http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/13/us/13florida.html
June 12, 2010

By DAMIEN CAVE

KEY LARGO, Fla. — When rigs first started drilling for oil off Louisiana’s coast in the 1940s, Floridians scanned their shoreline, with its resorts and talcum-white beaches, and said, No thanks. Go ahead and drill, they told other Gulf Coast states; we’ll stick with tourism.

Floridians worry that tourists like Jessie Weidner, 10, of Columbus, Ohio, will stop coming.

Now that invisible wall separating Florida from its neighbors has been breached. The spreading BP oil spill has already reached the Panhandle, and if it rides currents to the renowned reefs and fishing holes on both Florida coasts, the Sunshine State could become a vacation destination with the rules of a museum: Look, but don’t touch.

All because other states decided to rely on oil and gas, angry Floridians say; all because, in the water, there are no borders — only currents that can carry catastrophes hundreds of miles.

“There’s nothing we can do,” said Mike McLaughlin, 42, while stretching tanned shark skin on a dock here in the Keys. “We’re just sitting here, waiting for it all to disappear.”
Many Floridians, of course, say they are heartbroken for Louisiana, and they still reserve their most caustic criticism for BP and government regulators.

But with oil continuing to gush from a well off Louisiana, Florida has grown angrier at its oil-friendly neighbors. Gov. Charlie Crist said in an interview last week that “there’s a certain level of frustration” with the fact that Florida gets little if any financial benefit from offshore drilling, even though it shares the environmental risks.

On docks and beaches, many Floridians are less measured, and compare Louisiana to a neighbor with a bonfire that has set their block ablaze.

To some extent, it is a conflict set up by history. Louisiana and Florida may share the Gulf of Mexico, but they are essentially oil opposites.

Ever since World War II, when tar balls washed ashore across the gulf after German U-boats sank Allied oil tankers, Florida officials have held drilling at bay with state laws and lobbying in Washington to protect their state’s bustling tourism industry.

Louisiana, meanwhile, is an oil state through and through that discovered its first commercial deposits in 1901 and started drilling offshore in 1947.

State officials have never looked back, and the resulting divide between the two states is now economic as well as cultural: oil and gas contribute about $65 billion a year to the Louisiana economy, according to the state’s oil and gas association, while in Florida, tourism accounts for about $60 billion.

The difference, Floridians now note, is that a crowded bar in Miami has no impact on New Orleans. Oil spills are a different story.

Sean Snaith, an economist at the University of Central Florida, recently completed astudy showing that Florida’s gulf coast could lose 195,000 jobs and $11 billion this year alone if the spill cuts tourism in half.
With oil drilling — as with Wall Street — “there will be significant rethinking about who benefits and who bears the cost,” Mr. Snaith predicted.
Florida has a lot to lose, even beyond tourism and fishing. Housing has become increasingly concentrated along the state’s 8,436 miles of shoreline. With property values already down by a third in many areas and unemployment around 12 percent, the state could see its economy darkened for a decade by the spill.

Also vulnerable is the third-largest reef system in the world, which sits just offshore in the likely path of the loop current that, according to oceanographers,has already sent small blots of oil around Florida’s tip.

Residents worry about losing not just their livelihood, but also their way of life.

Fishermen motor out every day from docks all over the Keys searching for mahi mahi or lobster when the season opens in August, leaving early in the morning for that blissful moment when the sun rises over an open sea.
Boat-dwellers like Paul Peterson, 57, who piloted his 21-foot sailboat here from Massachusetts nine years ago, can hardly imagine being told that the water is off limits, or that the fish are too toxic to eat.

Mr. Peterson has been fighting Stage 4 lymphoma for years. He wears a gold necklace with a coin pulled from a local shipwreck, and he says the memories of diving — especially a few years back “with a great gal from Colorado” — have kept him going.

“It’s a hard fight,” said Mr. Peterson, referring to his cancer with the dropped r’s of New England. “And this place is so beautiful that it would be a sin. I don’t even want to say it or think about it.”
Many of his neighbors are still angry about how the cable news networks publicized the appearance of tar balls in Key West on May 17, tar balls that were not actually from the spill, leading some experts to surmise that they may have come from a ship.

Indeed, Florida is already learning that perception can define reality. Key Largo hosted a “reef fest” for divers last week, but after an extensive advertising campaign estimated to have reached 1.5 million people, only six divers showed up. Jackie Harder, president of the local chamber of commerce, said she had expected 300.
Charter boat captains and diving instructors are also struggling. In previous years, they would usually have had bookings for much of July by now. But next month is wide open for old-timers like Skip Bradeen, 67, who said he had never seen it this bad in his 40 years of taking amateurs out to land the big one.

What really worries most fishermen and environmental scientists are the long-term consequences if oil is carried around the coast of Florida, with plumes underwater and slicks onshore.

“It’s untold billions of babies of fish and lobsters and crabs,” said Douglas N. Rader, chief ocean scientist for the Environmental Defense Fund, an advocacy group. “A wide array of seafood that is in the surface layers of the sea are transferred through the superhighway of the loop current and are depending on the habitats affected by the oil.”
Gary Sands, a third-generation fisherman who works just past the Pilot House bar here in Key Largo, took a break on a hot morning of hammering together lobster traps to explain exactly what that means.

Sitting a few dozen yards from where Mr. McLaughlin stretched his shark skins, Mr. Sands pointed to a pair of blond teenagers, the sons of a fellow fisherman.
“I’m 68, but these boys, they’ve got 30 years,” he said. “If it doesn’t come back for these boys, what’s going to happen?”
Albert Pflueger, 50, another fisherman, whose family once owned the largest taxidermy company in South Florida, pondered the question. Across the docks sat a boat named What Next. Removing his sunglasses, Mr. Pflueger said he could imagine the Keys emptying out like an abandoned mining town.
“The whole Keys makes its living on the water,” he said. “If there is no water, there is no Keys.”
DuWayne Escobedo contributed reporting from Pensacola, and Gary Fineout from Tallahassee.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

 
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/13/opinion/13sun1.html

June 11, 2010
If ever there was a test of President Obama’s vision of government — one that cannot solve all problems, but does what people cannot do for themselves – it is this nerve-racking early summer of 2010, with oil spewing into the Gulf of Mexico and far too many Americans out of work for far too long.
The country is frustrated and apprehensive and still waiting for Mr. Obama to put his vision into action.

The president cannot plug the leak or magically clean up the fouled Gulf of Mexico. But he and his administration need to do a lot more to show they are on top of this mess, and not perpetually behind the curve.

It is well within Mr. Obama’s power to keep his administration and Congressional Democrats focused on what the economy needs: jobs and stimulus. Voters are anxious about the deficit. But the president needs to tell them the truth that without more spending the economy could remain weak for a very long time.
Unless Mr. Obama says it, no other politician will. Just the other day, the House passed an unemployment benefits extension from which Democrats, not Republicans, had stripped vital measures that would have helped lots of Americans, but did not close a tax loophole for billionaires.

Americans need to know that Mr. Obama, whose coolness can seem like detachment, is engaged. This is not a mere question of presentation or stagecraft, although the White House could do better at both. (We cringed when he told the “Today” show that he had spent important time figuring out “whose ass to kick” about the spill. Everyone knew that answer on Day 2.)
Any assessment of the 44th president has to start with the fact that he took office under an extraordinary burden of problems created by President George W. Bush’s ineptness and blind ideology. He has faced a stone wall of Republican opposition. And Mr. Obama has had real successes. He won a stimulus bill that helped avert a depression; he got a historic health care reform through Congress; the bitter memory of Mr. Bush’s presidency is fading around the world.
But a year and a half into this presidency, the contemplative nature that was so appealing in a candidate can seem indecisive in a president. His promise of bipartisanship seems naïve. His inclination to hold back, then ride to the rescue, has sometimes made problems worse.

It certainly should not have taken days for Mr. Obama to get publicly involved in the oil spill, or even longer for his administration to start putting the heat on BP for its inadequate response and failure to inform the public about the size of the spill. (Each day, it seems, brings new revelations about the scope of the disaster.) It took too long for Mr. Obama to say that the Coast Guard and not BP was in charge of operations in the gulf and it’s still not clear that is true.
He should not have hesitated to suspend the expanded oil drilling program and he should have moved a lot faster to begin political and criminal investigations of the spill. If BP was withholding information, failing to cooperate or not providing the ships needed to process the oil now flowing to the surface, he should have told the American people and the world.

These are matters of competence and leadership. This is a time for Mr. Obama to decisively show both.

 Special thanks to Richard Charter.

Elana Schor, E&E reporter

On the growing list of unknowns that surround the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster — How many barrels are spilling? When will the leak be capped? — belongs another, less-discussed mystery: How will the chemical soup of gushing crude and dispersants affect the health of cleanup workers, fishermen and others working along the coast?

Testing data released so far by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and BP PLC raised more questions than they answered for scientists and industrial medicine specialists consulted by Greenwire. Meanwhile, the chorus of lawmakers raising alarms about the health hazards of chemical exposure in the Gulf was joined yesterday by House Education and Labor Chairman George Miller (D-Calif.), who warned BP CEO Tony Hayward that a failure to request full worker monitoring “is irresponsible.”

“The magnitude of the Deepwater Horizon disaster is unparalleled and the potential health risks for cleanup workers remains largely unknown,” Miller wrote to Hayward, urging BP to expand its existing request for a National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) hazard evaluation of a portion of Louisiana coastal workers.

NIOSH, a division of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that provides scientific advice to OSHA, sent two teams of hygienists to the Gulf this week to test for chemical exposures of workers burning off collected oil and placing booms to help contain the spill.

As that work begins, BP has released limited test results aimed at tamping down public worries about the number of cleanup workers already reporting adverse symptoms. “It is important to recognise that the risks to the health of people from the chemicals associated with both the crude oil from the leak and the dispersants used to clean up the oil are very low,” the company states in a preface to its testing data.

That declaration was not sufficient for Gina Solomon, senior scientist at the Natural Resources Defense Council and a member of U.S. EPA’s Science Advisory Board.

“Even in the data BP has posted, there are quite a large number of samples over NIOSH recommended exposure limits and some samples over a limit BP had previously identified as over a level of concern for hydrocarbons,” Solomon said.

Noting the lack of details on where BP’s worker testing is occurring and what equipment is used, Solomon pointed to a section of the company’s government-approved chemical monitoring plan that classifies smaller boats in the Gulf as “reduced priority.”

A BP spokesman defended the level of its chemical exposure tests, stating via e-mail that the company has “a team of around 100 industrial hygienists and technicians” in the Gulf. “All results to date are within safe exposure limits” set by OSHA, the spokesman added, including levels for volatile organic compounds (VOCs), a broad class of chemicals found in crude oil, pesticides and common solvents such as turpentine.

Yet OSHA does not set specific VOC exposure standards — and even existing OSHA standards for chemicals likely to linger in the Gulf do not provide an assurance of safety, occupational hygiene experts said.

“I wouldn’t use OSHA standards here as the sole measure for decisionmaking for protection of workers,” said Steven Markowitz, an environmental science professor at the City University of New York who directed a clinic that treated response workers following the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.

“[Gulf] workers will likely have exposure to mixtures of substances which OSHA standards don’t address,” he added. “One of the things we learned from the World Trade Center is, when you’re unsure, err on the side of protection. Don’t err on the side of false reassurance.”

Benzene exposure

BP’s tests also show some workers have been exposed to the carcinogen benzene, which came as an unwelcome surprise to an occupational health expert and veteran of the 1989 Exxon Valdez cleanup who agreed to speak candidly on the condition of anonymity.
“They’re trying to say it’s not that bad, but I’m looking at it and saying, wow — that would be enough for me to say there’s [notable] exposure,” this source said, adding that the number of air samples BP has taken is “shockingly low … you would expect a lot more sampling data, but it can be difficult to take a lot of these samples.”

NIOSH sets significantly lower exposure limits than OSHA for several chemicals being monitored in spill cleanup workers, including benzene and 2-butoxyethanol, an ingredient in a dispersant that is no longer used in the Gulf. In addition, several sources noted that OSHA exposure limits are calculated based on an eight-hour day, even though many responders near the leaking well are working much longer shifts.

Hunter College toxicology professor Franklin Mirer said that using OSHA limits to assess chemical exposure in the Gulf “is less than helpful for understanding the health effects being reported” by the workers who have already sought medical treatment.

“If the message here is that OSHA standards are being complied with and large numbers of people are getting sick, that’s a lesson about the value of OSHA standards and about the protective measures that ought to be employed,” Mirer added, likening the occupational health risks of the oil disaster to those at the World Trade Center after Sept. 11.

BP announced yesterday that it would start burning as much as 10,000 barrels of collected oil per day next week, potentially altering the mix of hydrocarbons and other hazardous chemicals entering the air. Given that the Gulf game plan is changing so rapidly, longtime industrial health official Eileen Senn said worker protection is a more sensitive concern than testing.

“This whole sampling thing, it’s just barking up the wrong tree,” said Senn, who has more than four decades of experience in occupational hygiene. “I don’t feel like workers are being told the risks they’re being exposed to.”

OSHA has released worker education documents that outline the health risks posed by crude oil contact and dispersant use, and agency officials have publicly pressed BP to release the maximum amount of monitoring data while conducting their own local tests.

But one day after Reps. James Oberstar (D-Minn.) and Jerrold Nadler (D-N.Y.) called on OSHA to ensure that cleanup workers received respirators, the agency said they were not needed “unless a toxic chemical threat is identified.”

A Nadler spokesman called the existing worker-protection responses “all nonsense,” adding that the congressman “is continuing to push [OSHA and BP] to do the right thing and avert a public health crisis.”

Another potential stumbling block for OSHA’s efforts is its lack of jurisdiction beyond 3 miles offshore, where much of the most direct worker exposure to hydrocarbons likely is occurring. OSHA Deputy Assistant Secretary Jordan Barab told lawmakers yesterday that the agency has no plans to press for broader sway offshore.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://dailydeadbirds.com/

BP Oil Spill: Daily Dead Wildlife Tally 
Chad Nelsen
Surfrider Foundation
949.492.8170×408
cnelsen@surfrider.org
PO Box 6010, San Clemente, CA 92674

McClatchy Newspapers
Posted on Sat, Jun. 12, 2010

Coast Guard rejects BP oil leak plan as too little, too late

Mark Seibel
McClatchy Newspapers
 
WASHINGTON – The Coast Guard has told oil giant BP that its proposed plan for containing the runaway Deepwater Horizon well does not take into account new higher estimates of how much oil is gushing into the Gulf of Mexico and demanded that the company provide a more aggressive plan within 48 hours.
In a letter dated Friday and released Saturday, Coast Guard Rear Adm. James A. Watson also said that BP was taking too much time to ready ships to capture oil spewing from the well.
 
“You indicate that some of the systems you have planned to deploy may take a month or more to bring online,” Watson, who is the federal on-scene coordinator for the Deepwater Horizon disaster, wrote Doug Suttles, BP’s chief operating officer. “Every effort must be expended to speed up the process.”
 
The 48-hour deadline is the second the Coast Guard has given BP in the past week and indicates a growing recognition on the part of the Coast Guard that both BP and the Obama administration underestimated for weeks the amount of oil pouring from the well, which began leaking when an April 20 explosion shattered the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig, killing 11 workers. The rig sank two days later, taking a mile of well pipeline with it.
 
For weeks, the Obama administration and BP said the spill was leaking 5,000 barrels a day – about 210,000 gallons. On May 27, a government task force of scientists revised that estimate to a minimum of 12,000 to 25,000 barrels a day, and possibly much more. Then on Thursday, the government doubled those estimates to between 20,000 and 50,000 barrels a day, saying those, too, may understate the size of the leak because a decision to shear off the well’s riser pipe to add a “top hat” containment device may have unleashed more oil.
 
Watson said the new estimates were the reason for the new deadline, saying the plan Suttles outlined was only “consistent with previous flow rate estimates.”
 
“Because those estimates have now been revised . . . it is clear that additional capacity is urgently needed,” he said.
 
BP said it would respond to Watson’s letter “as soon as possible.”
 
BP and Coast Guard representatives have been meeting throughout the week, Coast Guard officials have said, to refine the plan, which Suttles outlined in a letter to Watson dated Wednesday – before the new flow rate estimates were released. In his letter, Suttles said the plan had been outlined on Tuesday to Interior Secretary Ken Salazar and Energy Secretary Steven Chu. “No objections were raised,” he wrote.
 
Under that proposal, BP outlined two phases – a temporary one involving three recovery ships and a jerry-rigged system combining the “top hat” containment device with hoses already in place from the “top kill” procedure that failed to stanch the well last month, and a more permanent one that involves construction of two new risers from the well that would be serviced by two large recovery ships that are en route to the site now.
 
BP said that the temporary phase would bring the amount of oil captured to 20,000 to 28,000 barrels a day by the end of next week. Most of that oil would be recovered by the Discoverer Enterprise drilling ship, which has been collecting around its stated 15,000-barrels-per-day capacity through the “top hat” but that Coast Guard officials believe can be pushed to 18,000 barrels a day. The remaining 5,000 to 10,000 barrels per day would be taken up by a second vessel, the Q4000 drilling platform, which would burn the oil in a rarely used, if not unprecedented, procedure. BP vice president Kent Wells said Friday that burning could begin as soon as Monday.
 
The burning idea has provoked some experts to raise questions about the health and environmental effects of the process.
 
Containment capacity would be pushed further during the temporary phase by the addition of a third vessel, the drill ship Discoverer Clear Leader, which would take on an additional 5,000 to 10,000 barrels a day when it is operational in mid July, Suttle wrote.
 
In the second, more permanent phase, Suttles said BP was building two permanent floating risers to provide oil to the Taisa Pisces and the Helix Producer recovery ships. Each riser takes about a month to complete, Suttles said. One is expected to be finished next week. Work on the second began Monday, June 7. Once operational, the new risers and ships would have capacity to receive between 40,000 and 50,000 barrels per day, BP said.
 
The plan foresees both the Q4000 and the Discoverer Clear Leader discontinuing operations once the new floating risers are operational, but says the Discoverer Enterprise would remain on site and could provide additional capacity, if needed.
 
In offering an estimate of the total capacity of the temporary phase, BP’s plan is more cautious than numbers Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen used in press briefings with reporters. On Friday, Allen said capacity would reach 38,000 barrels a day once the Discoverer Clear Leader is operational.
 
BP’s numbers may be more realistic, however. While Allen has said that the Discoverer Enterprise could be pushed to receive 18,000 barrels per day, the actual amount it’s recovered has declined by a few hundred barrels since it peaked at 15,800 barrels on Wednesday. On Thursday, the ship recovered 15,400 barrels and on Friday, it recovered 15,500 barrels, BP reported Saturday.
 
How much oil will flow to the Q4000 and the Discoverer Clear Leader is also uncertain. Neither vessel will be “pumping” the oil up from the sea, but instead will rely on the oil’s natural pressure to push it up through hoses that were originally used to push drilling mud into the well’s dysfunctional blowout preventer during the “top kill” effort. Based on the size of the hoses, the maximum amount likely to flow through to those ships would be 10,000 barrels per day, but could be less, depending on the oil reservoir’s pressure.
 
Both Suttles and Wells warned that there could be additional delays in the plans because of adverse weather and conditions at the drill site, which officials describe as crowded with dozens of ships.
 
© 2010 Miami Herald Media Company. http://www.miamiherald.com
 
Read more: http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/06/12/v-print/1677002/coast-guard-rejects-bp-oil-leak.html#ixzz0qfvaDv4s
 
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Coast Guard to BP: Speed it up, stop the spill

Published: Saturday, June 12, 2010, 4:06 PM     Updated: Saturday, June 12, 2010, 4:11 PM

The Associated Press

ORANGE BEACH, Ala. — The Coast Guard has demanded that BP step up its efforts to contain the oil gushing into the Gulf of Mexico by the end of the weekend, telling the British oil giant that its slow pace in stopping the spill is becoming increasingly alarming as the disaster fouled the coastline in ugly new ways today.
The Coast Guard sent a testy letter to BP’s chief operating officer that said the company urgently needs to pick up the pace and present a better plan to contain the spill by the time President Barack Obama arrives on Monday for his fourth visit to the beleaguered coast. The letter, released Saturday, follows nearly two months of tense relations between BP and the government and reflects the growing frustration over the company’s inability to stop the largest environmental disaster in U.S. history.
 
