before the public and saying

fracking is safe, without disclosing any of these related interests. I

mean, there’s some question as to whether someone with that sort of

stake in the industry should be working on this at all, but at the very

least it should be disclosed to the public, to journalists.

And because Groat didn’t disclose it, it

resulted in a lot of blowback in Texas. The journalists were very

concerned that Groat had not highlighted this for them when the report

was released, and it resulted in quite a bit of media coverage. The

University of Texas ended up commissioning an external review of the

study, which concluded that the study should actually be retracted and

noted that Groat’s conflict of interest was quite serious and should

have been disclosed. So, the sorts of transgressions that we see at MIT

have actually resulted in real accountability at other universities.

Groat actually retired as a result of this episode. And the director of

the Energy Institute at Texas, which is sort of an analog to MIT’s

Energy Initiative—the director actually resigned in the wake of this

external review. So there have been real consequences. There has been

real pushback against this trend at other universities. And there’s some

question as to whether that will happen with MIT.

AMY GOODMAN:

Well, going back to Moniz, because you’re talking about Groat here, not

to be confused with the energy secretary nominee of President Obama,

talk about what he makes at MIT, both as a university professor but also his outside funding.