{"id":23918,"date":"2015-05-20T10:21:38","date_gmt":"2015-05-20T15:21:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/?p=23918"},"modified":"2015-05-20T10:21:38","modified_gmt":"2015-05-20T15:21:38","slug":"oil-executive-says-he-didnt-try-to-get-earthquake-scientists-fired","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/2015\/05\/20\/oil-executive-says-he-didnt-try-to-get-earthquake-scientists-fired\/","title":{"rendered":"Oil Executive Says He Didn\u2019t Try to Get Earthquake Scientists Fired"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Harold<\/p>\n

Jemal Countess \/ Getty Images for TIME<\/p>\n

Harold Hamm in April 2012 at TIME Magazine's 100 Most Influential People In the World gala in New York City<\/p>\n<\/div>

Harold Hamm, the billionaire founder and CEO of Continental Resources, denies a report that told a University of Oklahoma dean he wanted scientists dismissed who were researching links between oil and gas production and Oklahoma\u2019s exponential increase in earthquakes.<\/p>

In emails obtained by Bloomberg\u2019s Benjamin Elgin<\/a>, Larry Grillot, then the dean of OU\u2019s Mewbourne College of Earth and Energy, wrote to colleagues after a meeting with the oil executive: \u201cMr. Hamm is very upset at some of the earthquake reporting to the point that he would like to see select OGS staff dismissed,\u201d Grillot wrote, referring to the Oklahoma Geological Survey, a state agency operated through the university.<\/p>

Hamm and Continental declined comment to Bloomberg, but the oilman disputed the report in a story by different reporter<\/a>, Adam Wilmoth of The Oklahoman<\/em>:<\/p>\n

\u201cAll that was false. It\u2019s incorrect,\u201d Hamm said. \u201cNobody asked for anybody to be removed. Nobody has been let go. Nobody was asked to be let go.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>

The emails in the Bloomberg story follow other emails obtained by EnergyWire\u2019s Mike Sorgahan<\/a>, which detail a meeting Hamm had with OGS seismologist Austin Holland and OU President David Boren. Boren is a board member at Continental and Hamm is a major university donor. Holland described the meeting as \u201cjust a little bit intimidating,\u201d but said the conversation never effected his scientific research. For their part, Hamm and Boren say the meeting was informational in nature.<\/p>

Grillot confirmed his discussion with Hamm in an interview with Bloomberg, but said nobody was dismissed from OGS and that he never relayed the oil executive’s displeasure with the agency\u2019s staff.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Harold Hamm, the billionaire founder and CEO of Continental Resources, denies a report that told a University of Oklahoma dean he wanted scientists dismissed who were researching links between oil and gas production and Oklahoma\u2019s exponential increase in earthquakes.In emails obtained by Bloomberg\u2019s Benjamin Elgin, Larry Grillot, then the dean of OU\u2019s Mewbourne College of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":10118,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[490],"tags":[489,500,238,515,324],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23918"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/36"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23918"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23918\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23926,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23918\/revisions\/23926"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10118"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23918"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23918"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stateimpact.npr.org\/oklahoma\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23918"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}