The dispute escalated on the same day that ominous new signs of the tragedy emerged on the beaches of Alabama. Waves of unsightly brown surf hit the shores in Orange Beach, leaving stinking, dark piles of oil that dried in the hot sun and extended up to 12 feet from the water’s edge for as far as the eye could see.
 
It was the worst hit yet to Alabama beaches. Tar-like globs have washed up periodically throughout the disaster, but Saturday’s pollution was significantly worse.
 
“This is awful,” said Shelley Booker of Shreveport, La., who was staying in a condominium with her teenage daughter and her friends near the deserted beach about 100 miles from the site of the spill.
 
Scientists have estimated that anywhere between about 40 million gallons to 109 million gallons of oil have spewed into the Gulf since a drilling rig exploded April 20, killing 11 workers. The latest cap installed on the blown-out well is capturing about 650,000 gallons of oil a day, but large quantities are still spilling into the sea.
 
The Coast Guard initially sent a letter to BP on Wednesday asking for more details on its plans to contain the oil. BP responded, saying a new system to trap much more oil should be complete by mid-July. That system’s new design is meant to better withstand the force of hurricanes and could capture about 2 million gallons of oil daily when finished, the company said.
 
But Coast Guard Rear Adm. James A. Watson said in a follow-up letter Friday he was concerned that BP’s plans were inadequate, especially in light of revised estimates this week that indicated the size of the spill could be up to twice as large as previously thought.
 
“BP must identify in the next 48 hours additional leak containment capacity that could be operationalized and expedited to avoid the continued discharge of oil … Recognizing the complexity of this challenge, every effort must be expended to speed up the process,” Watson said in the letter addressed to chief operating officer Doug Suttles.
 
Suttles said the company will respond to the letter by Sunday night.
 
“We’ve got a team of people looking to see, can we accelerate some items that are in that plan and is it possible to do more,” Suttles said as he spoke to workers at a command center where he thanked BP employees and contractors for their work in cleaning up the spill. “There are some real challenges to do that, including safety.”
 
The letter and deadline come just before Obama is set to visit the Gulf Coast on Monday and Tuesday. On Saturday, Obama reassured British Prime Minister David Cameron that his frustration over the oil spill in the Gulf was not an attack on Britain.
 
The two leaders spoke by phone for 30 minutes Saturday to soothe trans-Atlantic tensions over the spill. Cameron also has been under pressure to get Obama to tone down the criticism, fearing it will hurt the millions of British retirees holding BP stock that has taken a beating in recent weeks.
 
Cameron’s office said the prime minister told Obama of his sadness at the disaster, while Obama said he recognized that BP was a multinational company and that his frustration “had nothing to do with national identity.”
 
BP is hard at work trying to find new ways to capture more oil, but officials say the only way to permanently stop the spill is a relief well that will drill sideways into the broken well and plug it with cement.
 
Right now, a containment cap sitting over a well pipe is siphoning off around 653,100 gallons of oil to a ship the ocean surface. That oil is then unloaded to tankers and taken ashore.
 
To boost its capacity, BP also plans to trap oil using lines that earlier shot heavy drilling mud deep into the well during a failed attempt to stop the flow. This time, those lines will work in reverse. Oil and gas from the well will flow up to a semi-submersible drilling rig where it will be burned in a specialized boom that BP estimates can vaporize a maximum 420,000 gallons of oil daily. Another ship should be in place by mid-July to process even more oil.
 
News that the federal government had given BP until the end of the weekend to speed up the oil containment was met with raised eyebrows and long sighs as locals gathered to barbecue, drink Budweiser and listen to classic rock at a fishing benefit in Pointe a la Hache, La.
 
“I’ll believe it when I see it,” said Dominic Bazile, a firefighter.
 
Meanwhile, Gulf states affected by the disaster are putting the squeeze on BP, seeking to protect their interests amid talk of the possibility that BP may eventually file for bankruptcy.
 
The attorney general in Florida and the state treasurer in Louisiana want BP to put a total of $7.5 billion in escrow accounts to compensate the states and their residents for damages now and in the future. Alabama doesn’t plan to take such action, while Mississippi and Texas haven’t said what they will do.
 
As of the end of March, BP had only $6.8 billion in cash and cash equivalents available.
 
© 2010 al.com.
 

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McClatchy Washington Bureau
Posted on Fri, Jun. 11, 2010

Obama overlooked key points in giving OK to offshore drilling

Steven Thomma | McClatchy Newspapers

last updated: June 11, 2010 07:47:56 PM
 
WASHINGTON – Weeks before the world had ever heard of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig, President Barack Obama stood in the Roosevelt Room of the White House poring over maps of oil drilling sites in the Gulf of Mexico, Alaska and elsewhere.
 
Satisfied that he knew all he needed to know and confident that it was safe, he decided to propose expanded offshore drilling.
 
“This is not a decision that I’ve made lightly,” he said when he unveiled his proposal on March 31.
 
“Oil rigs today generally don’t cause spills,” he added two days later. “They are technologically very advanced. Even during Katrina, the spills didn’t come from the oil rigs, they came from the refineries onshore.”
 
On April 20, the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded, setting off the largest oil spill in U.S. history. It drove Obama to freeze the proposal he’d just made.
 
An in-depth review by McClatchy reveals how Obama reached that initial decision to expand offshore drilling _ and why he failed to get information that might have led him instead to delay or oppose it and perhaps even raise questions about the deepwater drilling that was already under way.
 
Obama did roll back some of the offshore drilling that the George W. Bush administration had approved on Bush’s last day in office. However, Obama never challenged the Bush era’s fundamental faith in the oil industry or its ability to clean up a massive spill. Instead, he embraced expanded offshore drilling, in part to win Republican support for broader legislation to curb climate change.
 
“He deserved to be more skeptical,” said Stephen Hess, a veteran of four White Houses back to the Eisenhower administration and an expert on how presidents do their job.
 
“They hadn’t thought through the various ramifications. They should have, obviously. But it didn’t seem obvious at the time.”
 
“Not well thought through,” said Rick Steiner, a retired University of Alaska marine scientist. “If they had really done their job, they would have understood there was high risk here.”
 
Indeed, Obama and his team overlooked some important points as they prepared to give the green light to more offshore oil drilling. Expanding the drilling was something he’d promised to do during his campaign, when gas prices topped $4 a gallon, and it was a lure he planned to use to win Republican votes for legislation aimed at curbing climate change.
 
Among their oversights:
 
Obama thought that funneling information through White House “czars” such as energy and environment adviser Carol Browner would get him all the data he needed.
 
He failed to drill into the government bureaucracy to test that information. He didn’t, for example, ask about the Interior Department’s Minerals Management Service, which had prepared a report in 2000 on the dangers of deepwater drilling that proved to be eerily predictive of what happened in the Gulf. The MMS regulates offshore drilling.
 
He never talked to the Coast Guard about its 2002 oil-spill drill in the Gulf or to the man who ran it, Adm. Thad Allen, who later would oversee the response to the Deepwater Horizon spill.
 
He didn’t reach out to outside experts, such as the National Academy of Engineering, to question claims that deepwater drilling technology was dependable.
Top Obama administration officials say that they did an exhaustive job marshaling information for more than a year, and that the president asked what he needed to ask when it arrived at his desk. Anyone, they said, would grow complacent about the safety of offshore drilling after decades without a major spill.
 
“It’s really important to understand you have decades of nothing going wrong,” said one senior administration official, who spoke only on the condition of anonymity as a matter of White House policy.
 
“The last time you saw a spill of this magnitude in the Gulf, it was off the coast of Mexico in 1979,” a second senior administration official said. “If something doesn’t happen since 1979, you begin to take your eye off of that thing.”
 
Obama’s management of the March 31 oil decision is important not simply because the April 20 disaster turned a global spotlight on the entire subject. The governing style of Obama, a new president with no prior executive experience, has been subject to constant second-guessing.
 
How he makes decisions when no one is watching is arguably as illuminating – perhaps more so – as how he decides when the whole world is watching, such as his long deliberation last fall over whether to send more troops to Afghanistan.
 
Then, he held three months of meetings, publicized with White House photos released to the media and documented with briefings to reporters backed by notes taken during the sessions.
 
This time, he met twice with the top administration officials on the oil drilling question. Aides couldn’t recall details of the deliberations, such as the date of the last meeting with the president or the length of the memo they gave him on oil drilling.
 
“I had never had an inquiry about how we made that decision,” one top aide said, until after “one of them blew up in the Gulf.”
 
For Obama, a former campaign adviser said, the decision to expand offshore drilling was born in the 2008 campaign, when gasoline prices were soaring and Republican rival Sen. John McCain of Arizona was scoring with his promise of more production – drill, baby, drill – to drive down prices.
 
Obama also warmed to new offshore drilling as part of a bipartisan proposal in Congress, led by Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., to allow expanded drilling while pushing higher fuel efficiency.
 
The president and his political aides looked at proposing expanded drilling as a way to win Republican support for a broader energy bill aimed at climate change.
 
“Involving offshore drilling way back in the campaign, and then in March, has been part of a series of bank shots all intended to address other issues, as opposed to being a free-standing priority,” said an environmental activist who’s close to the White House, who asked not to be identified because he was criticizing the administration.
 
“It was not a full-blown policy proposal,” the activist said. “It was bait in the water.”
 
“Absolutely not true,” Browner said in an interview. “There was a lot of time and energy spent on this … trying to determine what was the appropriate thing to do.”
 
Interior Secretary Ken Salazar gathered information about oil drilling for a year, including public hearings in Alaska, California, Louisiana and New Jersey. More than 530,000 comments were collected.
 
Browner was the West Wing aide responsible for taking Salazar’s recommendations and all viewpoints to Obama. She’s the assistant to the president for energy and climate change, with a deep background in environmental work. She was an aide to Al Gore, the director of the Florida Department of Environmental Protection and the administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency in the Clinton administration.
 
She said she didn’t advocate choices inside the White House.
 
“My job is to be an honest broker … on behalf of the Cabinet agencies,” she said, “to ensure that they are able to present their best recommendations to the president and that he has all of the information he needs to make a decision.”
 
Despite the brouhaha over Obama’s reliance on White House aides dubbed “czars” to oversee areas of policy, all modern presidents rely on top aides to funnel information to them, particularly when it comes from more than one department.
 
Bush, for example, insisted that one presidential assistant “own” any given issue so the president would know whom to go to and who could be held accountable, according to Bradley H. Patterson, the author of an authoritative book on White House management, “To Serve the President.”
 
After being updated periodically by Browner on the discussions that were under way, Obama received the final summary of recommendations first in a memo – aides couldn’t recall how many pages it was – then in a meeting for a final decision.
 
In the Roosevelt Room, Obama met with Browner, Salazar and others, including Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, Deputy Chief of Staff Mona Sutphen and Budget Director Peter Orszag.
 
DISSENT
 
Administration officials said they heard dissent and changed the proposal in response. They banned drilling in Alaska’s Bristol Bay and refused to propose new drilling leases for Alaska’s Beaufort Sea.
 
“There were people who argued that certain areas should be protected, so, for example, the Beaufort Sea got protected,” Browner said.
 
However, the March 31 decision left in place plans to allow Shell Oil to start drilling five exploratory wells already leased in the Beaufort Sea, plans that weren’t frozen until May 27, five weeks after Deepwater Horizon exploded.
 
Obama never reached out himself to prominent dissenters such as marine scientist Steiner, who’d argued to Interior against expanding offshore drilling. Steiner had worked on oil spill responses from the Exxon Valdez in 1989 through today’s Gulf spill.
 
“He didn’t talk to me,” Steiner said.
 
DIGGING INTO HIS GOVERNMENT
 
As he reviewed the pending decision, Obama didn’t ask for more information about the Minerals Management Service. Now infamous but little-known then, the MMS is the primary agency that oversees oil drilling. In 2000, it prepared a report that warned of the possibility of a major spill that could start with a fire atop a rig, noting that “retaining well control in deep water may be a problem,” and said that spreading oil could both remain underwater and rush ashore.
 
That report was shelved during the Bush years as the government bowed to the claimed technological infallibility of the oil industry. In fact, the agency became known for cozy relationships between regulators and the oil industry, something Salazar set out to fix when he took office last year.
 
Obama recently conceded that he was wrong to trust the oil companies.
 
“Where I was wrong was in my belief that the oil companies had their act together when it came to worst-case scenarios,” he said. “Now, that wasn’t based on just my blind acceptance of their statements. Oil drilling has been going on in the Gulf, including deep water, for quite some time. And the record of accidents like this we hadn’t seen before.”
 
He also laid some blame on the MMS.
 
“Prior to this accident happening, I think there was a lack of anticipating what the worst-case scenarios would be. And that’s a problem,” he said. “And part of that problem was lodged in MMS and the way that that agency was structured. That was the agency in charge of providing permitting and making decisions in terms of where drilling could take place, but also in charge of enforcing the safety provisions.”
 
Yet Obama didn’t ask about the MMS when he was weighing whether to expand drilling on the Outer Continental Shelf.
 
“In making OCS decisions, you wouldn’t have necessarily needed to ask about sort of what information MMS has,” the first senior administration official said. “In making the OCS decisions, the focus was not based on MMS information per se.”
 
The official said that the president “was aware that Ken Salazar had been making changes in terms of the ethics issues that had been quite significant in the prior administration” and the president was satisfied that Salazar “had taken important steps.”
 
While not asking about the MMS is potentially embarrassing in hindsight, presidential expert Hess said it was unrealistic to expect a president to know much about an otherwise obscure agency.
 
“MMS is probably an agency that never crops up on the White House radar. It’s in the bowels of the bureaucracy,” Hess said. “No president pays equal attention to every piece of the bureaucracy.”
 
COAST GUARD
 
Obama also didn’t personally quiz the Coast Guard or Adm. Thad Allen, who’d run an oil spill exercise off Louisiana in 2002 and who’d be the national commander of any federal oil spill response.
 
“Not that I’m aware of,” the first senior official said.
 
“The president understood that there are safety plans associated with each lease. What are they called? Contingency response plans, something like that. … That’s part of the safety checks and balances in the system.”
 
The administration officials also noted that Obama’s drilling proposal would require further studies and permits before any drilling started.
 
GOING OUTSIDE
 
Some presidents like to reach outside official channels for unfiltered advice. Bill Clinton, for example, loved to call people late into the night.
 
Obama did, too, when he was seeking the office. For example, he reached out to private-sector experts – such as Duke Energy CEO Jim Rogers – discussing energy with them in his campaign headquarters for three hours straight one Monday in June 2008.
 
“That was the beginning, I think, of the thought process” leading to expanded offshore oil drilling, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said.
 
The president also has expressed a desire to seek outside expertise since the oil spill.
 
“We’re relying on experts who’ve actually dealt with oil spills from across the globe,” Obama said at a news conference, adding that he and his administration would talk to the National Academy of Engineering, the National Laboratories and experts in academia.
 
He didn’t seek such outside expertise until the spill, however, at least not to ask about oil drilling technology in deep water or oil-spill response plans.
 
“Beyond routine meetings with ‘green group’ environmental organization CEOs and policy staff, I don’t think the administration reached out,” said Dianne Saenz, the communications director for Oceana, one of the environmental groups. “We did not know the specifics of the March 31 announcement on expanded offshore drilling areas before it was made.”
 
Browner said Obama did reach out.
 
“He’s met several times with representatives of the environmental community who would have raised this issue,” she said. “He also has met with various groups of business leaders who were interested in energy reform, some of whom would have raised this issue.
 
“They were not brought in specifically on this issue; they were brought in on energy more broadly.” Asked why Obama didn’t ask for outside opinions as he did in his campaign, she said that he now had staff do that.
 
“You have all these advisers; their job is to go out and do those sorts of things,” she said. “Our job is to synthesize this information and bring it back to him.”
 
Inside the White House, aides say that they and their president did the best they could, given the context before the unprecedented accident.
 
“The best piece of evidence we had was that there hadn’t been a problem for decades,” Browner said. “There are very few industries where you can probably look back over a several-decade period and not have a large-scale problem.”
 
“Nobody expected the damned thing to blow up,” said Hess, the presidential scholar. “A lot of things don’t get that presidential attention because the president is busy and historically, statistically, it’s not apt to happen very often.
 
“If somebody tells you something happens in Kandahar, you better challenge it if lives are at stake. But most things in the bureaucracy, you have some faith in the people you’ve asked to gather the information.”
 
Ultimately, it’s up to Obama to decide whether he’s satisfied with how he reached his decision to propose more offshore drilling.
 
A president’s decisions are only as good as the information that generates them. That point was driven home in early 1961, when an inexperienced President John F. Kennedy blindly signed off on what would become the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba.
 
Kennedy learned. Afterward he personally questioned experts skeptically, including his own generals. Eighteen months later, facing the Cuban Missile Crisis, he developed an advisory system that remains a model of executive decision-making, one that helped the world escape its closest brush with nuclear war.
 
McClatchy Newspapers 2010
 

——————————————————————————–
 

Breaking News / World
http://newsinfo.inquirer.net/breakingnews/world/view/20100613-275340/Obama-insists-anger-at-BP-not-directed-at-Britain
 
Obama insists anger at BP not directed at Britain
 
Agence France-Presse
 
Posted date: June 13, 2010
 
NEW ORLEANS–President Barack Obama said his sharp criticism of BP was not aimed at Britain Saturday as the US Coast Guard increased pressure on BP to contain the Gulf of Mexico oil spill.
Obama, who had been referring to BP by its former full name “British Petroleum,” told Britain’s Prime Minister David Cameron that “frustrations about the oil spill had nothing to do with national identity,” a spokeswoman for the prime minister’s Downing Street office said.
 
Obama has summoned BP Chairman Carl-Henric Svanberg to meet with him in Washington next Wednesday, criticized chief executive Tony Hayward, fired a warning over shareholder payouts and said he wants to know “whose ass to kick” over the catastrophe.
 
British newspapers in turn have demanded that Cameron — who has defended the need for a “financially strong BP” — stand up to Obama amid fears that his rhetoric was stoking an anti-British backlash.
 
“The prime minister stressed the economic importance of BP to the UK, US and other countries,” the Downing Street spokeswoman said. “The president made clear that he had no interest in undermining BP’s value.”
 
The White House said the pair, who spoke by phone, “discussed the impact of tragic oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, reiterating that BP must do all it can to respond effectively to the situation.”
 
Separately, the US Coast Guard ordered BP to improve its plans to contain the spill within 48 hours given new US government data this week that suggested the flow was as much as double previous estimates.
 
“Because those estimates have now been revised and estimate a substantially higher flow of oil from the Macado 252 well, it is clear that additional capacity is urgently needed,” it said in a letter dated June 11 and released Saturday.
 
US government data on Thursday suggested the flow of the leak — before a containment system was put in place last week — was between 25,000 and 30,000 barrels a day and could be upwards of 40,000 barrels a day.
 
But the containment system BP is using is only capturing around 28,000 barrels a day, and the company’s operation to boost that rate to between 40,000 to 50,000 barrels is not currently scheduled to be ready until July.
 
There will be no permanent solution until the first of two relief wells is completed, in August at the earliest, allowing the leak to be plugged with cement.
 
“I am concerned that your current plans do not provide for maximum mobilization of resources to provide the needed collection capacity consistent with revised flow estimates,” US Coast Guard Rear Admiral James Watson told BP in the letter.
 
“I am also concerned that your plan does not go far enough to mobilize redundant resources in the event of an equipment failure with one of the vessels or some other unforeseen problem,” he added.
 
“BP must identify in the next 48 hours additional leak containment capacity that could be operationalized and expedited to avoid the continued discharge of oil.”
 
BP meanwhile has indicated it may finally bow to US pressure and suspend its dividend payment due July 27.
 
Suspending the dividend is “an option that’s up for discussion,” a BP spokesman told AFP.
 
“No decision has been made on it, we are looking at options,” said the spokesman. “There’s a board meeting on Monday but they are not necessarily going to take a decision on it then.”
 
