Cornell program trains students to greenwash fracking

CoF Post 10/6/2025

Dear Cornell on Fire,

When we asked Cornell leadership why they refuse to declare a climate emergency, they told us that "the way we declare a climate emergency is through our work, it’s through the research, through our teaching." Why, then, is Cornell's Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management training students to lead the fossil-fuel industry’s climate denial? The Pulsepoint Project sponsored by the Dyson School’s SMART (Student Multidisciplinary Applied Research Teams) program is designed to capitalize (literally) on Cornell students’ skills and efforts to promote fossil-fuels. 

The best way to do research that is both effective and socially responsible — and the best way to learn doing such research — is by engaging with the communities that have a stake in it. Community-engaged learning is a key component of the Dyson School’s SMART program, billed as “transforming classroom knowledge into real-world impact across emerging markets.” Unfortunately, the Pulsepoint Project is a cuckoo’s egg laid by an oily corporation dedicated to subverting the very meaning of community engagement in its goals and deliverables. 

Project PulsePoint: Promoting Transparency & Sustainability, USA, aims to “[d]evelop a public relations program to strengthen stakeholder engagement and trust for Repsol’s operations in the Marcellus Shale.” PulsePoint is led by Dr Mubichi-Kut, Professor of Practice at the Dyson School and the executive director of SMART. To appreciate the implications of this project, consider that (1) the Marcellus Shale is a vast underground reservoir of natural gas that can only be extracted by hydraulic fracturing or “fracking”; that (2) Repsol is an international corporation attempting to profit off ecocide by entering the lucrative U.S. fracking business; and that (3) Cornell’s power plant burns fracked gas from Pennsylvania. When you switch on a campus light or thermostat, you’re igniting fracked gas piped to Cornell from the Marcellus Shale.

It is no wonder that an oily corporation, especially one that is engaged in fracking, is in need of a “public relations program.” Any way you look at it, fracking is an unmitigated disaster (unless you are a corporate shareholder with no concern for the future of humanity):

• Fracking, which makes it possible for oily corporations to keep extracting “hard to reach” fossil fuels that further exacerbate the ongoing and accelerating climate catastrophe, is particularly environmentally destructive.

• Fracking has terrible effects on the health of local residents. 

• Oil companies are guaranteed to spill. In July of this year, a Repsol shale gas well pad caused an uncontrolled release of wastewater for 34 hours in Bradford County. 

• Fracking businesses’ tainted money destroys communities by pitting neighbor against neighbor.

• Fracking fails even those who believe that environmental degradation and health damage are justified by the economics of utility pricing. For instance, it turns out that in Pennsylvania the frackers broke their promise of reducing electricity bills.

To greenwash such an enterprise requires extra sleight of hand with crafting the message and the PulsePoint project description does not fail to deliver. Here are some especially egregious examples of Newspeak that one finds in that two-page document:

— "Environmental restoration” by Repsol — What on earth (or under it) could that refer to? Will they literally paint the  equipment green, as has been done in Pennsylvania’s Allegheny National Forest?

— "Community engagement: Identify / propose potential impact metrics that could measure change in perceptions and engagement?” — An invasive corporation fine-tuning its public messaging is not what is usually meant by “community engagement.”

— "Identify key stakeholders e.g., operators, local residents, community leaders whose perceptions & attitudes are to be tracked” — We read this as an effort to ratchet up corporate spying on local people and specifically environmental activists. 

— "Identify messaging channels & activities to be tracked” — Ditto.

— "Interview Repsol community relations officer- to learn more about local histories, perceptions, sources of misinformation, etc.” — To learn about local histories etc., it is generally advisable to interview the locals, not a corporate greenwasher. More to the point, kicking Repsol out of NY and PA would lead immediately to a welcome decrease in the amount of misinformation about fracking in general and Repsol’s dirty business in particular. 

The only thing left to do for Cornell students mired in this reprehensible project is to provide the A+ “Exxtreme Energy Tone Guide and Truth Telling Guide” to their Repsol partners in lieu of any other deliverables. This PR resource is composed and fact-checked by the Yes Men with killer relevance to Repsol’s operations. 

Everyone — and especially those of us who reside in the area where Repsol operates — should be asking some pointed questions about PulsePoint. Why would any Cornell unit allow this oily corporation to use the university’s students and resources in its greenwashing campaign? Why would the Dyson School help tarnish Cornell’s reputation (such as it is) in climate- and community-related matters? Is fossil fuel money at work here, perhaps in the form of donations to the Dyson School or the Johnson College? 

Unfortunately, this is not an isolated incident. As a university, Cornell has propagated misinformation and viewpoints that replicate the same Big Oil climate doublespeak condemned by a Congressional report. As Cornellians, as community members, and as residents of upstate New York who suffer the consequences of fracking, we demand answers. 

Join us to call for answers around Cornell’s climate (in)action and conflicts of interest at our public advocacy event this Wednesday, 10/8, at 7:30pm in Ives Hall 305.

Awaiting an answer,

Cornell on Fire

Note: On September 18, we solicited comments on PulsePoint from Dr Mubichi-Kut, who serves as both the faculty lead for this project and the executive director of SMART. As of the time of this posting, there has been no reply.

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