Putting on partisan glasses: Political identity, quality of life, and oil and gas production in Colorado

Highlights

• Surveyed three communities in Northern Colorado with varying levels of oil and gas production.

• Modeled political identity, perceived impacts of oil & gas production, & self-reported quality of life.

• Findings suggest partisan motivated cognition regarding unconventional oil and gas (UOG) production.

• Different political identities engender divergent perspectives on UOG production's community effects.

• And divergent perceptions of how perceived community changes impact quality of life.

Abstract

Unconventional oil and gas technologies—such as hydraulic fracturing—have drastically increased the volume of oil and gas produced in the U.S., while simultaneously bringing drilling closer to residential areas. We examine quality of life impacts of unconventional oil and gas production, arguing that how people perceive its local effects is rooted in their political identities. Using survey data from three northern Colorado communities, we employ counterfactual mediation methods to understand relationships between political identity, perceived socio-environmental and community changes from oil and gas development, and self-reported quality of life. We find significant differences in how people perceive local development based upon political identity, whereby Tea Party supporters see little negative impact, and in turn are likely to believe that local development improves their quality of life. At the other extreme, Democrats perceive more negative community changes from oil and gas development and are more apt to believe that it reduces their quality of life. Republicans who do not support the Tea Party and political independents hold more mixed views. Overall, our analysis suggests that people's perceptions of local energy development and how it matters for their quality of life is, to some degree, a function of their political identities.

Introduction

Advances in unconventional technologies related to oil and gas production have helped spur a boom in oil and natural gas extraction and production in the United States (Wang and Krupnick, 2017). These advances have established the U.S. as one of the world's top producers of both oil and natural gas and, consequently, the largest hydrocarbon producer (Energy Information Agency (EIA), 2016).

Despite a bust in oil prices in 2015 and an over-supply of natural gas, extraction and production continue apace in many places. Though production has been scattered across more than fifteen U.S. states, a few states host the majority of production, including Texas, Pennsylvania, and Colorado (EIA, 2016). Indeed, Colorado's unconventional oil and gas (hereafter UOG) production has increased exponentially in recent years. For example, rates of oil extraction have quadrupled in the state since 2010, even as rates of natural gas extraction have increased by about 51% (EIA, 2016). Simultaneously, the state's population growth is among the most rapid in the US. As of 2012, more than 378,000 people in Colorado lived within 1.6 km of an oil and gas well (McKenzie et al., 2016). Situated near the Eastern slope of the Rocky Mountains, Weld County, Colorado (where two of our three study communities are located) is ranked eleventh in the U.S. in its oil production (alongside its ranking as one of the nation's top ten agricultural producers). This county boasts one of the highest well-to-people ratios in the nation, given that it hosts more producing wells than any other county in the U.S. (usually hovering around 21,000 with most new wells utilizing unconventional technologies) (FracTracker Alliance, 2016).

As UOG production collides with other land uses, such as agriculture, tourism, and residential development, Colorado has also become an epicenter of debate over UOG development (Malin et al., 2017, Mayer, 2018). Residents, policy makers, industry representatives, regulators, and others debate the merits and drawbacks of UOG, particularly the risks and hazards that exist when this sort of industrial activity occurs near their residential, educational, medical, and commercial sectors (Mayer, 2018, Malin et al., 2017). Proponents of widespread UOG production point to the economic growth, employment opportunities, and energy independence created by the industry's expansion (Ceresola and Crowe, 2015, Silva and Crowe, 2015, Malin, 2014). On the other hand, opponents express concern over environmental and public health, boom-bust cycles, and loss of political power.