Britain’s Times newspaper said BP was preparing to place the second-quarter dividend money — an expected 1.7 billion dollars — in an escrow account in an attempt to ease political pressure on the firm.
 
Top US lawmaker Nancy Pelosi has urged BP not to pay dividends and echoed pleas from Obama not to shortchange those hit by the disaster.
 
The final price tag for BP is still unknown because it is unclear how much oil is flowing from the well, how long the spill will last, and how far the oil will travel.
 
Analysts estimate that BP’s total liability for the environmental catastrophe, including the cleanup, compensation claims, government penalties, and a host of civil lawsuits, could reach 30 to 100 billion dollars.
 
The firm’s share price has fallen more than 40 percent since the Deepwater Horizon rig it leased exploded on April 20, prompting speculation about bankruptcy and a takeover bid.
 
 ©Copyright 2001-2010 INQUIRER.net, An Inquirer Company

Special thanks to Richard Charter and Vivian  Newman

http://pdf.keysnews.com/frontpage.pdf

Spinning water had kept oil west of Florida Keys

by Tim O’Hara

http://www.cwn-se.org/

Dear friends of Florida waters:

It’s Friday afternoon and I hope that all of you will get to take at least some of the weekend off to enjoy Florida’s waters.  Here in the panhandle, we have had a fairly good week.  The oil came into Perdido Pass a few days ago, from Alabama waters into Florida waters, which was completely unnecessary, but hopefully it is getting cleaned up and I hear that our local governments (Escambia and Santa Rosa Counties) have given the state notice that they are no longer waiting for the state to protect their shorelines. This is very wise of them, as the state is basically doing nothing substantial to protect Florida’s offshore or inland waters.  That part is very discouraging.

I have attached an op-ed that I wrote this morning after watching Gov. Crist on MSNBC’s Morning Joe program.  As you will see if you read it, my heart is on my sleeve, but where else should I keep it right now.  It will not be silent.  I’ve sent the op-ed out to the papers and posted it on our three Facebook pages as well as our Clean Water Network of FL website. Also, several organizations have asked me to write for their blogs, so it will go to them as well.  Feel free to share it with your members and/or friends if you think it is worthy of further distribution.

On Monday I’ll meet with the local County Commission chairman to discuss our tool kit and greater collaboration.  We are told that the large patches of oil are slowly drifting toward us, but so far we are mostly having the oil patties that I reported a few days ago.  The BP contractors are keeping the beach in front of my house spotlessly clean, but I am told that their efforts are less consistent in other places.

Please go to the www.cleanwaternetwork-fl.org website and see the two new action alerts to Gov. Crist and DEP Secretary Mike Sole.  If you have a minute to send them off, it would be very helpful.  Alternatively you can send you own message.  The important thing is that they need to hear from everyone.  The Atty Gen McCullum announced that he is asking BP for $2.5 billion for Florida.  This is a step in the right direction and we are glad to see it, even though it is extremely late.  A non-government member of a new committee on the oil spill, suggested this and amazingly, the AG took some action.

We are learning a lot more about the WRSCompass Corp. which DEP awarded a no-bid contract to.  We will post this info on our websites, so keep an eye out for it soon. 

Please enjoy your weekend and join me in feeling fortunate that the oil has not moved any closer to our state than it has.  The death toll on the marine life however is mounting and I know that you share my heartache over that.  We will get through this and hopefully some better public policy will result sooner rather than later.

For all of Florida’s waters,

Linda Young
Director

Op-Ed:

WE ARE NOW PAYING THE TRUE COST OF COMPROMISE

As director of a statewide environmental organization that works to keep our beaches clean and safe and the founder of Gulf Coast Environmental Defense, a panhandle group opposed to opening the eastern Gulf of Mexico to new drilling, I have spent the past 23 years working to avoid the nightmare that is now unfolding all around me.

Watching Morning Joe on MSNBC this morning, I listened to Governor Crist say that our beaches and shorelines are the best booms that we have to catch the sticky, toxic oil that is slowly creeping into Florida.  The same statement was attributed to his Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) Secretary Mike Sole in a Gannett newspaper last weekend.  I admit that even after 23 years of dealing with bureaucrats who care little about our waters, I was horrified to hear our governor say these words. 

Since 1993, Florida has been in a steady downward slide in search of the bottom rung on the ladder of environmental protection.  We may have finally arrived with our pathetic response to the life-sucking disaster that encroaches deeper by the moment into our state waters.  Years of environmental compromise for the sake of political expediency have incrementally desensitized our sunshine and blue-water culture.  The media, local governments and many business owners have quietly watched, sometimes given a nod and even when necessary cheered in unison with the polluters as they have systematically dismantled our environmental safeguards.  Today, we are witnessing an environmentally dysfunctional and detached state bureaucracy that can do little more than make excuses to the public out of one side of their mouths, while they quickly secure cushy contracts for their polluter-connected political buddies.  Meanwhile, dead turtles, dolphins, pelicans and fish take their last oily breaths and slowly drift through the endless sea of despair.

No, this is not a cheery synopsis.  I’m not here to beg anyone to come to the beach where I live and grew up, in order to help the local economy.  I’m here to say the same thing I said last month in May, standing before the Florida DEP and the Environmental Regulation Commission (ERC) in Tallahassee. We must stop using the Gulf of Mexico as a political bargaining chit.

DEP was there to seek final permission from the ERC to weaken water quality standards, in order to accommodate a deliberate 50 million gallon-per-day toxic discharge into the Gulf of Mexico.  The new estimates of the amount of oil coming from BP’s blow-out disaster come to 20,000 to 40,000 barrels per day, which could mean just under 2 million gallons per day.  Multiply that worse case scenario by 25 and that is what DEP thinks we should accept into the Big Bend Aquatic Seagrass Preserve, an important fishery, from the Buckeye pulp mill.  While crude oil pours from BP’s destroyed rig, Buckeye wants permission to dump industrial waste that is also chronically toxic and loaded with sludge, oils and grease, dioxin, and a whole host of life-destroying pollutants.

How did we arrive on the shores of America’s playground, where our Governor characterizes our beaches as the perfect oil-booms and our environmental regulators legitimize mass destruction of important near-shore fisheries?  If this is the death of common sense and decency, then it came by way of a thousand cuts.  We the people, the voters, the taxpayers of Florida elect these self-serving politicians who allow their polluter friends to externalize the cost of containing their waste.  It is passed on to us, and some days we barely notice the debt that is accruing in our names.  But one morning we wake up and the piper is at the door, demanding payment for our acquiescence. 

Governor Crist, Attorney General McCollum, DEP Secretary Mike Sole and others that should be trustworthy have handed over important responsibilities for protecting Florida’s shores to a handful of BP and oil industry cronies.  Jim Smith, a former BP lobbyist, is leading our legal team.  Our counties are being directed to adopt oil-protection plans developed by WRSCompass, a company whose CEO is the former chief-of-staff to Dick Cheney (formerly with Halliburton).  WRSCompass, according to the Destin Log newspaper, is helping BP get charter boats under contract and has worked for BP in previous years.  WRSCompass even earned BP’s Diamond Safety Award.  I can only wonder how it is possible to win a safety award from BP.

The citizens of Florida should not accept another day of political expediency, externalized costs or fluffy protection from our state officials.  We are not helpless turtles that are forced to gulp oil into our lungs and sink to the bottom.  Our leaders may be focused on the bottom rung of environmental protection, but we do not have to go there with them.  Now is the time to say no.  The cost of complacency is too high and we will no longer pay your piper!

Linda Young is the Director of the Clean Water Network of Florida, a coalition of more than 300 groups that are committed to full implementation, enforcement and strengthening of the Clean Water Act and other safeguards of our water resources.

 (06/10/2010)

 Some journalists trying to assess the effects of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill on wildlife and the environment have been turned away from public areas by BP PLC, cleanup contractors, local law enforcement officials and the Coast Guard, prompting concerns that officials are trying to filter the images that are ultimately seen by the public.

“I think they’ve been trying to limit access,” Rep. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) said. “It is a company that was not used to transparency. It was not used to having public scrutiny of what it did.”

The Coast Guard and Federal Aviation Administration denied an ordinary permit to Belle Chasse, La.-based Southern Seaplane Inc. after the company said a staffer from The Times-Picayune of New Orleans would be shooting photographs from the plane. Reporters from the New York Daily News were told by a local sheriff in Grand Isle, La., that they needed to fill out paperwork and be accompanied by a BP employee if they wanted to visit an oil-soaked beach.

An FAA spokeswoman said flight restrictions are necessary to prevent civilian aircraft from interfering with those being used in the oil spill response. The agency has revised its policy to allow news media flights after case-by-case review.

“Our general approach throughout this response, which is controlled by the Unified Command and is the largest ever to an oil spill,” BP spokesman David Nicholas said, “has been to allow as much access as possible to media and other parties without compromising the work we are engaged on or the safety of those to whom we give access.”

Michael Oreskes, senior managing editor at the Associated Press, compared the situation to that of embedded journalists in Afghanistan.

“There is a continued effort to keep control over the access,” Oreskes said. “And even in places where the government is cooperating with us to provide access, it’s still a problem because it’s still access obtained through the government” (Jeremy Peters, New York Times, June 9). –

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.naplesnews.com/news/2010/jun/10/hands-across-sand-protect-florida-coast-oil-spill/

The National Hands Across the Sand movement, which says “no” to oil and “yes” to renewable energy, will form a line on the beach by holding hands beginning at noon on Saturday, June 26. Candy Strafford welcomes all ages to join her as early as 11 a.m. near the Vanderbilt Beach Access located at the end Vanderbilt Beach Road, just west of the Ritz- Carlton Beach Resort. Get more information at (facebook.com/handsacrossthesand)
Event Details
        *       What: Hands Across the Sand
     *       When: Saturday, June 26, 2010, 11 a.m. to 12:15 p.m.
    *       Where: Naples Beach
     *       Cost: Not available
     *       Age limit: All ages
Full event details »
IF YOU GO
Vanderbilt Beach Parking Garage
Parking sticker required, or $8 parking fee; meters also available
100 Vanderbilt Beach Road, North Naples
Questions: 252-4000

For other locations, see Hands Across the Sand website: www.handsacrossthesand.com

Candy Strafford wants people to lend a hand to her – all in the name of protecting local beaches from off-shore oil drilling.

The Golden Gate Estates resident is a mother, and a grandmother, first and foremost. But she is now a pioneer in illustrating what peaceful environmental preservation is all about. Just using her one hand to reach out to others, as part of the National Hands Across the Sand movement, which says “no” to oil and “yes” to renewable energy.
Strafford, together with other Collier County residents, will form a line on the beach by holding hands beginning at noon on Saturday, June 26. Strafford welcomes all ages to join her as early as 11 a.m. near the Vanderbilt Beach Access located at the end Vanderbilt Beach Road, just west of the Ritz- Carlton Beach Resort.
Strafford is one of many community leaders spearheading an effort to reach out to thousands of local residents. She is asking all Floridians to take her up on the cause as part of the Hands Across the Sand movement, which originally started In Florida on Feb. 13 with a hand-holding chain of 10,000 people on nearly 100 beaches along the coastline.

“The message is simple. The images are powerful. We are drawing a line in the sand against offshore oil drilling along America’s beaches and in solidarity events across this great land,” the movement’s founder, Dave Rauschkolb, said.

Strafford agrees with Rauschkolb, and wants everyone to come together for the protection of pristine beaches in Naples, and beaches all over Florida.

“Because it is a national event, I was thinking it would be great to do it with my daughter and granddaughter,” said Strafford, as she strolls Vanderbilt Beach on a sunny morning with her 2-year-old granddaughter, Amaya, and her family, who is visiting Naples from England.

Those who cannot participate can take up their own “inland” cause by visiting handsacrossthesand.com, where they can check out the Hands Across the Sand interactive map to locate a beach nearby to link up.

“It’s so important for our future, and I became involved in the Hands Across the Beach’s movement just a short time ago,” said Strafford, who believes in promoting clean “green” renewable energy, and invites Naples, Marco Island and Bonita Springs residents to unite with her cause.

“This isn’t a protest, but it’s a gathering,” Strafford said, emphasizing the Hands Across the Sand movement as a community assembly, one without any political separations or age limits.
___________
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/virginiapolitics/2010/06/president_obama_may_have_put.html
Washington Post
June 10, 2010
Environmentalists plan offshore oil drilling protest on Virginia beaches

President Obama may have put an end to Virginia’s immediate offshore drilling plans, but that hasn’t stopped environmentalists from protesting any future possibility.

On June 26, activists will join hands on Virginia’s beaches to show their opposition to drilling on what is being dubbed as a National Day of Action. The event follows a similar one in Florida where 10,000 people locked hands on more than 80 beaches.
(Purell, anyone?)

“A spill or accident off the coast of Virginia, even at a fraction of the size of the Gulf Coast spill, would devastate our economy and our environment,” said Ari Lawrence, chair of the Virginia Beach Chapter of the Surfrider Foundation, one of the groups organizing the event. “The only option is to put an immediate stop to drilling off our coasts and seek sustainable energy solutions that do not pose such a significant threat to our future or the livelihoods of the American people.”

Earlier today, Virginia’s senators, Jim Webb and Mark Warner, urged federal authorities to coordinate with emergency preparedness officials with coastal states in the event that the oil spill reaches the Atlantic Coast. Several experts have indicated that it is possible that the oil could reach the Gulf Stream and be carried up the Atlantic coast to Virginia, they said.

Webb and Warner were joined on the letter by 20 other senators, including Barbara Mikulski and Benjamin Cardin of Maryland.

By Anita Kumar  |  June 10, 2010; 2:34 PM ET

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://ocean.si.edu/blog/invisible-loss-impacts-oil-you-do-not-see/

This is exactly what has been bothering me the most about the fact that MOST of the oil never makes it to the surface; we are destroying the very web of life in the Gulf of Mexico.  DV

Wed, 06/09/2010 – 9:23am — Chris Mah

Since late April, the world has watched a devastating oil spill from a BP drilling rig spread throughout the Gulf of Mexico and become one of the worst environmental disasters in the history of the United States.

CREDIT:   Dr. Allison J. Gong, UC Santa Cruz

We have all seen some of the impacts on large animals: birds, turtles, dolphins, and fishes have all been shown covered in oil with clogged gills, feathers and fins. Undoubtedly, the imagery of these familiar and normally photogenic animals is a powerful, heartbreaking reminder of the damage being done in the Gulf.

But, the effect of the oil on those organisms we do not see may be even more important.

I refer to the invertebrates—animals such as shrimp, crabs, sea stars, sea urchins, clams, snails, and worms, which lack backbones (or vertebrae). These species may not make the headlines as often as larger animals, but they are critically important to the ecosystem in the Gulf. In 1993, Dr. Thomas Suchanek, a researcher at the University or California, Davis published a scientific paper summarizing the effects of oil on invertebrate communities. The paper notes that very low concentrations of oil can produce dramatic changes in invertebrate populations.

Why is this important? Invertebrates comprise the majority of animals in the marine ecosystem. They include jellyfish that live throughout the water column (and are food for turtles and fish); sea stars, which live on the sea bottom; and more importantly the many clams, crabs, shrimps and other commercially important species that are fished in the Gulf. Oil, not to mention the more toxic dispersants being used in the clean-up, can have a wide range of harmful effects, including changes to reproduction, growth, feeding, movement, behavior, and breathing. Destruction of these animals will substantially change the food webs and interrelationships among the organisms that live in the Gulf.

We immediately think about the damage affecting adult animals, but in fact, the more severe damage may be done to those animals we can’t even see—the larvae (baby forms) that live among the plankton.

Seawater is full of plankton—tiny organisms that drift on the currents. Many of these organisms are larvae, or immature animals, mostly invertebrates that grow up to become those jellyfish, crabs, and clams. In many ways, the tiny forms of these animals are the most vulnerable, which is why there are so many of them. In nature, no predator would be able to devour them all, so eventually a significant fraction of those animals grow up into adults. But what happens when you poison the environment where they live? Massive swaths of ocean containing these organisms will likely be obliterated. Some reports are already talking about “dead zones” that could affect species in the Gulf for years to come.

The ecological effects will be even more long lasting. As with the adults, these larvae are part of complex food webs and can play important direct and indirect roles in ecosystems.

The domino effect of wiping out those adults will be devastating not only to the ecology but to the economy. For example, what happens to the shrimp fishery when not only all the adults are poisoned, but the larval forms are wiped out or significantly weakened? The same question applies to almost any edible marine animal in the Gulf of Mexico.

The scope of the damage is sad even if we only see images of poisoned pelicans and other large vertebrates, but what we do not see that may be the most widespread and devastating legacies of the Gulf oil spill.

Editor’s Note: Our guest blogger, Dr. Chris Mah, is an expert in the evolution and biology of sea stars. He works in the Department of Invertebrate Zoology at Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History and regularly shares his studies and adventures on the Echinoblog.

Special thanks to Erika Biddle

(06/11/2010)

Anne C. Mulkern, E&E reporter

An environmental group wanting reforms to offshore drilling and the petroleum industry’s biggest trade group launched dueling ads yesterday tied to the Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

Pew Environment Group is running an ad that shows an oil-soaked pelican with the message “Help stop this from happening again. Change the law.”

The ad — which appeared in Politico, Roll Call and CongressDaily — says, “The oil spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico could easily happen again unless we change the laws that allowed it to occur in the first place.”

The American Petroleum Institute’s ad will blanket the country for two weeks in papers that include The Washington Post, The New York Times, USA Today, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Gulf Coast newspapers and Beltway publications. There is a radio ad as well.

“The people of America’s oil and natural gas industry are working to help BP and the authorities respond to the spill,” the API print ad says. “Clearly, there will be lessons to be learned, and we are fully committed to doing everything humanly possible to understand what happened and prevent it from ever happening again.”

It also describes oil and natural gas as “vital domestic resources that power our way of life.”

Both ads come as the Obama administration and some in Congress consider policy changes because of the oil spill.

“We’re seeing the president grandstand on the spill. We’re seeing politicians push for [climate measures] because of the spill,” said Ken Green, resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, a think tank that favors free market policies. “It’s become now more of a thing to lever in legislation.”

The campaigns also arrive as polls show declining support for increased offshore drilling. About one-quarter of Americans now back added offshore drilling, while 31 percent want fewer offshore wells and 41 percent want the number of wells to remain at current levels, according to a poll conducted June 3-6 by The Washington Post and ABC News.

Overall support for drilling fell from 64 percent last August to 52 percent now, with 49 percent of respondents describing the Gulf spill as a symbol of broader problems. A quarter of Americans now support increased offshore drilling, while 31 percent want fewer offshore wells and 41 percent want the number of wells to remain at current levels, according to the poll.

Because of the magnitude of the spill, the timing is right for Congress to make regulatory changes, said Chris Mann, senior officer at the Pew Environment Group.

“A lot of people we’re talking to on the Hill feel that Congress has to act on this, including committee and chamber leadership,” Mann said. “It’s a major challenge to the Obama administration. Politically it seems to have become a huge liability. They need to demonstrate that they are hitting this head-on.”

API supports and is assisting the ongoing investigations into the causes of the spill, said Linda Rozett, API’s vice president of communications. But any reforms now could have negative unintended consequences, she said.

“To decide what to change in order to prevent something from happening before we know what caused it” could lead to the wrong solutions being enacted, Rozett said.

Seeking changes

Pew’s ad kicks off a new campaign calling for changes to the law governing offshore oil and natural gas exploration, as well as the rules covering oil spills that were enacted after the 1989 Exxon Valdez incident.

“In the early weeks of the spill, the concern was about the loss of life, the environmental impact,” Mann said. “More and more people are turning to what can we do to address not just the symptoms of this but the root causes.”

While human error and technological failures were probably factors, “the ultimate cause of the spill, ultimately we believe is a failure of governance.”
The Pew print spot asks Congress to take four measures in response to the spill. The first is a more thorough review of environmental impacts “at every stage of offshore oil and gas leasing and development.”

Environmental analyses done before as part of leasing for offshore drilling are insufficient, Mann said. The pre-lease reviews of the well involved in the current spill “didn’t seriously consider the possibility of a blowout,” or “how to deal with a blowout.”

