(Translated by https://www.hiragana.jp/)
Market tremors: Shale gas exploration, earthquakes, and their impact on house prices
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/juecon/v122y2021ics009411902030084x.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Market tremors: Shale gas exploration, earthquakes, and their impact on house prices

Author

Listed:
  • Gibbons, Stephen
  • Heblich, Stephan
  • Timmins, Christopher

Abstract

Shale gas has grown to become a major new source of energy in countries around the globe. While its importance for energy supply is well recognized, there has also been public concern over potential risks from hydraulic fracturing (‘fracking’). Although commercial development has not yet taken place in the UK, licenses for drilling were issued in 2008, signalling potential future development. This paper examines whether public fears about fracking affect house prices in areas that have been licensed for shale gas exploration. Our estimates suggest differentiated effects. Licensing did not affect house prices but fracking the first well in 2011, which caused two minor earthquakes, did. We find a 3.9–4.7 percent house price decrease in the area where the earthquakes occurred. The earthquakes were too minor to have caused any damage but we find the effect on prices extends to a radius of about 25 km served by local newspapers. This evidence suggests that the earthquakes and newspaper coverage increased awareness of exploration activity and fear of the local consequences.

Suggested Citation

  • Gibbons, Stephen & Heblich, Stephan & Timmins, Christopher, 2021. "Market tremors: Shale gas exploration, earthquakes, and their impact on house prices," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 122(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:juecon:v:122:y:2021:i:c:s009411902030084x
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jue.2020.103313
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S009411902030084X
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jue.2020.103313?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Sandra E. Black, 1999. "Do Better Schools Matter? Parental Valuation of Elementary Education," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 114(2), pages 577-599.
    2. Lucija Muehlenbachs & Elisheba Spiller & Christopher Timmins, 2015. "The Housing Market Impacts of Shale Gas Development," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(12), pages 3633-3659, December.
    3. Leggett, Christopher G. & Bockstael, Nancy E., 2000. "Evidence of the Effects of Water Quality on Residential Land Prices," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 39(2), pages 121-144, March.
    4. Acemoglu,Daron & Arellano,Manuel & Dekel,Eddie (ed.), 2013. "Advances in Economics and Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107016064, October.
    5. Emily Oster, 2019. "Unobservable Selection and Coefficient Stability: Theory and Evidence," Journal of Business & Economic Statistics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 37(2), pages 187-204, April.
    6. Acemoglu,Daron & Arellano,Manuel & Dekel,Eddie (ed.), 2013. "Advances in Economics and Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107638105, October.
    7. Jeremy G. Moulton & Nicholas J. Sanders & Scott A. Wentland, 2024. "Toxic Assets: How the Housing Market Responds to Environmental Information Shocks," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 100(1), pages 66-88.
    8. repec:cty:dpaper:(18/06 is not listed on IDEAS
    9. Pope, Jaren C., 2008. "Buyer information and the hedonic: The impact of a seller disclosure on the implicit price for airport noise," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(2), pages 498-516, March.
    10. Fitzgerald, Timothy, 2014. "Importance of Mineral Rights and Royalty Interests for Rural Residents and Landowners," Choices: The Magazine of Food, Farm, and Resource Issues, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 29(4), pages 1-7.
    11. James M. Snyder & David Strömberg, 2010. "Press Coverage and Political Accountability," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 118(2), pages 355-408, April.
    12. Alexander W. Bartik & Janet Currie & Michael Greenstone & Christopher R. Knittel, 2019. "The Local Economic and Welfare Consequences of Hydraulic Fracturing," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 11(4), pages 105-155, October.
    13. Lala Ma, 2019. "Learning In A Hedonic Framework: Valuing Brownfield Remediation," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 60(3), pages 1355-1387, August.
