Doctoral Dissertation Research: The Effect of Corporate Bankruptcy on Urban Oil and Gas Infrastructure

博士论文研究：企业破产对城市油气基础设施的影响

• 批准号: 2116759
• 负责人: James Holston
• 金额: $ 2.52万
• 依托单位: University of California-Berkeley
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2021
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2021-08-01 至 2023-05-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=2116759&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Doctoral; Dissertation; Research; Effect; Corporate

This award is funded in whole or in part under the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 (Public Law 117-2). Mass bankruptcies of energy companies have orphaned thousands of oil and gas wells across the United States in recent years, and these bankruptcies are projected to increase dramatically. Without solvent owners to plug and decommission them, such wells add to the already-sprawling network of abandoned oil and gas infrastructure. Oil and gas wells in cities are especially prone to abandonment, exposing nearby communities to toxins, redevelopment challenges, and exorbitant cleanup liabilities. This doctoral dissertation project investigates the impacts of corporate insolvencies on oil and gas-producing communities. In addition to providing training for a graduate student in methods of scientific data collection and analysis, the study’s findings are disseminated broadly to a variety of audiences, including in general interest publications, industry journals, legal bulletins, and the reports of environmental organizations.Three research questions motivate this study: (1) To what extent and in what ways does bankruptcy, as both a legal technology and a genre of political discourse, shape claims for urban economic stability, environmental justice, public health and safety, and corporate accountability? (2) How do insolvent oil and gas corporations and their orphan wells underscore the unpredictability and uncertainty of finance capitalism? (3) In what ways do the locations of orphan wells, in urban as opposed to rural areas, impact the responses of citizens to the abandonment and decommissioning of wells? To answer these questions the doctoral student uses ethnographic fieldwork to accompany and interview diverse urban stakeholders such as frontline community groups, environmental justice organizations, city officials, and industry representatives as they navigate corporate bankruptcies, oil and gas extraction, and the environmental and financial futures of their cities. The project offers a model for examining how accountability, liability, debt, and credit affect the oil and gas sector, and by extension, impacts nearly every aspect of political, economic, and social life of the spaces where this abandoned infrastructure is located for generations to come.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.

该奖项全部或部分由《2021年美国救援计划法案》（公法117-2）资助。近年来，能源公司的大规模破产使美国各地成千上万的石油和天然气井成为孤儿，预计这些破产将急剧增加。如果没有有偿付能力的业主来封堵和关闭这些井，这些井就会增加已经庞大的废弃油气基础设施网络。城市中的油气井特别容易被废弃，使附近的社区暴露在有毒物质中，面临重新开发的挑战，并承担高昂的清理责任。本博士论文项目研究公司破产对油气生产社区的影响。除了为研究生提供科学数据收集和分析方法方面的培训外，该研究的结果还广泛传播给各种受众，包括一般兴趣出版物、工业期刊、法律公报和环境组织的报告。(1)作为一种法律技术和一种政治话语类型，破产在多大程度上以及以何种方式塑造了对城市经济稳定、环境正义、公共卫生和安全以及企业责任的要求？(2)破产的石油和天然气公司及其孤儿井如何强调金融资本主义的不可预测性和不确定性？(3)与农村地区相比，孤儿井在城市的位置如何影响公民对井的废弃和退役的反应？为了回答这些问题，博士生使用人种学田野调查来陪同和采访不同的城市利益相关者，如一线社区团体，环境正义组织，城市官员和行业代表，因为他们应对公司破产，石油和天然气开采以及城市的环境和金融未来。该项目提供了一个模型，用于研究问责制、责任、债务和信贷如何影响石油和天然气行业，进而影响到这些废弃基础设施所在空间的政治、经济和社会生活的几乎各个方面。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。