Congress is likely to approve additional environmental reviews, Green said.

Pew wants a separation of government offices that collect revenues from offshore drilling from those that enforce safety regulations. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar in May split the Minerals Management Agency into three divisions: energy development, enforcement and revenue collecting (E&ENews PM, May 19).

Mann said that if Salazar’s revision is the correct overhaul, it should be made law so a future administration does not reverse it.

Pew wants an end to the current $75 million liability cap for economic damages connected to an oil spill. Two Democratic senators are pushing legislation that would eliminate that limit (E&E Daily, June 9). Companies should pay all of the costs associated with spills, Mann said.

Congress probably will lift that $75 million limit, Green said, although it might consider language to protect the smallest companies.

Pew also is looking for a national ocean policy that would coordinate with regional plans in helping guide places for offshore drilling. It wants to “identify which areas are appropriate for energy development and which are too ecologically sensitive.”

Identifying which areas are too ecologically sensitive for drilling could be difficult, Green said.

API response

API’s ad strives to highlight the rarity of a spill like the one in the Gulf.

“Nothing like the Deepwater Horizon spill has ever occurred in more than 60 years of oil and natural gas exploration in U.S. waters of the Gulf of Mexico,” the ad says. “We have already assembled the world’s leading experts to conduct a top-to-bottom review of offshore drilling procedures, from routine operations to emergency response.”

The API ad “is just part of the conversation,” about the spill and what to do next, Rozett said.

“It’s important for the industry to stay involved in the conversation as it moves forward,” about the spill, she added.

Any regulatory changes passed because of the BP spill could affect all oil and natural gas companies, AEI’s Green said.

“They’re just trying to in some way salvage some of their reputation,” Green said of the API ad. “They don’t want to be tarred with BP’s brush.”

The oil industry likely will succeed in “fending off what they consider particularly onerous,” changes, Green said, especially because offshore drilling plays a major role in the economies of Gulf states.

Go to link to see the API ad.

Go to link to see the Pew ad.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

“Three energy industry trade associations – the National Ocean Industries Association, the Independent Petroleum Association of America and the American Petroleum Institute – announced Thursday they were forming task forces to review the spill response and make recommendations on how to improve future cleanup and containment efforts.”
http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/business/deepwaterhorizon/7047151.html

Anger rises along with spill size estimate

By JENNIFER LATSON and JENNIFER A. DLOUHY
HOUSTON CHRONICLE
June 10, 2010, 11:24PM
Oil is flowing from a blown-out well in the Gulf of Mexico almost twice as fast – at minimum – as estimated previously, although some of it is now being captured, federal officials said Thursday.

Their estimates now range from 20,000 to 40,000 barrels per day, said U.S. Geological Survey Director Marcia McNutt – well above the most recent estimate of 12,000 to 19,000 barrels per day, and vastly higher than BP’s original reckoning of 1,000 to 5,000 barrels in the days after the April 20 blowout.

The high end of the estimate, 40,000 barrels, would represent almost 1.7 million gallons a day.
The new numbers estimate the rate before underwater robots cut a bent riser pipe that once connected the Macondo well, a mile below the Gulf’s surface, with the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig that exploded after the blowout, killing 11 workers.

Cutting the riser pipe on June 3 temporarily increased the total flow, but BP now is catching more than 15,000 barrels a day through a new pipe that was attached to the severed riser the next day.
BP is preparing in the next few days to siphon more oil from the spewing wellhead.

And as it tries to slow down the amount of oil surging into the Gulf, the company agreed to speed up payments to businesses and residents affected by the spill, responding to public outcry and government pressure.

BP also promised to take into account that many of the industries most affected by the spill – including fishing and tourism – make the bulk of their income in the summer months.

“We wanted to make sure they are calculating the damages to those individuals based on the earnings they would get in that short period of time, not dividing an annual salary by 12,” said Tracy Wareing, with the National Incident Command coordinating spill response.

Mounting frustration

BP officials also will meet with President Barack Obama next week to discuss the company’s financial responsibility. So far, it has paid more than $57 million to fishermen, deckhands and other workers who have lost wages and business because of the spill.

BP and the Obama administration faced mounting frustration and anger Thursday as lawmakers and Gulf Coast officials complained that efforts to clean up the crude are being stalled by a Byzantine response operation

“We’re at war here,” said Billy Nungesser, the Republican president of Plaquemines Parish, La. “I have spent more time fighting the officials of BP and the Coast Guard than fighting the oil.”
David Camardelle, the Democratic mayor of Grand Isle, La., said his hands are tied while he waits for BP and the Coast Guard to sign off on cleanup plans. “Please send us some help,” Camardelle pleaded, his voice breaking, as he testified in an emotional Senate homeland security subcommittee hearing.

The pair described sluggish decision-making, with it taking more than five days to navigate cleanup requests around layers of approval and other hurdles and get them to the top Coast Guard officials coordinating the response.

Disputes over control

Lawmakers on Thursday drew fresh comparisons to the government’s widely criticized response when Hurricane Katrina hit the New Orleans area in 2005.

“The people that are on the ground, either up to their chin in water or up to their knees in oil, in this case, don’t seem to have the resources or authority to get the job done,” said a teary Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La.

Juliette Kayyem, an assistant Homeland Security secretary, said the Coast Guard is working to make sure local officials have control over some issues in their backyards, such as decisions involving boom being deployed to trap floating oil.

Forty miles off the Louisiana coast, meanwhile, BP engineers continued to draw oil through the pipe installed last week, and worked on systems they expect will capture more of the oil.

BP engineers have been working on another pumping system that would be able to draw as much as an additional 10,000 barrels per day from the well.

That hardware is the same used unsuccessfully to pump drilling mud into the well in an earlier effort to plug it, now reversed to work as a vacuum. At the surface, it will separate crude and natural gas from the well and burn both since it cannot store them.

No room to add tanker

“To capture it, we’d have to bring in another tanker, and having all that in this small space would make it too congested,” BP Senior Vice President Kent Wells said Thursday.

BP engineers are also working on a system that could lift oil to tankers in rough seas, and could be disconnected temporarily if a hurricane threatened.

The new flow estimates announced Thursday were the work of three teams of scientists employed by the federal government, universities and independent research institutions.

The estimates varied widely, from as low as 12,600 barrels per day to as high as 50,000 barrels. But McNutt said the scientists generally agreed that the mid-range figures, from 20,000 to 40,000 barrels per day, were the most likely.

Reviewing the response

The problem that has plagued scientists and engineers from the start is that the Macondo well sits a mile beneath the surface, where only robots can work, and that they’ve never dealt with a blowout that deep.

Three energy industry trade associations – the National Ocean Industries Association, the Independent Petroleum Association of America and the American Petroleum Institute – announced Thursday they were forming task forces to review the spill response and make recommendations on how to improve future cleanup and containment efforts.

Latson reported from Houston and Dlouhy from Washington.
jennifer.latson@chron.com
jennifer.dlouhy@chron.com

special thanks to Richard Charter

Friends, neighbors, and fellow Conch Republicrats,
This morning on Facebook, I saw the short film my friends have been talking about.
 
Hundreds of us in Key West came together on Ocean Day 2010 to celebrate our love for our oceans,  and in my opinion this film captures one of those moments where people will say years from now,   “I was there.”
 
I was there. And so many others were there! See for yourself, you’ll be glad you did.*
 
Sea-to-STILL-Shining Sea: Key West Ocean Day 2010
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jO8yaBIKhI4

 
Mike Mongo
PS Feel free to share the link to this. I think it shows the world how great Key West really is.
*Special thanks to filmographer Haig Vargabedian and Digital Island Media for being there, too.

http://thephoenixsun.com/archives/10124

That’s so outrageous, especially since BP deliberately misrepresented it as a MUCH lower volume…. DV

http://www.theonion.com/articles/massive-flow-of-bullshit-continues-to-gush-from-bp,17564/

June 5th, 2010

LONDON—As the crisis in the Gulf of Mexico entered its eighth week Wednesday, fears continued to grow that the massive flow of bullshit still gushing from the headquarters of oil giant BP could prove catastrophic if nothing is done to contain it.

The toxic bullshit, which began to spew from the mouths of BP executives shortly after the explosion of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig in April, has completely devastated the Gulf region, delaying cleanup efforts, affecting thousands of jobs, and endangering the lives of all nearby wildlife.

“Everything we can see at the moment suggests that the overall environmental impact of this will be very, very modest,” said BP CEO Tony Hayward, letting loose a colossal stream of undiluted bullshit. “The Gulf of Mexico is a very big ocean, and the volume of oil we are putting into it is tiny in relation to the total volume of water.”

Hayward’s comments fueled fears that the spouting of overwhelmingly thick and slimy bullshit may never subside.

According to sources, the sheer quantity of bullshit pouring out of Hayward is unprecedented, and it has thoroughly drenched the coastlines of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Florida, with no end in sight.

Though no one knows exactly how much of the dangerous bullshit is currently gushing from BP headquarters, estimates put the number at somewhere between 25,000 and 70,000 words a day.

“We’re looking at a truly staggering load of shit here,” said Rebecca Palmer, an environmental scientist at the University of Georgia, who claimed that only BP has the ability to stem the flow of bullshit and plug it at its source. “And this is just the beginning—we’re only seeing the surface-level bullshit. It could be years before we sift through it all and figure out just how deep this bullshit goes.”

Congressional hearings aimed at stopping the bullshit have thus far failed to do so, with officials from BP and its contractors Halliburton and Transocean only adding to the powerful torrents of bullshit by blaming one another for the accident.

Along with the region’s wildlife and fragile ecosystem, countless livelihoods have been jeopardized by BP’s unchecked flow of corporate shit. Those who depend on fishing or tourism for their income are already feeling the noxious effects of the bullshit firsthand, as out-of-control platitudes begin to reach land and seep ashore.

Dense streams of shit are expected to continue spreading throughout the region and the entire United States.

“This bullshit, it’s everywhere,” said Louisiana fisherman Doug LaRoux, who lost his house to a tide of government bullshit following Hurricane Katrina. “It reeks. Big buckets of disgusting shit are oozing everywhere you look and I don’t know if it’s ever going to stop. I feel helpless”

Added LaRoux, “I never thought I’d be the victim of so much bullshit.”

Observers have noted that after the Exxon Valdez spill in 1989, corporate bullshit gushed up like a geyser for two decades and didn’t wane until the oil company had bullshit its way through an exhaustive process of court appeals that ultimately reduced payouts to victims by 90 percent.

Despite Hayward’s denials that BP is at fault for the environmental disaster and his concern that it will result in “illegitimate” American lawsuits, the embattled CEO has still managed to trickle out a few last drips of bullshit sympathy for Gulf Coast residents.

“I’m as devastated as you are by this,” Hayward said after a meeting with cleanup crews on Louisiana’s Fourchon Beach. “We will clean every last drop up and we will remediate all of the environmental damage.”

“There’s no one that wants this thing over with more than I do,” he added a week later, just absolutely defying belief with the thickest, most dangerous bullshit yet. “I’d like my life back.”

Millions of Americans reported feeling ill and disoriented upon contact with that particularly vile plume of bullshit.

Many environmentalists, including Palmer, have called for a boycott of BP until the bullshit stops or is at least under control, but they emphasize that in the long term, Americans will have to change their habits if they wish to avoid future catastrophes.

“We must all work together if we’re going to cure our nation of this addiction,” Palmer said. “The sad fact is, the United States has been running on bullshit for decades.”

Special thanks to Erika Biddle

http://www.propublica.org/feature/years-of-internal-bp-probes-warned-that-neglect-could-lead-to-accidents

A series of internal investigations over the past decade warned senior BP managers that the company repeatedly disregarded safety and environmental rules and risked a serious accident if it did not change its ways.

The confidential inquiries, which have not previously been made public, focused on a rash of problems at BP’s Alaska oil-drilling unit that undermined the company’s publicly proclaimed commitment to safe operations. They described instances in which management flouted safety by neglecting aging equipment, pressured or harassed employees not to report problems, and cut short or delayed inspections in order to reduce production costs. Executives were not held accountable for the failures, and some were promoted despite them.

Similar themes about BP operations elsewhere were sounded in interviews with former employees, in lawsuits and little-noticed state inquiries, and in e-mails obtained by ProPublica. Taken together, these documents portray a company that systemically ignored its own safety policies across its North American operations – from Alaska to the Gulf of Mexico to California and Texas.

Tony Hayward, BP’s CEO, has committed himself to reform since taking the top job in 2007. Top BP officials would not comment for this story, but spokesman Tony Odone said that in March an independent expert reported that BP has made “significant progress” toward meeting goals set in 2007 in response to a deadly Texas refinery explosion. Odone said the notion that BP has ongoing problems addressing worker concerns is “essentially groundless.”

Because of its string of accidents before the recent blowout in the Gulf, BP already faced a possible ban on its federal contracting and on new U.S. drilling leases [3] [3], several senior former Environmental Protection Agency debarment officials told ProPublica. That inquiry has taken on new significance in light of the Gulf accident. One key question the EPA will consider is whether the company’s leadership can be trusted and whether BP’s culture can change.

The reports detailing BP’s Alaska investigations — conducted by outside lawyers and an internal BP committee in 2001, 2004 and 2007 — were provided to ProPublica by a person close to BP who believes the company has not yet done enough to eradicate its shortcomings.

A 2001 report [4] [4] noted that BP had neglected key equipment needed for emergency shutdown, including safety shutoff valves and gas and fire detectors similar to those that could have helped prevent the fire and explosion on the Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf.

A 2004 inquiry found a pattern of intimidating workers who raised safety or environmental concerns. It said managers were shaving maintenance costs with the practice of “run to failure,” under which aging equipment was used as long as possible. Accidents resulted, including the 200,000-gallon Prudhoe Bay pipeline spill in 2006, the largest ever spill on Alaska’s North Slope.

During the same period, similar problems surfaced at BP facilities in California and Texas.

In 2002, California officials discovered that BP had falsified inspections of fuel tanks at a Los Angeles-area refinery and that more than 80 percent of the facilities didn’t meet requirements to maintain storage tanks without leaks or damage. Inspectors were forced to get a warrant before BP allowed them to check the tanks. The company eventually settled a civil lawsuit brought by the South Coast Air Quality Management District for more than $100 million.

In 2005, an emergency warning system failed before a Texas City refinery exploded in a ball of fire. BP’s investigation of that deadly accident [5] [5] — conducted by a committee of independent experts — found that “significant process safety issues exist at all five U.S. refineries, not just Texas City.” It said “instances of a lack of operating discipline, toleration of serious deviations from safe operating practices, and apparent complacency toward serious process safety risk existed at each refinery.” BP spokesman Odone said that after the accident the company adopted a six-point plan to update its safety systems worldwide. But last year the Occupational Safety and Health Administration fined BP $87 million for failing to make safety upgrades at that same Texas plant.

It is difficult to compare safety records among companies in industries like oil exploration. Some companies drill in harsher environments. And bad luck can play a role. But independent experts say the pervasiveness of BP’s problems, in multiple locales and different types of facilities, is striking.

“They are a recurring environmental criminal and they do not follow U.S. health safety and environmental policy,” said Jeanne Pascal, a former EPA debarment attorney who led the investigations into BP. “At what point are we going to say we are not going to do business with you any more, bye? None of the other supermajors have an environmental criminal record like they do.”

***

Response efforts get underway as more than 200,000 gallons of oil spill out of a corroded hole in the Prudhoe Bay pipeline into the snow in March 2006. (BPXA)

Since the late 1960s, BP has pulled oil from underneath Alaska, usually without problems. But when the company pleaded guilty to a felony conviction in 1999 for illegal dumping at an offshore drilling field there it drew fresh scrutiny to its operations and set off a cascading cycle of attempted — and seemingly failed — reforms that continued over the next decade.

To avoid having its Alaska division debarred — the official term for a cancellation of contracts with the federal government — BP agreed to a five-year probationary plan with the EPA. The company would reorganize its environmental management, establish protections for employees who speak out about safety issues, and reform its approach to risk and regulatory compliance. The company pledged to improve its conduct and reform its safety and maintenance programs.

Less than a year later, employees complained to an independent arbitrator that BP was letting equipment and critical safety systems languish at its Greater Prudhoe Bay drilling field. BP, in the spirit of reform, hired a panel of independent experts to examine the allegations.

The panel identified systemic problems in maintenance and inspection programs — the operations that keep the drilling in Prudhoe Bay running safely — and warned BP that it faced a “fundamental culture of mistrust” by its workers, in part because senior management lacked a structure of accountability.

“There is a disconnect between GPB (Great Prudhoe Bay) management’s stated commitment to safety and the perception of that commitment,” the experts said in their 2001 operational integrity report [4] [4]. “Correcting these underlying causes is essential … for ensuring long term operational efficiency and mechanical integrity. Without a concerted effort to address these basic issues, any other action will provide only temporary relief.”

According to the report, “unacceptable” maintenance backlogs ballooned as BP tried to sustain profits in the aging North Slope even though production was declining. The consultants concluded that BP had neglected to clean and check pressure valves, emergency shutoff valves, automatic emergency shutdown mechanisms and gas and fire safety detection devices essential to preventing a major explosion. It warned management of the need to update those systems, which “have a potential immediate safety impact or that pose an environmental threat.”

It also warned that emergency shutdown systems would need to be operated manually, that there may not be enough staff to do so, and said that even if closed, the isolation valves were known to leak.

“Workers believe internal leak-through of isolation valves is a significant problem and under certain circumstances may pose a potential hazard to workers and equipment,” the report stated.

In May 2002 — less than seven months later — Alaska state regulators underscored the panel’s critical findings in a tersely worded order warning BP that it had failed to maintain its pipelines. Alaska struggled for two years to make BP comply with state laws and clear the pipeline of sedimentation that could interfere with leak detection systems.

Soon after, BP hired another team of outside investigators to check complaints made by workers on the North Slope. The resulting 2004 study by the law firm Vinson & Elkins warned that pipeline corrosion endangered operations on the Slope.

“Due to corrosive conditions present at the Greater Prudhoe Bay oilfield and the age of the field, corrosion control is and has been a major issue for BPXA,” the study said.

It also offered a harsh assessment of BP’s management of health, safety and environment concerns raised by employees. According to the report, workers accused BP of allowing “pencil whipping,” or falsifying inspection data. The report quoted an employee who said BP workers felt pressure to skip key diagnostics, including pressure testing, cleaning of pipelines and checking for corrosion, in order to cut costs.

“To reduce staff workload it was suggested by BPXA management not to rebuild the pulling equipment as often … and possibly not pressure test the equipment,” BP employee Marc Kovac wrote in a safety complaint filed with the company. “This obviously would increase the potential for equipment failure resulting in equipment damage, environmental spills and injury to workers.”

The report said that the manager in charge of corrosion safety in Alaska at the time, Richard Woollam, had “an aggressive management style” and subverted inspectors’ tendency to report problems on the pipeline.

“Pressure on contractor management to hit performance metrics (e.g. fewer OSHA recordables) creates an environment where fear of retaliation and intimidation did occur.”

Woollam was soon transferred, but the damage was done.

Two years later, in March 2006, disaster struck. More than 200,000 gallons of oil spilled out of a corroded hole in the Prudhoe Bay pipeline into the snow, the largest spill ever on the North Slope. Inspectors found that the steel pipe — the inside of which hadn’t been inspected in years — had been corroded to dangerously thin levels along nearly 12 miles of pipeline. It was exactly the kind of situation BP’s auditors and Alaska officials had feared.

When Congress held hearings into the cause of the spill later that year, Woollam pleaded the Fifth Amendment. He now works in BP’s Houston headquarters. Reached at his home in Texas this week, Woollam referred questions to the BP press office, which declined to comment on the matter.

***

Tony Hayward, then a 25-year BP veteran, took over BP in May 2007 as global CEO. (Sean Gardner/-Pool/Getty Images)

In August 2006, just five months after the spill at Prudhoe Bay, a pipeline safety technician for a BP contractor in Alaska discovered a two-inch snaggle-toothed crack in the steel skin of an oil transit line. Nearby, contractors were grinding down metal welds, sending a fan of sparks shooting across the work site. The technician, Stuart Sneed, feared the sparks could ignite stray gases, or the work could make the crack worse, so he ordered the contractors to stop working.