    14. Kelly C. Bishop & Christopher Timmins, 2011. "Hedonic Prices and Implicit Markets: Estimating Marginal Willingness to Pay for Differentiated Products Without Instrumental Variables," NBER Working Papers 17611, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    15. Laurent Gobillon & Thierry Magnac, 2016. "Regional Policy Evaluation: Interactive Fixed Effects and Synthetic Controls," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 98(3), pages 535-551, July.
    16. Hans R.A. Koster & Edward W. Pinchbeck, 2022. "How Do Households Value the Future? Evidence from Property Taxes," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 14(1), pages 207-239, February.
    17. Ron Cheung & Daniel Wetherell & Stephan D. Whitaker, 2016. "Earthquakes and House Prices: Evidence from Oklahoma," Working Papers (Old Series) 1631, Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland.
    18. Delgado, Michael S. & Guilfoos, Todd & Boslett, Andrew, 2016. "The cost of unconventional gas extraction: A hedonic analysis," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(C), pages 1-22.
    19. Koster, Hans R.A. & Ommeren, Jos van, 2015. "A shaky business: Natural gas extraction, earthquakes and house prices," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 120-139.
    20. Steve Gibbons, 2004. "The Costs of Urban Property Crime," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 114(499), pages 441-463, November.
    21. Henrik Andersson & Lina Jonsson & Mikael Ögren, 2010. "Property Prices and Exposure to Multiple Noise Sources: Hedonic Regression with Road and Railway Noise," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 45(1), pages 73-89, January.
    22. McCoy, Shawn J. & Walsh, Randall P., 2018. "Wildfire risk, salience & housing demand," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 91(C), pages 203-228.
    23. Gibbons, Stephen & Machin, Stephen & Silva, Olmo, 2013. "Valuing school quality using boundary discontinuities," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 15-28.
    24. James J. Heckman & Rosa L. Matzkin & Lars Nesheim, 2010. "Nonparametric Identification and Estimation of Nonadditive Hedonic Models," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 78(5), pages 1569-1591, September.
    25. Patrick J. Walsh & J. Walter Milon & David O. Scrogin, 2011. "The Spatial Extent of Water Quality Benefits in Urban Housing Markets," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 87(4), pages 628-644.
    26. Laura A. Bakkensen & Lint Barrage, 2017. "Flood Risk Belief Heterogeneity and Coastal Home Price Dynamics: Going Under Water?," NBER Working Papers 23854, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    27. Patrick Bajari & Jane Cooley Fruehwirth & Kyoo il Kim & Christopher Timmins, 2012. "A Rational Expectations Approach to Hedonic Price Regressions with Time-Varying Unobserved Product Attributes: The Price of Pollution," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(5), pages 1898-1926, August.
    28. Acemoglu,Daron & Arellano,Manuel & Dekel,Eddie (ed.), 2013. "Advances in Economics and Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107016057, October.
    29. Naoi, Michio & Seko, Miki & Sumita, Kazuto, 2009. "Earthquake risk and housing prices in Japan: Evidence before and after massive earthquakes," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(6), pages 658-669, November.
    30. Acemoglu,Daron & Arellano,Manuel & Dekel,Eddie (ed.), 2013. "Advances in Economics and Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107674165, October.
    31. Brookshire, David S & Thayer. Mark A & Tschirhart, John & Schulze, William D, 1985. "A Test of the Expected Utility Model: Evidence from Earthquake Risks," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 93(2), pages 369-389, April.
    32. Weber, Jeremy G. & Hitaj, Claudia, 2015. "What Can We Learn about Shale Gas Development from Land Values? Opportunities, Challenges, and Evidence from Texas and Pennsylvania," Agricultural and Resource Economics Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 44(2), pages 40-58, August.
    33. Acemoglu,Daron & Arellano,Manuel & Dekel,Eddie (ed.), 2013. "Advances in Economics and Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107627314, October.
    34. Acemoglu,Daron & Arellano,Manuel & Dekel,Eddie (ed.), 2013. "Advances in Economics and Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107016040, October.
    35. Hans R.A. Koster & Jos N. van Ommeren, 2015. "Natural Gas Extraction, Earthquakes and House Prices," Tinbergen Institute Discussion Papers 15-038/VIII, Tinbergen Institute.
    36. Jeremy G. Weber & J. Wesley Burnett & Irene M. Xiarchos, 2016. "Broadening Benefits from Natural Resource Extraction: Housing Values and Taxation of Natural Gas Wells as Property," Journal of Policy Analysis and Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 35(3), pages 587-614, June.
