Evaluation of General Sources

DES Daughter. "The Fracking Industry Secret Sauce" 7/27/2015 via Flickr. Attribution-Non Commercial License.

In my search for controversies in the field of chemical engineering, the most prevalent topic was the debate on the use of fracking as a means of recovering fossil fuels for energy. This blog post includes an evaluation of two sources I found on fracking, one article from Chemical and Engineering News and another from the University of Cincinnati's website.

"Uneven State Rules And Trade Secrets Fuel Fracking Debate": an article from Chemical and Engineering News

• URL: The URL for this source is http://cen.acs.org/articles/93/i11/Uneven-State-Rules-Trade-Secrets.html which is a ".org" website. The ".org" means that it comes from a non-profit organization which is an indicator of an unbiased and credible source that most likely has the goal of informing whoever is reading. 

• Author: The author of this article is Jessica Morrison. She has a profile on the C&EN website which verify her credentials as having a B.S. and PhD in chemistry with honors from Kaiser Health and the Chicago Tribune as a mass media reporting intern. These credentials support the credibility of this article.

• Last Updated: This article comes from the March 2015 edition of the journal. The website has working links to each new issue of the journal that is published monthly.

• Purpose: The text seeks to inform the reader about the controversy regarding fracking. The article brings points from both sides of the debate by mentioning the fracking companies' refusal to tell what chemicals are used in the process while also discussing the benefits of the energy extraction process. 

• Graphics: The article includes one graphic that depicts a map of the United States, showing each state's current regulations on fracking. This graphic's purpose is to inform rather than show a benefit or disadvantage of fracking which further supports the article's reliability.

• Position on Subject: Stated previously in the 'Purpose' section, the article brings information supporting both sides of the debate. Pros and cons of the fracking process are brought in an informative, non-persuasive manner. C&EN seeks to inform their readers so that they are knowledgeable of the content.

• Links: The article contains several hyperlinks to sources that give further information on fracking. Rather than suggest further places of research, the article includes links to the sources of the information throughout the article. Each source is linked with the individual or organization that brought forth the information, so the reader knows who the information is connected to.

"UC Doctoral Student's Research Digs Deep into the Fracking Controversy": an article from the University of Cincinnati's website 

• URL: The URL of this article is http://www.uc.edu/news/NR.aspx?id=13243. It is a ".edu" source, meaning it comes from a research center from an educational system. This indicates that the information has been checked thoroughly and can be considered credible.

• Author: The author of this article is Dawn Fuller. She has a profile on the university's site. She has been a Public Information Officer at UC for 15 years. Her credentials indicate that the source has been written by a reliable author.

• Last Updated: The webpage shows when the article was published, which was in 2011. The date alone indicates that the information may be out of date as it was over four years ago. There are no links to any supporting information as the article is based on another woman's research. The lack of working links puts into question where the information was found.

• Purpose: The article seeks to inform of Deborah Kittner's research on the fracking controversy. It appears to be mostly informative on the controversy rather than promoting a certain viewpoint, which further supports the credibility of the article.

• Graphics: The only graphic in this article is a photo of Deborah Kittner, the center of the article. 

• Position on Subject: The article seems to be purely informative, however there is a slight imbalance in the information supporting and disapproving of fracking. Little information is mentioned about the benefits of fracking, while there is more on the potential health risks and negative reactions to the process. There is no clear support for one side, however, so the author can't gain anything from the information posted and all of the details seem to align with other articles on fracking that I've seen, so there is some reliability in this source.

• Links: There are no suggestions of or actual links to other sources. Citations are also lacking, putting major doubt in the reliability of the article.