“Any inspector knows a crack in a service pipe is to be considered dangerous and treated with serious attention,” Sneed told ProPublica. “The crack could have created a hellacious leaker with people grinding on it.”

Sneed believed that the Prudhoe Bay disaster had made BP management more amenable to listening to workers concerns about potential safety problems. The company had replaced its chief executive for North America with Robert Malone and had ordered him to make fundamental changes. Malone quickly focused on reforming the company’s culture in Alaska.

But instead of receiving compliments for his prudence, Sneed — who had also complained that week that pipeline inspectors were faking their reports — was scolded by his supervisor for stopping the work. According to a report from BP’s internal employer arbitrators, Sneed’s supervisor, who hadn’t inspected the crack himself, said he believed it was superficial.

The next day, according to multiple witness accounts and the report, that supervisor singled out Sneed and harassed him at a morning staff briefing. Within a couple of hours, the supervisor sent emails to colleagues soliciting complaints or safety concerns that would justify Sneed’s firing. Two weeks later, after a trumped up safety infraction, he was gone.

During the investigation BP inspectors substantiated Sneed’s concerns about the cracked pipe. The arbiter also investigated Sneed’s account of what happened when he reported the problem. Not only did the report confirm his account, but it determined that he was among the best at his job.

The investigators interviewed dozens of workers and according to most of them Sneed “was likely to be the most careful technician on the Slope with respect to safety and quality of his inspections. If there was corrosion in existence… he would find it,” said the report, which was authored by Washington, D.C., attorney Billie Garde and environmental investigator Paul Flaherty and delivered to BP executives in late 2006.

So why would BP want to get rid of one of its most effective inspectors? The report echoed BP’s internal investigations from 2001 and 2004, finding, once again, that BP pressured its contractors and employees in order to save money.

“Many of the people interviewed indicate that they felt pressured for production ahead of safety and quality,” the report stated.

Contractors received incentives to list large numbers of completed inspections, the report found, something Sneed said routinely led workers to falsify their reports. Contractors also received a 25 percent bonus tied to BP’s production numbers. With fewer delays, more oil would be pumped, and more cash would flow to companies executing the work under BP supervision.

The message to workers was clear.

“They say it’s your duty to come forward,” said Sneed of BP’s corporate policies and public statements, “but then when you do come forward, they screw you. They’ll destroy your life.”

“No one up there is ever going to say anything if there is something they see is unsafe,” he added. “They are not going to say a word.”

The following year saw another shakeup at BP. The company had already replaced its chief executive of Alaskan operations with Doug Suttles — the man now in charge of offshore operations and cleanup of the disaster in the Gulf. In May 2007 it also named a new global CEO, Tony Hayward, a 25-year BP veteran.

But worker harassment claims continued to be made in Alaska and elsewhere, and more problems with the Alaska pipeline systems also emerged.

In September 2008, a section of a high pressure gas line on the Slope blew apart. A 28-foot-long section of steel — the length of three pickup trucks — flew nearly 1,000 feet through the air before landing on the Alaskan tundra. Sneed had raised concerns about the integrity of segments of the high-pressure gas line system before he left the company. If the release had caught a spark the explosion could have been catastrophic, said Robert Bea, a University of California Berkeley engineering professor who has worked for BP on the North Slope.

Three more accidents rocked the same system of pipelines and gas compressor stations in 2009, including a near explosion that could have destroyed the entire facility. According to a letter that members of Congress sent to BP executives [6] [6], obtained by ProPublica, the near miss was the result [7] [7] of malfunctioning safety and backup equipment.

BP spokesman Tony Odone said BP is continuing to roll out a company-wide operating management system that helps track and implement maintenance. He said the company reduced corrosion and erosion-related leaks in Alaska by 42 percent between 2006 and 2009.

***

The BP West Coast Products LLC Carson oil refinery on Aug. 7, 2006, in Carson, Calif. (David McNew/Getty Images)

As BP battled through the decade to avoid accidents in Alaska, another facility operating under a different business unit, BP West Coast Products, was having similar problems.

For years the BP subsidiary that refined and stored crude oil was allowed to inspect its own facilities for compliance with emission laws under the South Coast Air Quality Management District, the agency that regulates air quality in Los Angeles. The thinking was that companies had the technical knowledge and that self-inspection was cheaper and more efficient.

But in 2002, eight years after the program began, inspectors with the management district thought BP’s inspection results looked too good to be true. Between 1999 and 2002, BP’s Carson Refinery had nearly perfect compliance, reporting no tank problems and making virtually no repairs. The district began to suspect that BP was falsifying its inspection reports and fabricating its compliance with the law.

The management district sent its own inspectors to investigate, but when they tried to enter BP’s plant, the company turned them away. According to Joseph Panasiti, a lawyer for the management district, the agency had to get a search warrant to conduct inspections required by state law.

When the regulators did finally get in, they found equipment in a disturbing state of disrepair. According to a lawsuit the management district later filed against the company, inspectors discovered that some tanker seals had tears that were nearly two feet long. Tank roofs had gaps and pervasive leaks, and there were enough major defects to lead to thousands of violations.

“They had been sending us reports that showed 99 percent compliance, and we found about 80 percent noncompliance,” Panasiti told ProPublica. “It was clear that no matter what was said, production was put ahead of any kind of environmental compliance.”

Panasiti sued BP for $319 million, alleging, among other things, that emissions from the refinery forced nearby schools to be evacuated on two separate occasions. After 24 months of litigation, BP settled out of court, agreeing to pay more than $100 million without admitting guilt. Colin Reid, the plant’s operations manager during the prosecution, was later promoted to a vice president position at a BP office in the United Kingdom. Reid recently left BP; he did not respond to requests for comment.

Allegations that BP or its contractors falsified safety and inspection reports are a recurring theme. Similar allegations were attributed to workers in BP’s 2001 and 2004 internal reports on Alaska, but the internal auditors stopped short of confirming that fraud had occurred. The 2004 Vinson & Elkins report, titled “Report for BPXA Concerning Allegations of Workplace Harassment From Raising HSE Issues and Corrosion Data Falsification,” says investigators did not thoroughly examine those allegations and couldn’t conclude whether fraud had occurred. But the report extensively quoted workers who described how it was done.

As recently as 2006 a North Slope worker told a BP investigator that he suspected tests had been faked after an inspection team produced 2,500 completed reports from a weekend’s work in remote territory. In 2007 another North Slope safety engineer brought in to examine a pipeline system quickly identified a pattern of problems in an area that had received clear inspection reports for the previous five years.

***

BP’s Atlantis heads to the Gulf in August 2006. (Flickr user: munchicken)

In August 2008, Kenneth Abbott accepted a job with a BP contractor as a project control leader on the Atlantis, a monstrous deepwater drilling rig in the Gulf of Mexico that is significantly larger than the Deepwater Horizon rig that sank in April. The Atlantis is capable of producing more than eight million gallons of oil a day from the ocean floor.

Abbott supervised a staff of six charged with doing internal audits and making sure the rig machinery was built to specifications and had the documents and instructions necessary to operate safely. It was an important job on one of the world’s most advanced drilling platforms.

Yet it quickly turned sour. In a debriefing with the person who last held the post, Abbott was told that BP did not have final design drawings ready to deliver to the crews that would operate the Atlantis in the Gulf, Abbott said in an interview with ProPublica [8] [8].

Final design drawings, called “as-built” drawings, are considered an essential safety component. They prove that a piece of equipment — say a shutoff valve or an engine winch — was built the way it was supposed to be. Those drawings are thus the final checks to make sure the equipment operates properly. They also serve as instruction manuals for emergencies. If there is a fire on deck or a blowout, for example, operators under extreme stress and danger can use the design drawings to find the hidden kill lever that can shut an engine down before it explodes.

Abbott told ProPublica that as-built documents had been issued for only 274 of more than 7,100 pieces of equipment, the equivalent of constructing a house without having an architect or engineer sign off on the blueprint.

In May, Abbott filed a lawsuit against the Minerals and Management Service in federal court in Texas aiming to force the regulatory agency to stop Atlantis operations until BP could prove the documents are in place. He is not seeking monetary damages or compensation.

In the court filings, he said that some of the most critical spill-protection infrastructure, including the wellhead documents, hadn’t been approved. None of the sub-sea risers — the pipelines and hoses that serve as a conduit for moving materials from the bottom of the ocean to the facility — had been “issued for design.” And the manifolds that combine multiple pipeline flows into a single line at the sea floor hadn’t been reviewed for final use.

Abbott — an engineer with 30 years of experience completing design documents for companies like Shell and General Electric — said the completion of “as-built” documents is standard for the industry. Machinery is designed, approved for manufacturing, checked to make sure it was built properly, and then approved for final use. If BP didn’t provide the documentation to its workers in the field, it would be a stark exception.

Yet to Abbott’s surprise BP’s engineers resisted completing the process.

“I just hit a lot of resistance form the lead engineers,” Abbott told ProPublica. “They got really angry with me. They wanted to shortcut the system and not do the reviews, because they cut short the man hours.”

Abbott estimates BP saved $2 million to $3 million by streamlining the process.

“There seemed to be a big emphasis to push the contractors to get things done and that was always at the forefront of the operation,” Abbott said. “I felt there had to be balance. You had to have safety because peoples’ life depended on it. My management didn’t see it that way.”

Abbot’s complaint wasn’t the first time the company had been warned about not maintaining as-built drawings. According to BP’s internal 2001 operational integrity report conducted in Alaska, as-built documentation wasn’t being maintained at the company’s Prudhoe Bay operations either.

It was among the issues BP executives were encouraged to fix after the audit of their operations there nearly a decade ago.

BP declined to discuss Abbott’s allegations, telling ProPublica it does not comment on pending legal matters. In a previous statement made to federal investigators, BP said the drawings were updated and in place before the Atlantis began operating. The Minerals and Management Service is reportedly investigating Abbott’s claims and Congress has also launched an inquiry that is still in progress.

A BP ombudsman letter written by Billie Garde and obtained by ProPublica confirmed Abbott’s allegation that the company had violated its own safety and management protocol by not completing as-built documentation. The ombudsman’s office has not yet investigated Abbott’s claims about the specific pieces of equipment that lacked documentation because Abbott didn’t make that information available until he filed the lawsuit last month.

Shortly after he raised his complaints to BP management, Abbott lost his contract to work with BP.

***

The U.S. Coast Guard responds to the Deepwater Horizon disaster after it exploded on April 20, 2010. (Deepwater Horizon Response)

Among the most important pieces of safety equipment that BP was criticized for not having in place in Alaska, according to its own 2001 operational integrity report, were gas and fire detection sensors and the emergency shutoff valves that they are supposed to trigger.

When gas leaks from a pipeline break or a blowout near a running engine, it’s a lot like stomping on the accelerator of a car: The engine will suck up the fuel vapors and scream out of control. Gas sensors are critical to preventing an explosion, because they can shut down a rig engine before that happens.

Now investigators are learning that similar sensors — and the shutoff systems that would have been connected to them — were not operating in the engine room of the Deepwater Horizon rig that exploded in the Gulf of Mexico.

In sworn testimony before a Deepwater Horizon Joint Investigation panel in New Orleans last month, Deepwater mechanic Douglas Brown said that the backstop mechanism that should have prevented the engines from running wild apparently failed — and so did the air intake valves that were supposed to close if gas enters the engine room. The influx of gas from the well gave the engines “a more volatile form of burning mixture,” he said, and caused them to rev out of control. Another system was supposed to kick in and shut the engines down, but that system also failed. He said the engine room wasn’t equipped with a gas alarm system that could have shut off the power.

Minutes later, the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded in a ball of fire, killing 11 workers before sinking to the seafloor, where it left a gaping well pipe that continues to gush oil and gas into the Gulf.

The investigation into that massive spill is still under way, but these revelations — plus evidence that BP skipped key parts of the drilling process intended to prevent a blowout to save roughly $5 million — echo the problems that BP’s auditors, attorneys and investigators have identified in the past 11 years.

Over the next few months, the Department of Justice will decide whether what happened in the Gulf violates criminal or civil laws intended to protect the environment. Separately, EPA investigators are considering whether to end BP’s ability to do business with the federal government, a sanction that could cost it billions in revenue. The investigators say a pivotal question in that investigation will be whether BP’s record over the past decade amounts to a corporate culture of “non-compliance.”

ProPublica Director of Research Lisa Schwartz and researcher Sheelagh McNeill contributed to this report.

Examiner
June 10, 2010

 http://www.examiner.com/x-19632-Salt-Lake-City-Headlines-Examiner~y2010m6d10-Kevin-Costner-sells-32-oil-spill-machines-to-BP-to-recycle-6-million-gallons-of-water-a-day-photos

Wednesday, Kevin Costner presented his oil spill solution to Congress and demonstrated his machine that separates oil from water with a 99.9% success rate. Actor, Kevin Costner said that he was inspired by the Exxon-Valdez oil spill in 1989 to come up with an idea that would safely separate oil from water, and over the years he has spent $20 million on the machine and the patent for it.

“There’s been some question as to why I’m here,” Costner told the House Energy and Environment subcommittee on Wednesday. “I want to assure everyone here it’s not because I heard a voice in a cornfield,” Costner said joking about the Field of Dreams movie he made several years ago.

Costner said that over the years he has had a difficult time getting any interest in buying the machines. He said he performed for the Coast Guard, private companies, and the government, but no was interested.

“My enthusiasm for the machine was met with apathy,” said Costner.

But in May, BP asked for 6 of Costner’s machines to be flown to the Gulf to be tested. And now BP has ordered 32 more of the machines because they have an almost 100% success rate in separating oil from ocean water. The machines, marketed by Ocean Therapy Solutions suck up the oily water and recycle the water. 32 machines will process about 6 million gallons of water each day.

Costner said “that as long as the oil industry profits from the sea, they have an obligation to protect it.” He went on to say that the cleaning devices “should be on every ship transporting oil, they should be on every derrick, they should be in every harbor.”

“There’s 33 platforms that are shut down,” said Costner. “We can put Americans back to work and bring into the 21st century the technology of oil spill recovery.”
Last Friday, Obama cancelled his business trip to Asia and headed back down to the Gulf Coast. Thursday night, Obama told Larry King that he was “furious with the entire situation.”

Recently, a new video of the gushing oil had many of the investigative teams calling BP untrustworthy because more oil was leaking from the well then they originally claimed. For more on that story, click here.

The state of Utah has 28 oil drilling companies throughout the state. Two years ago President Bush allowed oil drilling to be done near two national parks, much to the dismay of many Utah residents. Oil drilling isn’t considered safe in the US, and without the safety requirements for oil drilling that other countries require, residents near the oil drilling are typically distraught.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

Great!  I was worried about that one; but read on for the next one…..DV

(06/10/2010)
Robin Bravender, E&E reporter

The Senate today blocked a bid from Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) to veto U.S. EPA’s climate regulations.

The chamber rejected, 47-53, a procedural motion that would have allowed a vote on the disapproval resolution, effectively killing the measure to overturn EPA’s scientific finding that greenhouse gases threaten public health and welfare.

All 41 Republicans and six Democrats — Sens. Evan Bayh of Indiana, Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas, Ben Nelson of Nebraska, Mark Pryor of Arkansas and Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia — voted in favor of the resolution.

Murkowski and her supporters had acknowledged that the measure had little chance of becoming law because it faced a tough battle passing the Democrat-led House and the White House this week pledged a veto.
The Senate’s rejection of the measure is expected to energize proponents of a climate bill, who anticipate new momentum for their efforts as senators seek an alternative to EPA rules.

“That’s helpful to us,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) told reporters after the vote. “Its obvious people want some rules and regulations.”

Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.), who is co-sponsoring a cap-and-trade climate and energy bill with Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.), said yesterday that he was hopeful Murkowski would fail, “And I think that will give us a little momentum.”

David Hamilton, director of the Sierra Club’s global warming program, said a Murkowski failure marks “a good directional signal” for a Senate climate bill.

Murkowski had argued that the resolution had nothing to do with the science, but was necessary to block overwhelming economic and regulatory impacts from federal climate rules. She said the threat of EPA regulations should not be used as a tool to prod the Senate to rush to complete a climate bill.

“Congress would not pass, should not pass bad legislation in order to stave off bad regulations,” Murkowski said.

Rockefeller bill

Meanwhile, the Senate appears poised to soon vote on another, more limited, effort to handcuff EPA climate rules.

During the run-up to today’s vote on Murkowski’s measure, Democratic leaders promised a vote on a narrower bill from West Virginia’s Rockefeller to impose a time-out for two years on EPA rules aimed at industrial emitters, a Senate aide said (Greenwire, June 10).

Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.), a co-sponsor of Rockefeller’s bill, said today that there would be a vote, but that there was no firm date.

Rockefeller spokeswoman Jamie Smith said that “Rockefeller is not part of any deal. He is fighting to be sure the Congress — not the unelected EPA — decide major economic and energy policy.” Rockefeller voted in favor of the Murkowski resolution today.

That measure could spark another brawl between those who support EPA rules in the absence of legislation and others who want to take the option off the table completely.

Reporters Darren Samuelsohn and Katherine Ling contributed.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.ft.com/home/uk

ByCarola Hoyos in London, ft.com
Published: June 8 2010 15:09 | Last updated: June 8 2010 15:09
Norway will not allow any deepwater oil and gas drilling in new areas until the investigation into the explosion and spill in the US Gulf of Mexico is complete, Terje Riis-Johansen, the Nordic country’s energy minister, has said.
“We are now working on the 21st licensing round. It will be conducted in light of what we have experienced in the Gulf of Mexico,” Mr Riis-Johansen said in a statement.
 ”It is not appropriate for me to allow drilling in any new licences in deepwater areas until we have good knowledge of what has happened with the Deepwater Horizon [the Gulf rig that exploded on April 20] and what this means for our regulations,” he added.
It is the first such decision outside the US, which put in place a seven-month moratorium on deepwater drilling in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon explosion, which killed 11 people and has caused the biggest ever oil spill in US coastal waters.
Norway’s oil industry is eager for access to the estimated 1.3bn barrels of oil beneath the Lofoten islands of northern Norway to offset declining output from mature North Sea fields. Norwegian oil production has fallen by 50 per cent from its peak a decade ago.
But the government of Jens Stoltenberg, prime minister, is deeply divided over whether to open Lofoten, with pro-oil elements of his Labour party pitted against environmental opposition from others in the centre-left coalition. The Gulf of Mexico spill has bolstered the argument of those who want to protect Lofoten and its important cod spawning grounds from drilling.
The UK’s department of energy on Tuesday announced it would increase inspections and consider tightening other regulation in light of the US spill.
The moratorium in the US will cut production in the country’s most important region for new oil by 100,000-300,000 barrels a day, the International Energy Agency said on Tuesday.
In a report to be published this week, the rich countries’ energy watchdog will reveal that were the moratorium to last one year, oil output in 2015 would be cut by 100,000 barrels a day. If the moratorium continued for two years, that loss would rise to 300,000 barrels a day, slashing 2015 production from the Gulf of Mexico by about 20-25 per cent.
Additional reporting by Andrew Ward in Stockholm

Special thanks to Richard Charter

From: “Legal Planet: Environmental Law and Policy”
Date: June 8, 2010 10:19:52 AM PDT

Dan Farber | June 8, 2010 at 9:18 am URL: http://wp.me/prxko-1Nh

That Washington Post has a detailed story that details BP’s culture of carelessness:

Taken together, these documents portray a company that systemically ignored its own safety policies across its North American operations — from Alaska to the Gulf of Mexico to California and Texas. Executives were not held accountable for the failures, and some were promoted despite them.

What’s most disturbing in the story is BP’s history of filing false reports and suppressing worker concerns about safety and adverse safety information.

It’s worth pointing out that for once the lawyers were the good guys in the story.   BP’s Houston law firm, Vinson & Elkins, warned BP that warned that pipeline corrosion endangered operations” in Alaska:

[The V&E report] also offered a harsh assessment of BP’s management of employee concerns. According to the report, workers accused the company of allowing “pencil whipping,” or falsifying inspection data. The report quoted an employee who said employees felt forced to skip key diagnostics, including pressure testing, pipeline cleaning and corrosion checks.

