What do you call a report that makes major math mistakes, pulls language directly from other publications without citation, and fails to disclose the researchers’ financial conflicts of interest?

In the fight over fracking, it might just be called “peer-reviewed” science.

The most recent example of such sketchy research comes from the University of Buffalo, which released a report [PDF] this month concluding that fracking is getting safer and pointing for proof to Pennsylvania, ground zero for drilling.

The problem isn't just that the study itself is misleading and riddled with errors (which it is). It's that in their efforts to win public favor, the fracking industry increasingly hides behind academia to circulate  misinformation -- and the University of Buffalo is the latest cover.

If looks could drill ...

Right now the fossil fuel industry, utility execs, pundits, and politicians from both parties would like us to believe that natural gas will solve our chronic energy woes. But they all suffer from short memories. For years, natural gas has been known in the field as the "crack cocaine of the power industry." As one energy company official famously put it: "They get you hooked and then they raise the price."

Natural gas earned this reputation because its prices have fluctuated dramatically over the years. When prices are low (like now), lawmakers, power utilities, and consumers eagerly embrace natural gas. Then the price rockets up and they all suffer the consequences.

All this matters because Washington may be making long-term policy decisions for us based on false, or at least shaky, assumptions. When federal regulators take an overly optimistic natural gas industry at their word, they risk upping this country's fossil fuel addiction and ensure that in due time we're left stranded again in only a few short years without a realistic solution to our energy and climate change woes.

Energy markets as a whole swing like a pendulum, but we can still attempt to untangle the mechanisms that have anointed natural gas as energy-savior-du-jour once again -- mechanisms that can be as tough to pin down as the odorless, colorless gas itself.

How much gas is there, really?