GASH - Gas Shales in Europe
GASH from how it appears on the main map seems to be an indeoendent organization. During our research we had continuously stumbled upon GASH and new it is an important actor, and upon reading their webpage and noticing a field called sponsors, we had to tjeck it out (the specific sponsors can be seen on the picture to the left). TOTAL for instance is the company who have obtained drilling licenses in Nordjylland. Well it led us to the conclusion that a more extensive link map would be useful, see bottom of page.
The overall research goal for GASH is to identify the shale formations in Europe's underground and predict and assess the potential for shale gas extraction in designated areas of Europe. Through scientific consultancy, research, and geological surveys GASH cooperates with different research institutions and communities. GASH is the overarching institution for "mapping out" the shale formations drawing on primarily on scientific knowledge to benefit oil and gas companies. GASH, as an institution, places itself as a hybrid between "scientific" and "commercial" institutions, overlapping between our "Science" and "Companies" categories.
The initiative started in 2009 and is planned to end in Fall 2012. By Fall 2012 GASH aims to have their final results. Their final results might offer new insights to this controversy and possibly uncover a fresh set of knowledge to be implemented into the emerging controversy.
Below we offer a map of GASH and its affiliates: concretely is shows how well the Industry relates to scientific institutions and knowledge. To maximize the map click on the "Download File".
gash-network.png | |
File Size: | 1884 kb |
File Type: | png |
GASH-Map Description
Visually our GASH-map shows how companies and scientific institutions connect through miscellaneous conferences, meetings and congresses. An outline appears around the various conferences (huge red and orange spots) circulating the centralized GASH. GASH becomes the central organ which everyone else revolves around, indicating the interesest in GASH's research and expertise on the matter of hydraulic fracturing, mapping shale formations and assessment of the European underground. Among the actors are large private oil and gas companies as well as smaller communications firms, advisory panels and government bodies. The linking structure is relatively solid which also indicates how internationally diverse these actors are and how they manage to establish steady flows of information and communication. These actors correspond physically around conferences thereby manifesting both a network in and outside of cyberspace, which also serves as a positioning strategy for further development concerning hydraulic fracturing, i.e. marks a high degree of interconnectedness of the various actor groups: "Scientists", "Companies", and "Government".
Beside actually showing a connectedness between a scientific institution and gas companies, this example also serves to exemplify some of the exploratory strengths of digital methods in social science research when combined with qualitative investigations. Without the two methods combined we would never have encountered what we believe to be a discovery of quintessential value for the description of the practice of one group of actors within the controversy, namely the practice of conference meetings between gas company executives.
Especially one conference, set to be held on 25th of September named "Unconventional gas conference", caught our attention. To see what they talk about and learn who "frack" who, click the button below.
Beside actually showing a connectedness between a scientific institution and gas companies, this example also serves to exemplify some of the exploratory strengths of digital methods in social science research when combined with qualitative investigations. Without the two methods combined we would never have encountered what we believe to be a discovery of quintessential value for the description of the practice of one group of actors within the controversy, namely the practice of conference meetings between gas company executives.
Especially one conference, set to be held on 25th of September named "Unconventional gas conference", caught our attention. To see what they talk about and learn who "frack" who, click the button below.