The report said that Richard Woollam, the manager in charge of corrosion safety in Alaska at the time, had “an aggressive management style” and subverted inspectors’ tendency to report problems. “Pressure on contractor management to hit performance metrics (e.g. fewer OSHA recordables) creates an environment where fear of retaliation and intimidation did occur,” it said. Woollam was soon transferred.

Unfortunately, BP did not heed the report, resulting in a disastrous accident in Alaska two years later.  The company has apparently made some efforts to clean up its act in the last few years, but obviously this was too little and too late.

I can’t help wondering whether criminal charges against BP should have been filed years ago.  That might have gotten the attention of management and the shareholders in time to fix the corporate culture before Deepwater Horizon started drilling.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.maritime-executive.com/article/oped-not-enough-lifeboats/

Tuesday, June 8th, 2010

Not Enough Lifeboats by Tony Munoz, Editor-in-Chief, MarEx Newsletter and the Maritime Executive Magazine

Forty-nine days of “top kill,” “junk Shot,” controlled burns, dispersants and hi-tech domes and the Gulf of Mexico oil spill is still a calamity of immeasurable proportions, which is still continuing to devastate the environment and economies of the Gulf States. For the White House the spill has been yet another test of competence and leadership, and the glaring truth is there are not enough lifeboats for everyone.

There was so much excitement in the offshore industry after the 27-year congressional moratorium on offshore drilling ended on September 29, 2008. While the pro-oil Bush administration did nothing after the end of the moratorium, it would take the anti-drilling Obama to lift the ban on March 31, 2010. The offshore industry embraced the potential renaissance. But, the OCS stimulus potential simply exploded and melted into the bottom of the ocean on April 20th.

This “Energy Pearl Harbor” has shaken every American and many throughout the world. In the last few days, LSU’s Pelican subsea vessel witnessed at least a 400-foot underwater plume of thick oil sitting on the ocean floor that goes on forever and NOAA has sent its research vessel, THOMAS JEFFERSON, to hopefully provide us the truth about the impact of the spill undersea. But, what is clear to everyone is that neither BP nor the oil industry had anything even closely resembling an emergency response plan for drilling at 5,000 feet. For years the oil industry has touted the deepwater technologies, which had evidently outstripped government regulators’ ability to understand and deal with the realities of a possible catastrophic oil spill event.

Then, of course, there are rumors about the purported cowboy tensions between Transocean workers and BP superintendents about the pace of drilling, which could have led to many mistakes. These tensions were so evident to all the workers that Transocean Tool Pusher, Jason Anderson, one of the eleven men that died in the explosion, spent his last trip home getting his affairs in order. He told his wife Shelly he was so concerned about the safety practices of BP that he drew up a Will and began offering advice to his wife about how to raise their kids. While Transocean filed a petition to limit its liability to $27 million, BP, who spent a record $15 million last year for Lobbyists in Washington, will feel the full impact of the event, because nobody wants to see BP limit its liability.

As the oil spreads 100 miles across the Gulf coastline devastating businesses and wildlife, Americans are appalled by the unneeded suffering. However, this brings me to another point; Louisiana’s governor, Bobby Jindal, who last year said there should be as little federal government interference as possible because the American people can handle anything is now begging for federal interference for money, supplies, and assistance to create barriers islands to protect the state’s wetland. And, what about all the folks that screamed and shouted about the socialistic president that federalized the financial institutions, car companies and health care, these are now the same people screaming for him to do something in the Gulf of Mexico crisis. It’s a catch 22 Mr. Obama, damned if you do and damned if you don’t, it’s just the same American political climate that has grinded congress to a halt of ever getting anything done up there.

For all the devastation being inflicted on wildlife and businesses in the Gulf, for all the uncalculated billions (?) that BP and its associates may be on the hook for, for all the offshore operators and shipbuilders whose futures may hang in the balance, for the workers cleaning and skimming crude in the ocean and on the beaches whose future health may become another casualty, and for Obama who may or may not be competent enough to fix the problem because he entered the fray way too late, there are simply not be enough lifeboats.

But, like Coast Guard Admiral Thad Allen, who is the designated incident command leader, said, “Replace BP with what?

The Gulf Coast spill is far from over, and there is so much more pain and suffering yet to come. While the Russians may be snickering in their vodka at us, they have suggested putting a nuke 16,000 feet into the well to cauterize the hole. Something, they did in the 60s and 70′s five times with an 80 percent success rate.

Well, we need to do something, because we just had lunch at the OceanEnergy Conference in Fort Lauderdale, where Matthew Simmons, the renowned energy investment guru and author of “Twilight in the Desert”, spoke and said, if we let it bleed out it may take 25 years because there is more oil in the hole than even BP expected. He also said, what this country needs is a good education on alternative wind energy, and as far as the offshore industry is concerned there are 3,442 active rigs in the Gulf and many are over 30 years old. The federal government will require inspections and upgrades, which will be another boom for the energy support industry.

Déjà Vu All Over Again

While this is day 49 for the Deepwater Horizon debacle, its day 34 in Akwa Ibom along the Niger Delta, where another offshore spill is still adding millions of more gallons of crude to the ocean environment. In an already devastate estuary, an oil rig operated by a subsidiary of ExxonMobile is polluting the seas and tidal marshes in a country that admits there have been at least 2,000 major oil spills. Nigeria has tough sounding “paper tiger’ environmental laws, but their enforcement is by a government totally corrupted by big-oil. And, let’s not forget about the “ABAN PEARL” natural gas exploration rig that sank 23 days after the Gulf of Mexico event. On May 13th, the rig sank for no apparent reason, but Chavez said on his Tweeter account that all the gas connections had been disconnected and all 95 workers were taken off safely.

Note: The MarEx has covered this event since the beginning and we will continue to do so and let our readers have access via OPEDs. So, if you want your comments heard, please send your messages to tonymunoz@maritime-executive.com

Thanks to Richard Charter

Coast Guard Panel to Screen, Evaluate Oil Spill Technologies

Jun 09, 2010
The Interagency Alternative Technology Assessment Program workgroup, newly established by the National Incident Commander for the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill, has called for white papers that cover oil spill response solutions on http://www.FedBiz Opps.gov.
The Coast Guard’s Research and Development Center, in collaboration with interagency partners, is seeking white papers on:

oil sensing improvements to response and detection;
oil wellhead control and submerged oil response;
traditional oil spill response technologies;
alternative oil spill response technologies; and
oil spill damage assessment and restoration.
The workgroup and center will screen and triage submissions based on technical feasibility efficacy and deployability. This will be a federal process to ensure a fair, systematic, responsive and accountable review of alternative response technologies by interagency experts.

The initial screening will determine potential for immediate benefit to the oil spill response effort; whether more detailed investigation or evaluation by the appropriate government agency is needed; or if the white paper submission does not support this incident.

The workgroup, established by Adm. Thad Allen, the national incident commander, includes the U.S. Coast Guard, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Department of Interior, Minerals Management Service, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, and the Department of Agriculture.

The Research and Development Center, located in New London, Conn., is part of the U.S. Coast Guard Acquisition Directorate’s Research, Development, Test and Evaluation Program. The Acquisition Directorate has been supporting the response to the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill with an on-site subject matter expert who provides guidance on in-situ burns, dispersant and sorbent boom use. The RDT&E Program’s Fire and Safety Test Detachment in Mobile, Ala., is coordinating local logistical support for volunteers in the Gulf Coast region. The RDC also participates in the interagency Flow Rate Technical Group, helping provide the latest scientifically validated information about the amount of oil flowing from the Mississippi Canyon 252 well.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

Notices]             
[Page 32769-32770]
From the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov]
[DOCID:fr09jn10-52]                       

———————————————————————–

ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY

[FRL-9160-6]

 
Science Advisory Board Staff Office; Request for Nominations of
Experts to Provide Scientific and Technical Advice Related to the Gulf
of Mexico Oil Spill

AGENCY: Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).

ACTION: Notice of request for nominations.

———————————————————————–

SUMMARY: The Science Advisory Board (SAB) Staff Office is requesting
public nominations of experts to serve on potential workgroups or
panels to advise the Agency on scientific and technical issues related
to the Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill.

DATES: Nominations should be submitted by June 24, 2010 per
instructions below.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Any member of the public wishing
further information regarding this Request for Nominations may contact
Ms. Stephanie Sanzone, Designated Federal Officer (DFO), EPA Science
Advisory Board (1400F), 1200 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW., Washington, DC
20460; via telephone/voice mail (202) 343-9697; by fax at (202) 233-
0643; or via e-mail at sanzone.stephanie@epa.gov. General information
concerning the EPA Science Advisory Board can be found on the EPA SAB
Web site at http://www.epa.gov/sab.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION:
    The SAB was established by 42 U.S.C. 4365 to provide independent
scientific and technical advice, consultation, and recommendations to
the EPA Administrator on the technical basis for Agency positions and
regulations. As announced previously Federal Register, May 19, 2010,
Volume 75, Number 96, Page 28009), the SAB may be asked to provide
advice on a range of scientific and technical issues related to the
Gulf of Mexico oil spill. To expand the pool of experts available to
serve as SAB consultants, the SAB Staff Office is seeking public
nominations of nationally recognized experts for potential service on
SAB workgroups, panels or committees to provide advice on this critical
matter. The advice will assist the Agency in developing and
implementing timely and scientifically appropriate responses to oil
spill contamination in the Gulf of Mexico and along the Gulf Coast. All
SAB advisory activities generally comply with the provisions of the
Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA). As announced previously (Federal
Register, May 19, 2010, Volume 75, Number 96, Page 28009), critical
mission and schedule requirements may preclude the full 15 days notice
in the Federal Register prior to advisory meetings, pursuant to the
final rule on Federal Advisory Committee Management codified at 41 CFR
102-3.150. However, information on Gulf of Mexico oil spill meetings,
as well as experts selected for service will be posted on the SAB Web
site at http://www.epa.gov/sab as they are available. Nominees will be
invited to serve based on: Scientific and technical expertise,
knowledge, and experience; availability and willingness to serve;
absence of financial conflicts of interest; and scientific credibility
and impartiality.
    Request for Nominations: The SAB Staff Office is requesting
nominations of nationally and internationally recognized experts with
demonstrated research or operational experience assessing the
environmental impacts and associated mitigation of impacts due to oil
spills, oil products, oil constituents, and dispersants in air and
water (including wetlands) media. Appropriate expertise may include one
or more of the following disciplines: Chemistry; fate, transport and
exposure assessment; toxicology; public health; ecology; ecotoxicology;
risk assessment; engineering; and economics.
    Process and Deadline for Submitting Nominations: Any interested
person or organization may nominate qualified individuals for possible
service in the areas of expertise described above. Self-nominations are
encouraged. Nominations should be submitted in electronic format (which
is preferred over hard copy) following the instructions for
“Nominating Experts to Advisory Panels and Ad Hoc Committees Being
Formed” provided on the SAB Web site. The instructions can be accessed
through the “Nomination of Experts” link on the blue navigational bar
on the SAB Web site at http://www.epa.gov/sab. To receive full
consideration, nominations should include all of the information
requested.
    EPA’s SAB Staff Office requests: contact information about the
person making the nomination; contact information about the nominee;
the disciplinary and specific areas of expertise of the nominee; the
nominee’s curriculum vitae; sources of recent grants and/or contracts;
and a biographical sketch of the nominee indicating current position,
educational background, research activities, and recent service on
other national advisory committees or national professional
organizations.
    Persons having questions about the nomination procedures, or who
are unable to submit nominations through the SAB Web site, should
contact Ms. Sanzone, DFO as indicated above in this notice. Nominations
should be submitted in time to arrive no later than June 24, 2010. EPA
values and welcomes diversity. In an effort to obtain nominations of
diverse candidates, EPA encourages

[[Page 32770]]

nominations of women and men of all racial and ethnic groups.
    The EPA SAB Staff Office will acknowledge receipt of nominations.
The names and biosketches of qualified nominees identified by
respondents to the Federal Register notice and additional experts
identified by the SAB Staff will be posted on the SAB Web site at
http://www.epa.gov/sab. Public comments on this List of Candidates will
be accepted for 15 calendar days. The public will be requested to
provide relevant information or other documentation on nominees that
the SAB Staff Office should consider in evaluating candidates.
    For the EPA SAB Staff Office, a balanced subcommittee or review
panel includes candidates who possess the necessary domains of
knowledge, the relevant scientific perspectives (which, among other
factors, may be influenced by work history and affiliation), and the
collective breadth of experience to adequately address the charge. In
establishing workgroups, the SAB Staff Office will consider information
provided by the candidates themselves, and background information
independently gathered by the SAB Staff Office. Selection criteria to
be used for panel membership include: (a) Scientific and/or technical
expertise, knowledge and experience (primary factors); (b) availability
and willingness to serve; (c) absence of financial conflicts of
interest; (d) absence of an appearance of a lack of impartiality; (e)
skills working in advisory committees and panels for the Panel as a
whole, and (f) diversity of and balance among scientific expertise and
viewpoints.
    The SAB Staff Office’s evaluation of an absence of financial
conflicts of interest will include a review of the “Confidential
Financial Disclosure Form for Special Government Employees Serving on
Federal Advisory Committees at the U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency” (EPA Form 3110-48). This confidential form allows Government
officials to determine whether there is a statutory conflict between
that person’s public responsibilities (which includes membership on an
EPA Federal advisory committee) and private interests and activities,
or the appearance of a lack of impartiality, as defined by Federal
regulation. The form may be viewed and downloaded from the following
URL address http://www.epa.gov/sab/pdf/epaform3110-48.pdf.
    The approved policy under which the EPA SAB Office selects
subcommittees and review panels is described in the following document:
Overview of the Panel Formation Process at the Environmental Protection
Agency Science Advisory Board (EPA-SAB-EC-02-010), which is posted on
the SAB Web site at http://www.epa.gov/sab/pdf/ec02010.pdf.

    Dated: June 1, 2010.
Anthony F. Maciorowski,
Deputy Director, EPA Science Advisory Board Staff Office.
[FR Doc. 2010-13858 Filed 6-8-10; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 6560-50-P

Special thanks to Richard Charter

Robin Bravender, E&E reporter

Industry and left-leaning advocacy groups are waging last-minute lobbying efforts as the Senate prepares to vote tomorrow on a measure aimed at blocking federal climate regulations.

A coalition of 24 industry groups sent a letter yesterday to members of the Senate urging them to support a resolution from Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) that would prevent U.S. EPA from regulating greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act.

The groups include the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, American Petroleum Institute, National Mining Association, National Petrochemical & Refiners Association, National Association of Manufacturers and National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, among others.

“While our organizations may differ on some subjects with respect to approaches toward climate change, we are united in opposition to unilateral EPA action to regulate [greenhouse gases] under the [Clean Air Act],” the letter says.

The letter also urges senators to oppose any measures to codify EPA regulation of greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act by legislatively affirming EPA’s “tailoring” rule or similar measures.

Sens. Tom Carper (D-Del.) and Bob Casey (D-Pa.) have discussed introducing a measure that would seek to exempt small stationary sources from greenhouse gas regulations while allowing the agency to regulate larger emitters. The proposal would be “very similar” to EPA’s tailoring rule, which would phase in greenhouse gas permitting requirements starting with the biggest polluters, according to a Senate aide (E&E Daily, May 18).

Meanwhile, a liberal advocacy group is expanding a television campaign targeting Murkowski’s supporters to include Massachusetts Sen. Scott Brown, one of the few Republicans who has not yet declared support for the resolution.

Americans United for Change — a group formed in 2005 by Democratic officials and labor interests — will launch a $40,000 television ad in Boston tomorrow targeting the Massachusetts senator after hearing that he is “leaning toward supporting it,” said Jeremy Funk, the group’s spokesman.

The 30-second ad, which features images of oil spewing from BP PLC’s Deepwater Horizon rig, accuses Republicans of “working to gut the bipartisan Clean Air Act” and “giving Big Oil a bailout.” Worst of all, the ad says, “Senator Brown is considering voting ‘yes.’”

Brown and Maine’s Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins are the three Republican senators who have not yet publicly staked out a position on the resolution. The remaining 38 GOP senators are co-sponsoring Murkowski’s legislation.

Brown’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Americans United for Change is running similar ads in Maine targeting Collins and a national ad running on Washington, D.C., cable channels during the run-up to tomorrow’s vote (E&ENews PM, June 7).

Special thanks to Richard Charter

I don’t agree, but here is one theory….(Richard Charter)

http://www.newsweek.com/2010/06/08/should-we-clean-oiled-animals.html

Why it may be more humane to euthanize them instead.

Photos: A.J. Sisco / UPI-Landov
Brown pelicans soaked in oil await cleaning at a rescue center (left), while birds that have been cleaned wait for their release.
So far, the numbers have been small. As of June 6, rescue workers had collected 820 birds and 289 turtles from the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, the majority of them already dead. But the current spill promises to be the largest in U.S. history, and as cleanup efforts stretch across the summer, it’s clear that more oiled birds will be found, stuck and suffering in black goo. And as they do with every oil spill, rescue workers will go to great lengths to capture and clean the survivors hoping to restore them to their natural habitat.

Is it worth the effort? Some scientists aren’t so sure. Because the stress of being captured and bathed is as significant as the trauma of being doused in oil, and because research suggests that many rescued birds die shortly after being released, some experts say euthanasia is a more humane option. “It might make us feel better to clean them up and send them back out,” says Daniel Anderson, an ornithologist at the University of California, Davis. “But there’s a real question of how much it actually does for the birds, aside from prolong their suffering.”
Clean bird feathers repel water and regulate body temperature-dirty ones don’t. Oil in particular makes feathers heavier and diminishes their ability to trap air, which in turn makes birds less buoyant and more vulnerable to drowning. They are also more vulnerable to overheating (oiled feathers are less insulative), and organ damage (licking their feathers clean forces birds to ingest lethal quantities of black gooey hydrocarbons).

(Oiled mammals suffer many of the same stresses as birds, including habitat loss, disregulated body temperature, and organ damage. They are also more vulnerable to viruses and bacteria that humans carry; sea turtles have their own vulnerabilities, but because all sea turtles are endangered, most scientists agree that it’s worth the effort to try and save as many as possible.)

Jesse Cancelmo
The Gulf spill’s disastrous effects on marine life
Animals at Risk From the Gulf Oil Spill
Of course, being captured and cleaned is no picnic either. Some birds wind up returning to their destroyed habitats only to fall victim to the oil again. And those who manage to avoid a second oil bath suffer dramatically shortened life spans and lower reproductive success. Of the thousands of birds that were rescued from the Prestige oil spill off the coast of Spain in 2002, only 600 were released into the wild; most of the rest died after just a few days in captivity.
To be sure, survival rates vary widely by species, and not all species fare poorly. For example, South African penguins often go on to live long lives and breed well after being rescued from an oil spill. But species endemic to the gulf region, including the brown pelican, which was just removed from the Endangered Species List last year, remain among the most difficult to save. More than half the pelicans rescued from the American Trader spill in 1990 died within a year; fewer than 15 percent lasted two years.

Bird rescuers say they have learned a lot since then about how to best help oil-soaked birds, and that therefore, survival rates stand to increase this time around. “The rescue operations have gotten more sophisticated year by year,” says Michael Fry, an ornithologist with the American Bird Conservancy. In the past, birds were cleaned right away, and volunteers often worked through the night bathing rescued birds. But, as research has since shown, the stress of capture and cleaning can be profoundly deleterious to a bird’s health-knocking hormones out of balance and exacerbating organ damage. So now, captured birds are left to rest for a day or two before being cleaned, and only washed during the day, so as not to disrupt their circadian rhythms.

According to the International Bird Rescue Research Center (IBRRC), a nonprofit rescue operation that has responded to some 200 oil spills around the world, these protocol tweaks have dramatically increased the proportion of birds who make it from rescue to release-from 5 percent to 80 percent for some species.