    37. Pope, Jaren C., 2008. "Fear of crime and housing prices: Household reactions to sex offender registries," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(3), pages 601-614, November.
    38. Shawn J. McCoy & Xiaoxi Zhao, 2018. "A City under Water: A Geospatial Analysis of Storm Damage, Changing Risk Perceptions, and Investment in Residential Housing," Journal of the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, University of Chicago Press, vol. 5(2), pages 301-330.
    39. Renaud Coulomb & Yanos Zylberberg, 2016. "Rare events and risk perception: evidence from Fukushima accident," GRI Working Papers 229, Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment.
    40. Jason P. Brown & Timothy Fitzgerald & Jeremy G. Weber, 2019. "Does Resource Ownership Matter? Oil and Gas Royalties and the Income Effect of Extraction," Journal of the Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, University of Chicago Press, vol. 6(6), pages 1039-1064.
    41. Mastromonaco, Ralph, 2015. "Do environmental right-to-know laws affect markets? Capitalization of information in the toxic release inventory," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 54-70.
    42. Ferreira, Susana & Liu, Haiyan & Brewer, Brady, 2018. "The housing market impacts of wastewater injection induced seismicity risk," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 92(C), pages 251-269.
    43. Singh, Ruchi, 2019. "Seismic risk and house prices: Evidence from earthquake fault zoning," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 187-209.
    44. Kenneth Y. Chay & Michael Greenstone, 2005. "Does Air Quality Matter? Evidence from the Housing Market," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 113(2), pages 376-424, April.
    45. Balthrop, Andrew T. & Hawley, Zackary, 2017. "I can hear my neighbors' fracking: The effect of natural gas production on housing values in Tarrant County, TX," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 61(C), pages 351-362.
    46. Rosen, Sherwin, 1974. "Hedonic Prices and Implicit Markets: Product Differentiation in Pure Competition," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 82(1), pages 34-55, Jan.-Feb..
    47. Jushan Bai, 2009. "Panel Data Models With Interactive Fixed Effects," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 77(4), pages 1229-1279, July.
    48. Yinger, John, 2015. "Hedonic markets and sorting equilibria: Bid-function envelopes for public services and neighborhood amenities," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 9-25.
    49. Gibbons, Stephen & Machin, Stephen & Silva, Olmo, 2013. "Valuing school quality using boundary discontinuity," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 45246, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    50. Boslett, Andrew & Guilfoos, Todd & Lang, Corey, 2016. "Valuation of expectations: A hedonic study of shale gas development and New York’s moratorium," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 14-30.
    51. Bernstein, Asaf & Gustafson, Matthew T. & Lewis, Ryan, 2019. "Disaster on the horizon: The price effect of sea level rise," Journal of Financial Economics, Elsevier, vol. 134(2), pages 253-272.
    52. James Feyrer & Erin T. Mansur & Bruce Sacerdote, 2017. "Geographic Dispersion of Economic Shocks: Evidence from the Fracking Revolution," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(4), pages 1313-1334, April.
    53. Justin Gallagher, 2014. "Learning about an Infrequent Event: Evidence from Flood Insurance Take-Up in the United States," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 6(3), pages 206-233, July.
    54. Metz, Neil E. & Roach, Travis & Williams, Jordan A., 2017. "The costs of induced seismicity: A hedonic analysis," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 160(C), pages 86-90.
    55. Leigh Linden & Jonah E. Rockoff, 2008. "Estimates of the Impact of Crime Risk on Property Values from Megan's Laws," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(3), pages 1103-1127, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Lisha Wang & Jian Wang & Xuepeng Qian, 2023. "Does the bullet train exacerbate urban shrinkage? Lessons from Japan," Papers in Regional Science, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 102(1), pages 187-212, February.
    2. Malin, Stephanie A. & Mayer, Adam & Hazboun, Shawn, 2023. "Whose future, whose security?: Unconventional oil and gas extraction and the economic vulnerability and forced participation of small-scale property owners," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 86(PA).