Further, emerging studies indicate that the costs associated with UOG may be substantial. For instance, economic growth may be more temporary and modest than industry-funded studies have indicated (Kinnaman, 2011), in part because jobs are given to extra-local workers who moved from one oil patch to another (Wrenn et al., 2015). In addition, UOG can put pressure on local infrastructure (Graham et al., 2015) and is associated with various environmental risks, including: potential exposure to undisclosed chemical mixtures in preliminary environmental toxics research (Colborn et al., 2011); hazardous air pollutants examined in various epidemiological and exposure studies (McKenzie et al., 2012; Adgate et al., 2014; Pétron et al., 2012; Gilman et al., 2013, Halliday et al., 2016); higher rates of birth defects (McKenzie et al., 2014) and childhood cancer (McKenzie et al., 2017) in epidemiological analyses; under-reported oil spills and multiple pathways for water contamination (Rozell and Reaven, 2012); poor regional air quality (Ahmadov et al., 2014); industrial accidents (Haley et al., 2016; Lai et al., 2017a, Lai et al., 2017b); and other possible risks for public health (Rabinowitz et al., 2014; Adgate et al., 2014). These outcomes likely vary across states, particularly because of the fragmentary nature of most state-by-state regulations governing the industry (Malin et al., 2017, Davis, 2012, Rabe, 2014, Zirogiannis et al., 2016, Blair et al., 2017).

Social scientists have conducted a growing number of studies examining risk-benefit perceptions of UOG (Jacquet, 2012, Schafft et al., 2013, Boudet et al., 2014, Crowe et al., 2015). People living near UOG have expressed divergent responses. Residents of Pennsylvania report that they have experienced benefits such as increased tax revenue and job growth, but they also have concerns about water pollution, noise, and traffic (Brasier et al., 2011, Jacquet, 2012, Jacquet and Stedman, 2013). Studies conducted in other high-production states find similar complexity in people's perceptions, from Texas (Anderson and Theodori, 2009, Gullion, 2015, Theodori, 2009), to Louisiana (Ladd, 2013, Ladd, 2014), and Ohio (Willow, 2016).

Rural communities more often have histories of natural resource dependence on extractive industries like oil and gas production – and related social problems, such as persistent poverty and social disruption (Krannich and Luloff, 1991, Humphrey et al., 1993, Peluso et al., 1994, Smith et al., 2001, Brown and Swanson, 2004). However, contemporary UOG production is rather novel due to its siting in peri-urban and urban areas. This is true in Colorado, where previous oil booms were more removed from urban populations. This spatial encroachment makes the era of UOG production unique. Further, restructuring of the oil and gas industry regarding corporations’ susceptibility to boom and bust cycles makes the dynamics of boom-bust industries a bit different, along with changes in the ways UOG production creates mini-booms and busts (Jacquet and Kay, 2014).

The rapid and dynamic shifts within the oil and gas industry - and especially its new proximity to densely populated areas – means that it is important to understand how UOG production impacts quality of life. Further, although political identity has been established as an especially important predictor of environmental and energy-related views (McCright and Dunlap, 2011a, McCright and Dunlap, 2011b; Fisher et al., 2013), the role(s) played by political identity in shaping people's views of UOG production, their perceived changes to quality of life, or changes to their environment have been under-explored.

In this analysis, we consider how political identity could lead to motivated cognition, filtering how people interpret social, environmental, and community changes related to UOG production. In turn, we unpack how this partisan motivated cognition may be associated with perceived quality of life impacts (or lack thereof) from UOG production. We suggest that political identities are likely relevant for how people perceive and interpret any changes in their neighborhoods or biophysical environments – and how those perceived changes influence people's self-reported quality of life.

We use survey data from three Colorado communities located near some of the most active UOG production in the U.S. and counterfactual mediation techniques (e.g., Robins, 1992; Pearl, 2001; Sobel, 2008; VanderWeele, 2009; Imai et al., 2010; Valeri, 2013) to understand the complex interplay between political identity, perceived local socio-environmental changes, and to self-reported quality of life. As such, this analysis contributes to the literature on environmental attitudes and partisanship (e.g., McCright and Dunlap, 2011a, McCright and Dunlap, 2011b), research on the social aspects of UOG (Malin, 2014, Ladd, 2014, Boudet et al., 2014; Clarke et al., 2016) – particularly quality of life impacts – and the “place effects” literature (Hamilton et al., 2010). In the next section, we consider the literature on quality of life in the face of energy booms.