But part of that increase may be due to greater selectivity on the part of rescuers. “They do blood tests right in the field now,” says Fry. “And birds that are loaded with hydrocarbons or don’t look like they’re going to make it are put down right away, rather than subjected to the stress of captivity and cleaning.”
And so far, while release rates may be improving, there is little evidence of better medium or long-term survival, especially for the more-difficult-to-save species. “They say they are getting better results, but I haven’t seen any data,” says Anderson. “And while the husbandry methods are better, there still aren’t good biomedical protocols, for repairing the internal organ damage.” Rescue workers have taken to giving Pepto-Bismol to afflicted birds, to help them absorb ingested hyrdrocarbons, but its unclear how much this actually helps.

The world’s worst man-made environmental disasters
On one point, experts do agree: the best way to save birds is to prevent them from being doused in oil to begin with. After the Exxon Valdez spill, a wildlife-care network, established by Congress and funded by oil-company taxes, began mapping all of the country’s “sensitive areas” (those vulnerable to significant wildlife casualties from prospective oil spills). The network has since established a system where protective booms and trained responders are rapidly deployed in the wake of a spill. For the current gulf oil spill, Fry says, responders were mobilized and facilities were ready on the day of the explosion. “Of course, when you have a spill the size of Connecticut, and the oil company’s containment efforts fail miserably,” he adds, “that preparedness is going to be of limited value.”

At any rate, rescue efforts will continue, in large part because the public demands that they do. “Without an organized response, members of the public will try to care for oiled wildlife on their own,” says Florina Tseng, a veterinarian and bird rescue expert at Tufts University. “We’ve seen this over and over. And as well-intentioned as they are, they have no knowledge of proper wildlife care.” Tseng says that while concrete figures are hard to come by, the cost of rescue and rehabilitation efforts are a tiny sliver of the total clean-up costs, and thanks to the Oil Spill Act of 1990, are the legal responsibility of the offending oil company.

“I think for some species it makes more sense to euthanize,” says Anderson. “But that’s a difficult thing to do, especially for people who have built their lives around saving animals.”

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/world/us_and_canada/10273904.stm
Page last updated at 19:40 GMT, Wednesday, 9 June 2010 20:40 UK

 US Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said drilling would continue in a “safe way”

US Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has told a senate panel that a six-month moratorium on deepwater drilling will stay in place until safety is assured.

But he sought to reassure senators that the moratorium – imposed after the huge Gulf of Mexico spill – was a “pause” rather a permanent halt to exploration.

Coast Guard Adm Thad Allen said the amount of oil captured from the leaking well could almost double by next week.

President Barack Obama has criticised BP’s efforts to deal with the spill.
He is due to make his fourth trip to the Gulf of Mexico next week.
Mr Salazar’s announcement came a day after he announced plans to bolster safety requirements for shallow-water oil drilling.

He said that drilling would continue, but it “has to be done in a safe way”.
Mr Salazar said the pause, which was put in place following the 20 April explosion of the Deepwater Horizon rig, would remain “until we can have a sense of safety, until we have a sense that this can never happen again”.
Mr Salazar also told the panel he would ask BP to repay the salaries of any workers laid off due to the six-month moratorium.

Three committees and two subcommittees on Capitol Hill were to discuss matters related to the oil spill and oil industry on Wednesday.

Underwater plumes

Among the new safety regulations announced by Mr Salazar on Tuesday, oil companies drilling in US waters will now have to inspect their blow-out preventers and provide safely certificates.

BP engulfed in controversy again

The failure of the blow-out preventer on the Deepwater Horizon rig led to the oil spill, the worst in US history.

A containment cap placed on the blown-out well last week is now helping to contain some of the leaking oil.

Adm Allen said in a press conference on Wednesday that the containment operation was now catching up to 630,000 gallons (2,864,037 litres) daily.
He said he hoped the existing containment structure would soon be able to hold 1.17 million gallons per day.

“We’re only at 15 [15,000 barrels] now and we’ll be at 28 [28,000 barrels] next week. We’re building capacity,” said Adm Allen.
At some point there might “have to be a transition between a containment cap and a regular cap”, he said.

Adm Allen added that Obama administration officials were talking to BP about a longer-term containment strategy with “built-in redundancies”.
The government has estimated that 600,000 to 1.2 million gallons a day are leaking from the bottom of the sea.

BP’s efforts to tackle the spill have come under close scrutiny
BP has said it will donate net revenues from the oil recovered to a fund to restore wildlife habitats on the coastlines of four affected Gulf Coast states.
However, a BP spokesman told the AP news agency that it could not say how much of the recovered oil had been processed.

Adm Thad Allen wrote to BP on Tuesday demanding “more detail and openness” about how the company is managing claims for compensation payments to individuals and businesses in the region.

“The BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill is having a devastating impact on the environment and the economy of the Gulf Coast states and their communities,” he wrote.

Meanwhile, tests have shown that underwater oil plumes have travelled at least 64km (40 miles) from the leaking well, the US government says.
Scientists noted that concentrations of oil in the plumes were “very low”, but said the plumes were very difficult to clean up, and they could damage the Gulf’s abundant sea life by depleting oxygen in the water.

Speaking on US network NBC’s Today show on Wednesday, BP spokesman Doug Suttles maintained BP’s position that no massive underwater oil plumes in “large concentrations” had been detected.

“It may be down to how you define what a plume is here,” he said.

‘Cut corners’

Oil has been leaking into the Gulf of Mexico since the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded and sank off the coast of the US state of Louisiana, killing 11 workers.

The morning the rig exploded, a BP executive and an official from Transocean, which operated the rig, argued over how to proceed with the drilling, survivors of the blast told CNN.

The workers said BP had routinely cut corners and pushed ahead despite concerns about safety.

A BP spokesman said it would not comment on specific allegations until an investigation into the accident was completed, but said that “BP’s priority is always safety”.

BP chief Tony Hayward is scheduled to appear before Congress next week.
BP shares fell 3.4% on Wednesday over worries that the company will have to suspend its dividend payments to pay for legal claims and cleaning up the spill.
ATTEMPT TO CAP OIL LEAK

The latest stage in BP’s efforts to contain leaking oil has involved lowering a cap onto the failed blowout preventer (BOP) valve system on the seabed. The cap sits on the BOP’s lower marine riser package (LMRP) section.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FGX7krQYI_4&feature=player_embedded

AssociatedPress — June 09, 2010 — A rare and different perspective at the oil spill from beneath the surface. The AP’s Rich Matthews got an exclusive look at the spill by joining a dive team who explored how the oil is impacting the Gulf of Mexico. (June 9)

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/08/us/08dam.html 

By JOHN LELAND

Published: June 7, 2010

MAGNOLIA SPRINGS, Ala. — James Hinton looked over a barge jutting into the mouth of a 6,000-acre estuary last weekend and said, “If we can make this work, if the oil don’t get in here, 1,275 miles of bay and river coastline will be protected.”

A day later, Mr. Hinton said: “I could go to jail for going against unified command. Now, I don’t mind going to jail, I just need to make sure it’s for doing the right thing.”

In a month in which Gulf Coast officials have railed about not being able to protect their shorelines from oil and not getting support from BP or the unified command structure set up to handle the cleanup efforts, Mr. Hinton, a volunteer fire chief in Magnolia Springs, a small town of fewer than 1,000, has emerged as a man with a plan.

“What he’s doing is really admirable,” said Bethany Kraft, executive director of the Alabama Coastal Foundation, a nonprofit environmental group. “He’s taking things into his own hands instead of waiting for other people to do something about it.”

Mr. Hinton went into action the first week of May, calling a town meeting to discuss ideas for protecting Weeks Bay, an estuary off Mobile Bay that supports 19 federally protected species, including bald eagles and wood storks. The residents came up with a solution that is unique on the gulf, said Malissa Valdes, a spokeswoman for the unified command, which approves all responses in federally governed waters.

From the start, the townspeople were unsatisfied with the unified command’s plan for Weeks Bay — a strand of floating surface barriers known as boom stretched across the bay’s mouth. Because of tidal currents, any oil on top of the water could splash over the boom, then into the bay and up the Fish and Magnolia Rivers into nurseries for area wildlife. A plan to string boom across Mobile Bay failed when water shredded the barrier.

Mr. Hinton’s solution was simple: run a wall of barges across the mouth of Weeks Bay to block the current, then run five layers of boom behind it — two to block the oil, and three strands of absorbent boom to soak up any oil that got through the containment layers.

The town bought the boom right away, before an increase in demand nearly quadrupled the price. Money for the project came from the state, which received $25 million from BP for emergency response efforts.

“We’re not biologists or engineers or scientists,” Mr. Hinton said. “We took common sense and what we knew about the water from living here. I’m pretty proud of our little plan.”

Between rain showers on Sunday, two dozen volunteer firefighters and teenage explorers laid out the layers of boom, while a tugboat and a crane moved nine barges into place, anchored by 40-foot spikes, with a closeable 100-foot gap for boats to pass through.

To seal the bay entirely they would need approval from unified command. But they are resolved to close it at the first sight of nearby oil, with or without approval, said Charles S. Houser, the mayor of Magnolia Springs, who earns a monthly salary of $100.

“We’re not going to wait for BP,” Mr. Houser said. “If we saw oil right there we’d close the bay right now. The lesson we learned from Louisiana is to act, not wait. We’ll ask for forgiveness later.”

The biggest challenge, Mr. Hinton said, has been dealing with BP and the unified command bureaucracy. The 36 fire chiefs in Baldwin County here passed a resolution to censure BP for poor communications with fire crews.

Mr. Hinton said that so far no other communities had contacted him about copying his plan. “A fire chief told me, ‘Jamie, you can slow down in your preparations, the federal government is going to take care of it.’ I said, ‘Meaning the way they took care of Katrina, Ivan and the Valdez spill?’ ”

He added: “If you wait on BP, it’ll be like Louisiana. They had a month to protect the marshes. The Bible says the good Lord made the world in seven days. I’m not going to risk what happened in Louisiana happening here.”

Special thanks to Linda Young

For Immediate Release
Date: Tuesday, June 8, 2010
 

CONTACT:    Jim Manley, (202) 224-2939
 
REID SPOKESMAN: REPUBLICANS PUSH FOR $47 BILLION GIVEAWAY TO BIG OIL, PROTECTING YET ANOTHER SPECIAL INTEREST OVER THE MIDDLE CLASS
 
Washington, DC- Jim Manley, spokesman for Nevada Senator Harry Reid, released the following statement today  regarding the Murkowski resolution of disapproval, which amounts to a Republican giveaway to big oil companies:
 
“Even with thousands of barrels of oil still gushing into the Gulf, Republicans are trying to hand a $47 billion giveaway to big oil companies later this week.
 
“This giveaway, otherwise known as the Murkowski disapproval resolution, is backed by oil company lobbyists because it would increase the nation’s consumption of oil by at least 455 million barrels, and probably waste several billion more. This latest attempt by Republicans to protect big oil companies comes after they repeatedly blocked Democrats’ attempts to hold BP fully accountable for its negligence by increasing the grossly insufficient $75 million oil spill liability cap.
 
“With Republicans standing up for Wall Street, health insurance companies and now big oil companies, this begs the question – is there any special interest Republicans will not protect?”

Thanks to Richard Charter

from our “oh, swell” department….
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/09/us/09spill.html
 
June 8, 2010

By JUSTIN GILLIS, CAMPBELL ROBERTSON and JOHN BRODER

The government confirmed Tuesday that plumes of dispersed oil were spreading far below the ocean surface from the leaking well in the Gulf of Mexico, raising fresh concerns about the potential impact of the spill on sea life.
Tests conducted by researchers at the University of South Florida found that the concentrations of oil-related chemicals in the water were generally low. Still, the tests confirmed that some toxic compounds that would normally be expected to evaporate from the surface in a shallow-water oil spill were instead spreading through the ocean in the Deepwater Horizon leak.

Joe Raedle/Getty Images

Workers cleaned oil residue that washed up on Pensacola Beach in Florida on Monday.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which helped to fund the research, said it was still working to get a better handle on the potential impact of the spill on fish, corals and other wildlife. Jane Lubchenco, the NOAA administrator, said the agency was doing its best to determine “where the oil is going, and where it is at the surface, and where it might be below the surface, and what the consequences of that oil will be to coastal communities as well as to the health of the gulf.”
The University of South Florida tests confirmed that detectable levels of petroleum compounds had traveled as far as 42 miles northeast of the leaking well in the Gulf of Mexico.
The announcement of test results appeared to confirm information first presented three weeks ago by another group of researchers, who found evidence of large plumes of dispersed oil droplets in the deep ocean, with the largest plume stretching west and southwest of the well. Their findings suggested that a significant amount of oil could be spreading through the deep ocean in plumes or layers of highly dispersed oil, rather than rising to the surface.
Those scientists have not yet completed their analysis of the water samples they collected, but one of them, Samantha Joye of the University of Georgia, held a news conference Tuesday where she presented detailed instrument readings. Those readings confirm that a large plume, probably consisting of hydrocarbons from the leak, stretches through the deep ocean for at least 15 miles west of the gushing oil well, Dr. Joye said.
Bacteria appear to be consuming the oil-related compounds at a furious pace, Dr. Joye said. That is depleting the water of oxygen, she said, though not yet to a level that would kill sea creatures.
The announcement of test results on the plumes came in a morning news conference in which the national commander of the response to the spill, Adm. Thad W. Allen of the Coast Guard, said that BP’s new containment cap had captured 14,482 barrels of oil in the most recent 24-hour period, though several of the vents on the cap remain open. The captured oil is being brought to the surface for processing, though a great deal of oil is still leaking out at the ocean floor.
The new figures bring the total collected over four days to about 42,500 barrels of oil, while 30.6-million cubic feet of natural gas has been flared off.
Responding to a reporter’s question about why more progress has not been made, Admiral Allen responded: “I have never said this is going well. We’re throwing everything at it that we’ve got. I’ve said time and time again that nothing good happens when oil is on the water.”
-
Earlier Tuesday, President Obama said he would have fired BP’s chief executive, Tony Hayward, over the handling of the oil spill if Mr. Hayward worked for him. Mr. Obama’s remarks, part of an interview on NBC’s “Today” show , came as the president was defending his own response to what is being called the nation’s worst environmental disaster.
Critics have said that Mr. Obama has not displayed enough outrage over the spill, which resulted from an explosion on a drilling rig on April 20 that killed 11 workers.
“I don’t sit around just talking to experts because this is a college seminar,” Mr. Obama told the show’s host, Matt Lauer, in an interview conducted Monday in Kalamazoo, Mich. “We talk to these folks because they potentially have the best answer, so I know whose ass to kick.”
The Interior Department was preparing on Tuesday to release new safety and environmental rules that would allow shallow-water drilling in the Gulf of Mexico to resume. The step would answer concerns from the energy industry and local officials that the freeze on all drilling in the gulf is putting hundreds of people out of work and denying the industry millions of dollars in revenue.
The Obama administration declared a six-month moratorium on deep-water drilling in the aftermath of the BP spill, but said that it would allow exploration and production wells to continue operating in water less than 500 feet deep. Even so, it essentially halted shallow-water drilling operations while the new guidelines were being written. Those new rules are expected as soon as Tuesday afternoon from the Minerals Management Service, the Interior Department unit responsible for policing offshore operations.
Well operators complained that the wait for the new guidelines was causing hardship across the gulf. The president of the National Ocean Industries Association wrote in a letter on Monday, “Although as this accident shows, one accident is one too many, a lengthy shutdown of drilling will only multiply the economic and emotional stress and loss of jobs that has already devastated the region.” The trade group official, Randall Luthi, a former director of MMS, said that offshore drilling is responsible for 200,000 jobs along the gulf coast and 30 percent of the nation’s domestic oil production.
An Interior Department official said that the new rules would clarify how shallow-water drillers could meet safety and environmental regulations and resume operations.
“Pulling back exploration plans and development plans and requiring them to be updated with new information is consistent with this cautious approach and will ensure that new safety standards and risk considerations are incorporated into those planning documents,” the agency said in a statement.

 
Joseph Berger contributed reporting from New York.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://blog.al.com/live/2010/06/another_gulf_oil_spill_well_ne.html

By Ben Raines
June 07, 2010, 6:20PM
The Deepwater Horizon is not the only well leaking oil into the Gulf of Mexico for the last month.

A nearby drilling rig, the Ocean Saratoga, has been leaking since at least April 30, according to a federal document.

While the leak is decidedly smaller than the Deepwater Horizon spill, a 10-mile-long slick emanating from the Ocean Saratoga is visible from space in multiple images gathered by Skytruth.org, which monitors environmental problems using satellites.

Federal officials did not immediately respond when asked about the size of the leak, how long it had been flowing, or whether it was possible to plug it.

Skytruth first reported the leak on its website on May 15. Federal officials mentioned it in the May 1 trajectory map for the Deepwater Horizon spill, stating that oil from the Ocean Saratoga spill might also be washing ashore in Louisiana.

The only other mention the Press-Register was able to find of the spill in federal documents occurred in a May 17 transcript of a U.S. Coast Guard media conference. In that transcript, Admiral Mary Landry said that she was unaware there was another drilling rig leaking oil in the Gulf.

Officials with Diamond Offshore, which owns the drilling rig, said that they could not comment on the ongoing spill and referred the Press-Register to well owner Taylor Energy Co., which hired Diamond. Taylor Energy officials did not return calls seeking comment.

Saturday, the Southwings environmental group flew over the Ocean Saratoga with photographer J. Henry Fair of Industrial Scars.com and returned with photos that appear to show a large oil crew boat pumping dispersants into the water at the spill site.

“It appeared the crew boat had barrels of dispersant on board,” said Tom Hutchings of Southwings, a volunteer organization of pilots who monitor environmental problems from airplanes.

Henry Fair said that his photos show a large hose coming off the boat and disappearing into the water with several buoys tied to it. It was unclear how far the hose extended underwater.

“I see a hose going over the side. The boat was not moving, but it was making a wake, disturbing the water a lot,” Fair said. “I see a glossy slick that one would usually identify as petroleum, and it goes a long way away.”

Officials at the National Response Center said that the spill had been reported, but would not say when it began. The U.S. Coast Guard did not immediately respond to e-mails seeking comment.

“We accidentally discovered this spill looking at the Deepwater Horizon images. The question is, what would we see if we were systematically looking at the offshore industry?” said John Amos with Skytruth.org. “Is this an aberration, or are things like this going on all the time? That’s why we are calling for public, transparent monitoring everywhere offshore drilling is going on in U.S. waters.”
____________

(Courtesy industrialscars.com/J. Henry Fair)
A crew boat appears to be spraying dispersant on a slick emanating from the Diamond Offshore drilling rig Ocean Saratoga, working in deepwater about 12 miles off the tip of Louisiana. Skytruth, which monitors environmental problems via satellite, discovered the apparent leak three weeks ago in a satellite image.

Thanks to Richard Charter

BY TIMOTHY O’HARA Citizen Staff
tohara@keysnews.com

The two vessels will run along paths north of the Tortugas in search of any weathered oil products such as light sheen or tar balls that potentially could threaten the Keys, and ultimately Florida’s east coast. They will be fitted with “Neuston nets,” large and relatively long nets used for sampling substantial volumes of water, said Joint Incident Command spokeswoman Diana Friedhoff-Miller.

The monitoring efforts are intended to provide a minimum of 48 hours’ notice so responders can maximize preparedness and response activities and notify the public, the Joint Incident Command said in a prepared statement.

One of the vessels will start looking 30 miles northwest of the Tortugas and the other will start 54 miles northwest of the seven-island chain. One of the vessels already is patrolling an area off the Tortugas, and the other is slated to leave Robbie’s Marina on Stock Island today. The patrols will run from four to 10 days, Friedhoff-Miller said.

Additional vessels and aircraft patrols may be implemented as necessary to provide early warning detection of any weathered oil products, officials said.

Some oil from the Deepwater Horizon spill has made its way to the Loop Current, which loops north from the Gulf Stream into the Gulf of Mexico, then down Florida’s west coast and through the Florida Straits.

While National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) projection maps show a clockwise spinning eddy has broken off the Loop Current and appears to be keeping oil sheens and tar balls away from the Keys, a University of South Florida computer model and satellite images show two small, but separate, patches of oil were in the Florida Straits south of Key West on Sunday.

The areas to be patrolled include a section off the Tortugas that the National Marine Fisheries Service briefly closed to fishing last week due to concerns of oil contamination.

