The Silent Partner Behind the Shale Energy Boom – Taxpayers

By ANDREW C. REVKIN

Since 2011, Alex Trembath, a tireless and talented energy analyst at nonprofit The Breakthrough Institute, has been digging into the complicated history of public and private initiatives and investments that unlocked the vast gas and oil resource contained in layers of shale rock.
He charted evidence that investments in basic research, testing and development by the federal government lay behind the private-sector initiatives that have since fundamentally reshaped global forecasts for energy, economies and geopolitics.

http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/07/31/the-silent-partner-behind-the-shale-energy-boom-taxpayers/?_r=1&