University of Texas to Withdraw Fracking Study Responding to scathing criticism, the University of Texas says it will take steps to resolve conflicts of interest related to a campus energy institute's 2012 report on the potential effects of fracking, Andrew C. Revkin reports. The institute has been faulted for ties to the natural gas drilling industry. The university said it had accepted all of the recommendations of an independent review panel that found that the institute had shown "very poor judgment" and an "inattention" to the "challenges of conducting research in an environment inevitably fraught with conflict of interest concerns."