    3. Kitchens, Carl & Wallace, Cullen T., 2022. "The impact of place-based poverty relief: Evidence from the Federal Promise Zone Program," Regional Science and Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Steve Gibbons & Stephan Heblich & Esther Lho & Christopher Timmins, 2016. "Fear of Fracking? The Impact of the Shale Gas Exploration on House Prices in Britain," SERC Discussion Papers 0207, Centre for Economic Performance, LSE.
    2. Lucija Muehlenbachs & Elisheba Spiller & Christopher Timmins, 2015. "The Housing Market Impacts of Shale Gas Development," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(12), pages 3633-3659, December.
    3. Keeler, Zachary T. & Stephens, Heather M., 2020. "Valuing shale gas development in resource-dependent communities," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 69(C).
    4. Xuejuan Su & Huayi Yu, 2022. "Valuing elementary schools: evidence from public school acquisitions in Beijing," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 124(4), pages 1117-1141, October.
    5. Boslett, Andrew & Hill, Elaine, 2019. "Shale gas transmission and housing prices," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 57(C), pages 36-50.
    6. Wesley Burnett, J. & Mothorpe, Christopher, 2021. "Human-induced earthquakes, risk salience, and housing values," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(C).
    7. Tomasz Serwach, 2022. "The European Union and within-country income inequalities. The case of the New Member States," Working Papers hal-03548416, HAL.
    8. Ahlfeldt, Gabriel M. & Nitsch, Volker & Wendland, Nicolai, 2019. "Ease vs. noise: Long-run changes in the value of transport (dis)amenities," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 98(C).
    9. Jörg L. Spenkuch & David Toniatti, 2016. "Political Advertising and Election Outcomes," CESifo Working Paper Series 5780, CESifo.
    10. Tang, Cheng Keat, 2021. "The Cost of Traffic: Evidence from the London Congestion Charge," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 121(C).
    11. Ruben Durante & Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, 2018. "Attack When the World Is Not Watching? US News and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 126(3), pages 1085-1133.
    12. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/6l0phu0dat8eg98t75kpqihcid is not listed on IDEAS
    13. David Strömberg, 2015. "Media and Politics," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 7(1), pages 173-205, August.
    14. Jason P. Brown, 2021. "Response of Consumer Debt to Income Shocks: The Case of Energy Booms and Busts," Journal of Money, Credit and Banking, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 53(7), pages 1629-1675, October.
    15. Bishop, Kelly C. & Timmins, Christopher, 2019. "Estimating the marginal willingness to pay function without instrumental variables," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 109(C), pages 66-83.
    16. Yukihiro Yazaki, 2017. "Newspapers and political accountability: evidence from Japan," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 172(3), pages 311-331, September.
    17. Simeon Alder & Guillermo Ordonez, 2016. "Deceptive Redistribution," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 22, pages 223-239, October.
    18. Kuminoff, Nicolai V. & Jarrah, Abdul Salam, 2010. "A new approach to computing hedonic equilibria and investigating the properties of locational sorting models," Journal of Urban Economics, Elsevier, vol. 67(3), pages 322-335, May.
    19. Ruben Durante & Ekaterina Zhuravskaya, 2015. "Attack When the World is Not Watching? International Media and the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict," SciencePo Working papers Main hal-03459981, HAL.
    20. Patrick Balles & Ulrich Matter & Alois Stutzer, 2024. "Special Interest Groups Versus Voters and the Political Economics of Attention," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 134(662), pages 2290-2320.
    21. Benesch, Christine & Loretz, Simon & Stadelmann, David & Thomas, Tobias, 2019. "Media coverage and immigration worries: Econometric evidence," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 160(C), pages 52-67.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Shale gas; Fracturing; Hedonic prices; Housing prices; Consumer expectation; Information; Media; United Kingdom;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • R1 - Urban, Rural, Regional, Real Estate, and Transportation Economics - - General Regional Economics
    • Q5 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics
    • Q4 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Energy

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:juecon:v:122:y:2021:i:c:s009411902030084x. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/622905 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.