The fishing was shut down for roughly 24 hours before the ban was lifted. 

SITUATION REPORT

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said the oil plume on Monday was less than five miles from Pensacola and 260 miles from St. Petersburg, with non-contiguous sheens and scattered tar balls closer. Southwest winds pushed sheen and tar balls toward the western Panhandle, with confirmed cases from Escambia to Walton counties.

June 7, 2010

Dear friends of Florida waters: 

I just want to give you an update on the spill.  First of all thank you again for your emails, letters and phone calls on the oil disaster to the state officials.  It is making a difference.  I have received so many follow-up emails from you, with the outstanding contacts that you have made through your groups, communities and friends.  I am amazed by how far and wide we reach.  We have seen Governor Crist finally start asking for more money from BP, first an additional $50 million last week and then another $100 million was requested over the weekend.  I’m not sure how that money will be allocated if the state receives it, but I do know that our local governments are begging for equipment and resources to clean up the oil and they are not getting cooperation from BP.  The state is still not taking the type of proactive steps to protect our shores that the Clean Water Network of FL and our local governments expect to be taken.  So please continue to forward any and all information that you receive from me, to your local government, state officials and other helpful contacts that may be in a position to help.

Before I go any further, I want to give you a bit of good news.  I just finished an hour long TV interview with the Canadian Broadcasting Corp about the spill.  The reporter shared with me that in two days there will be a big event in Mobile, Alabama where the Canadian Ambassador to the US will officially present a bunch of off-shore boom to the US.  Apparently this is not the pathetic little boom that BP and the state are using, which is designed to be used around construction sites and not in the Gulf of Mexico or in open waters (it’s too small for that). This is real boom that the Canadian government keeps on hand in case there’s a spill.  Hmmmm . . . Now there’s a novel idea.

I encourage you to watch the internet for news stories, as well as our facebook pages for Clean Water Network of FL and Florida Clean Water Network.  Also our website (address below) which I have been updating less frequently, but it has our citizens’ tool kit and other news.  I can also send you the full toolkit by email it you need for me to. 

You have probably seen Admiral Thad Allen on TV, telling us that this is going to continue being an issue for the rest of this year.  Excuse me, Admiral but this is going to be an issue for years and we at the Clean Water Network of FL and our partners are trying to think long-term as well as what needs to be done immediately.  While it is impossible to know what the future will bring, we can anticipate likelihoods and urge our state, federal and local governments to be proactive on getting protections in place in advance.  A good example of wise, proactive government actions can be found in Walton County, where a rare resource called “dune-lakes” are found.  They exist at only one other place in the world.  Walton County is currently building berms to block Gulf waters from entering these lakes, which are primarily fresh water except during rare occasions when the Gulf gets high enough to come over the low natural berms, such as during a hurricane.  It would be devastating for the oil-contaminated Gulf to get into these lakes.  The County is building a double set of berms across each lake and then putting booms behind the second berm.  In my opinion, this is the type of proactive work that should be provided by the state, but is not happening.

There was an article in the Gannett papers over the weekend where Mike Sole told the reporter that the best oil booms we have in Florida are our beaches.  That would be unbelievable to me if I had not been dealing with Mr. Sole over the past several years and had the opportunity to learn first hand how little he cares for Florida’s resources.  A local newspaper reported a few weeks ago (and this was confirmed to me by a local environmental leader who also heard it) that Mr. Sole told a district BP representative in a meeting about the oil spill that BP has no need to worry in the Panhandle, because DEP would take good care of them.  Whew!!! That is bold, but he knows that he answers to the leadership of the Florida Legislature and they are completely in cahoots with big oil.  Please do not be fooled by his mild manner and seemingly humble countenance.  He is not on our side!

It is disappointing to hear the men in charge for the feds or the state, speak in a way that sounds like they are being deliberately misleading.  I think we know that we cannot trust their judgment (at a minimum) or their integrity (possibility).  For the uninformed, they come across as sincere, but clearly they are both compromised.  Sorry to say.  I wish we had someone we could go to for real, honest, cutting-edge information.  I sincerely hope that if the oil continues to spread to other parts of Florida, that our efforts to strengthen protection for our waters in the Panhandle, will  be helpful to the rest of Florida’s coast.

On a more positive note, I can report that BP contract workers are keeping some of the beaches very clean of oil and even cigarette butts.  The clean-up efforts seem to be spotty, but at least here on Navarre Beach where I live, the beach is being kept in immaculate shape.  So far.  The air is a different story and at various times during the day and night, the odor from the oil can be mild to very strong. 

Believe it or not, we are still working on all of our other projects that are important to Florida’s waters such as the new designated use (unswimmable/barely fishable waters), Buckeye pulpmill, TMDLs/Impaired Waters Rule and numeric nutrient criteria.  I’m going to send you an update on those issues and ask for help again, but in a separate email.  This one is too long already.  Thank you to everyone who made it all the way to this point.  You are real troopers and I appreciate you more than you can know.

For all the creatures in the Gulf,

Linda Young
Director

http://animals.change.org/blog/view/bp_tries_to_block_photos_of_dead_wildlife

by Laura Goldman
June 05, 2010 07:30 AM (PT)
For animal lovers, one of the most heartbreaking aspects of the Gulf spill is the oil-drenched wildlife washing up on shore. If you’re too horrified to look at any photos, you’re in luck – BP doesn’t want you to see them.

As of Friday morning, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s tally of dead animals collected in the Gulf area was 527 birds, 235 sea turtles (six to nine times the average rate), and 30 mammals, including dolphins. Yesterday morning, the spill washed over Queen Bess Island (called “Bird Island” by locals), which is a habitat for Louisiana brown pelicans, the state bird that was once an endangered species. Forty-one of the birds were coated with oil, and that number is expected to rise.

Have you seen the terrible pictures of all this carnage? Neither have I. And neither has anyone else.

Wonder why? The New York Daily News reported on Wednesday that BP has ordered its contractors not to share pictures or otherwise publicize the scores of dead and injured wildlife.

An unnamed BP contractor gave a reporter a very different tour from the one presented to President Obama during his recent visit. Among the “highlights,” if that’s what they can be called, was a decomposing dolphin that the worker said had been found filled with oil.
The shoreline grass of Queen Bess Island was covered with stricken marine life, some dead and some struggling to breathe. The normally white heads of pelicans were dark with oil.

The worker said BP was insistent it didn’t want any photos of the dead animals. “There is a lot of coverup for BP,” the worker told the reporter. “They know the ocean will wipe away most of the evidence.”

As extra assurance that most of us will never see photographic or any other evidence of the true extent of the carnage, Louisiana residents said BP quickly whisks off dead and injured wildlife to inaccessible buildings and offshore ships. Out of sight, out of mind … but forever in locals’ memories.

New York Daily News reporters trying to get a closer look at the disaster were escorted from a beach by police who said they were taking orders from BP. Even Louisiana residents have been required to sign non-disclosures.

Really, BP? Did you not get the memo this isn’t a police state? You may be able to control politicians by lining their pockets, but your bucks stop there. This disaster is going to affect all of us, and we have every right to see the extent of the damage.

In an encouraging development, this week Charlie Riedel of the Associated Press was somehow able to bypass BP’s myriad roadblocks and snap some appalling photos. They may make us want to shield our eyes, but it’s important we don’t bury our heads just as BP would love for us to do.

Photo Credit: marinephotobank

Laura Goldman is an award-winning writer and longtime animal advocate who lives in the Los Angeles area with two pit bull mix pound pups.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

by David Helvarg President, Blue Frontier Campaign

Thanks David; you’re way with words goes right to my heart.  DV

It was a windy day, feisty like the gal. Although she used to say I never looked happier than when I was coming out of the water after getting beaten up by the waves, the ocean can also provide solace, remind us that we are part of something larger, even when large parts of our own souls have drifted away.

Five years later I returned to Rodeo Beach where oil had come ashore. Behind the orange plastic fencing and pollution warning signs fifty-eight contract workers in yellow hazmat suits were removing oil stained boulders and scraping away the contaminated sand with a front loader called a Bobcat. We’d seen real bobcats around there and I just hoped they didn’t find any dead seabirds to feed on as toxins tend to bio-accumulate up the food chain. I’d come to the beach for a Coast Guard press conference before going out with them to do a damage assessment in parts of Richardson Bay where Nancy and I used to live and it all felt like sacrilege.

This was during the 2007 Cosco Busan spill when a large container ship hit the San Francisco Bay Bridge spilling 53,500 gallons of toxic bunker fuel into the Bay, though the initial estimates by the Ship’s captain were far lower. Three years later you can still find remnant oil in the wetlands near where I live and the Bay’s herring fishery has yet to recover.

According to conservative government estimates the BP Deepwater Horizon’s almost mile-deep wellhead has pumped 500 times a Cosco Busan spill worth of raw petroleum into the Gulf of Mexico since the rig exploded in April.

I remember after Hurricane Katrina spending an evening with a dozen displaced Cajun fishermen who were living in a carport below a three-story office building in Bell Chasse Louisiana. They slept at night on dry patches of carpet in one of the water damaged law offices above. They insisted on sharing the food and beer they had in big coolers with me and told me they weren’t sure they’d move their families back to Buras or Empire or other storm devastated towns I’d seen in Plaquemines Parrish where the world had turned upside down with boats on the land and houses in the water. They would keep catching fish out of the Bayou however. Of that they were certain. Now their livelihoods are at risk from BP’s oil spill as are the wetlands that have sustained their people and culture since 1699 when Pierre Le Moyne landed on the Gulf Coast and reported an abundant game, “and some rather good oysters.”

Oil, unlike some chemicals and vast amounts of plastic polymers we’re also dumping into the sea, will biodegrade over time. In about 40 years much of the damage we’re seeing as the BP spill begins to come ashore will naturally remediate. Of course by then changing weather, ocean productivity and sea level rise linked to the burning of oil and coal will also have radically altered the 40 percent of America’s coastal wetlands now at immediate risk.

I’m deeply tired of wake up calls that don’t seem to wake us up to our intimate and essential connections to the everlasting sea. If the rapid loss of Arctic sea ice linked to climate change won’t do it, if the industrial overfishing of the world’s oceans that threaten commercial extinction of edible fish by mid-century won’t do it, if the loss of over a third of the world’s coral reefs in the blink of an eye in which I’ve lived my life won’t, then I’m not sure an oil spill the size of Connecticut spread throughout the water column and still growing will do it either.

What’s most frustrating is the solutions are known. If you stop killing fish faster than they can reproduce, if you stop producing 100 million tons of single use plastic every year, if you don’t build and dump on salt marshes, mangroves and other protective coastal habitat, if you repair aging sewage systems and don’t use storm drains as toilets, if you move from oil and gas to new energy systems including offshore wind, waves and tides, you can turn the tide. All it takes is our personal and political will.

After Nancy died I thought about returning to war reporting because I knew it was an effective antidote to depression. Instead I founded a non-profit group dedicated to the ocean and seaweed (marine grassroots) organizing thinking that while we’ll probably always have wars we may not always have healthy and abundant seas – or coastal wetlands. I don’t know if it’s too late. All I know for certain is if we don’t try we lose and this salty blue world of ours is too beautiful, scary and sacred to lose.

Special thanks to  David Helvarg

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=118852434823395

The President’s Council on Environmental Quality  is soliciting comments, questions, and other input on Outer Continental Shelf oil and gas exploration and development.   Deadline is June 17th, 2010.   Here’s the link for more info and to post your comments.  It’s easy… go for it.   DV 

http://www.whitehouse.gov/administration/eop/ceq/initiatives/nepa/mms-review-submit

Here are the comments I submitted.  Feel free use any or all of it in your comments:

June 7, 2010

Associate Director for NEPA Oversight

Council on Environmental Quality

722 Jackson Place NW

Washington, DC 20503

Cc: hgreczmiel@ceq.eop.gov

Dear Sirs/Ms.

I write to you today as a native Floridian who has worked for the past 24 years to protect coral reefs from my home in Key West, Florida.  My husband and I founded Reef Relief, a small grassroots environmental organization and even received a Point of Light from President Bush Sr.  We have recently retired so what follows are my personal comments based on that experience.

Every year during that time, I travelled to Washington, D.C.  to meet with our Congressmen and deliver resolutions from all levels of government, business and conservation organizations in the Florida Keys opposing oil and gas development affecting the Florida Keys.  I participated in planning efforts and supported the Outer Continental Shelf Coalition comprised of organizations from all over America that actively worked to oppose the current policy of offshore oil and gas exploration and development in fragile marine areas along our coasts.  We consistently encouraged a progressive, thoughtful energy policy for America based on sustainable, renewable, nonpolluting sources such as solar and wind and promoted conservation of energy use by all Americans.

Now the worst case scenario is upon us as the BP blowout has escalated to the worst environmental catastrophe in America’s history.   What we have been saying all along has now been revealed in graphic detail to all Americans:  our country makes decisions on this important energy source while deliberately dominated  by corporate oil interests with little or no regard for our oceans, marine life and coral reefs that provide so much to all of us.  Not to mention the considerably economic value of our fisheries, tourism, and related industries throughout Florida, Alaska, and other fragile and valuable coastal areas.   As a result, American is entrenched in a serious oil habit, with little incentive for alternatives. 

Annual oil and gas development moratoriums were passed over the years, but no permanent protection has been achieved and now our worst fears have become a reality in the Gulf of Mexico.  And the Gulf Loop Current is carrying it into the Florida Keys.  It’s easy to say “I told you so.”  What’s more important right now is to get it right, before any more time passes and further losses are incurred.

I support and incorporate the following recommendations of the Center for Biologic Diversity as follows.  My  comments in italics expand upon those comments of the Center:

1. A full housecleaning at Interior and even the President’s staff  should begin now to replace all staff with direct ties to the oil and gas industry with qualified, knowledgeable candidates without a conflict of interest and a true desire to serve the public interest. Perhaps it should start with Mr. Salazar who knew or should have known what was going on in MMS. 

Remove former BP executive Sylvia Baca from her job as deputy assistant secretary for land and minerals management. Secretary Salazar expressed outrage at the Inspector General’s finding earlier this week that the revolving door between the oil industry and the Minerals Management Service has undermined the agency’s effectiveness and credibility. He did not mention, however, that in June 2009 he himself appointed a BP executive to oversee the Minerals Management Service.    “Sylvia Baca is a classic example of the revolving door between oil companies and the MMS,” said Suckling. “It was a terrible judgment call to appoint her; it is politically catastrophic to keep her. If Salazar is serious about reform, he needs to start with his own interest-conflicted appointments.”   2. Ban the use of environmental waivers for offshore exploration and production plans. Such waivers are designed for very small-impact projects such as constructing hiking trails and outhouses. There is no possible scenario in which an offshore drilling project – whether deepwater, ultradeepwater, or shallow water – can be considered a non-threat to the environment, economy, and endangered species.   It is actually a disservice to the bidders to allow plans that would be denied at a later phase of the permitting process to proceed any further than this point.  It creates an inference of acceptability when in fact, the plan may be inherently dangerous, faulty, environmentally flawed or otherwise inappropriate for the site proposed.

3. Rescind all drilling approvals issued with environmental waivers. Hundreds of dangerous offshore oil platforms are operating today in the Gulf of Mexico without having undergone any environmental review. These dangerous drilling projects are operating illegally and threaten the Gulf with additional oil spills. Just today, a new spill was cited in the Gulf. Is anyone in a position of authority doing any monitoring of current activities?  This should apply to Alaska oil industry operations as well.  Just last week a spill occurred along the Alaska pipeline that could have been prevented. Offshore platforms are not the only vulnerable oil and gas operations currently permitted by MMS.

4. Rescind the Interior Department’s plan to open up new areas on the Atlantic Coast, eastern Gulf of Mexico, and Alaska to offshore oil drilling. The president’s announcement, made on March 31, 2010, three weeks before the BP explosion, was made on the false premise that offshore oil drilling is safe.  Many of these areas have been under Congressional moratoria for years; there’s a good reason for protecting these valuable coastal areas and they are also inconsistent with certain existing military operations. And now we know we cannot depend upon false plans submitted by the industry that it can be done safely. 
5. Permanently ban all new offshore oil drilling, beginning in Alaska. As a nation, we need to transition to clean energy sources such as sun and wind as fast as possible. Pushing forward with new, dangerous, and dirty offshore oil drilling sends the wrong signal to energy companies and technology developers. Continued subsidizing of Big Oil is a major hindrance to our nation’s development of clean energy.  Florida is the Sunshine State; why isn’t solar a major industry here?  Public utilities should be encouraged by government policy to invest in solar instead of dangerous nuclear power, which still has no satisfactory long term disposal solution. 

6.  Require that current oil lessees fund the development and adoption of safe, alternative oil spill planning and deployment technologies such as microbes and other emerging solutions to oil pollution.  Oil spill response and deployment planning is glaringly absent from the advances so proudly espoused by the oil industry.  The same strategies that were used 30 years ago are still being relied upon by the industry for the Gulf spill today without regard to the consequences of drilling deeper.  The dispersant being used by BP is banned in the UK, and is deathly for coral reef ecosystems. Using dispersants in areas with coral reefs and other highly productive ocean environments destroys all sea life exposed to it; it is taken up into the food chain as it settles on the bottom; it prevents new growth on the bottom and smothers all existing life, and then creates  residual continuing impacts on marine life reproduction and growth patterns for generations.   The  strategy of letting oil come ashore beaches and then cleaning it up is counterproductive and ineffective. Oil is still found in the sand along the shore in Valdez. It should be removed at the source of the spill immediately.  Burning oil on the surface creates unacceptable air pollution consequences.  Plans should be implemented immediately rather than waiting for accidental oil spills to damage marinelife and shorelines. If we must allow drilling while we transition to sustainable energy sources, it should be contingent on ecofriendly spill and blowout cleanup plans.

7. End all tax exemptions and advantages to the oil and gas industry, which pays less in U.S. taxes than the average American family.   There is no rationale for global energy giants to receive tax breaks from our country when we are in an economic crisis.  All royalties due to the US by such companies should be closely monitored for compliance and payments enforced in a timely manner.  This oversight has been sadly lacking on the part of MMS.

8.  Insure complete press access to spill sites. Freedom of the press is the hallmark of our democracy.   Currently, reporters are being excluded from BP spill sites on the basis of safety, yet they will not let clean-up workers wear masks. And the U.S. Coast Guard is helping to enforce their private rules to public shorelines.   This is a double standard designed to restrict public knowledge of their actions. Workers going to the hospital for treatment of spill-related symptoms have their clothes confiscated by BP.    

9.  Increase government oversight of how the cleanup operations occur.  Even as President Obama says he is in control, BP continues to do as it pleases.  We should encourage the utilization of local, onsite knowledgeable resources with the capacity to implement cleanup plans immediately.  BP,  for example,  is using one firm to treat injured seabirds, when in fact, there are local organizations in all coastal areas that have the facilities, expertise and ability to do so.   This should apply to injured sea turtles and dolphins as well.  Local boaters in the Florida Keys could be mobilized to boom off all the wildlife refuges and coral reefs.   Supporting the local economy is the least the oil giants could do in the event of a spill that impacts many coastal economies.

10.  Invest in an aggressive program of developing renewal energy for America and encourage all Americans to conserve energy.  Now.   

Thank you for the opportunity to present my viewpoint. I hope you can improve government especially as it relates to offshore oil and gas development in America.  There is no better time. 

Very truly yours,

DeeVon Quirolo 

dquirolo@gmail.com

1223 Royal Street

Key West, Florida 33040

http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/06/07/gulf.oil.plume/?hpt=T1

St. Petersburg, Florida (CNN) — As if the pictures of birds, fish and animals killed by floating oil in the Gulf of Mexico are not disturbing enough, scientists now say they have found evidence of another danger lurking underwater.

The University of South Florida recently discovered a second oil plume in the northeastern Gulf. The first plume was found by Mississippi universities in early May.

USF has concluded microscopic oil droplets are forming deep water oil plumes. After a weeklong analysis of water samples, USF scientists found more oil in deeper water.

“These hydrocarbons are from depth and not associated with sinking degraded oil but associated with the source of the Deep Horizon well head,” said USF Chemical Oceanographer David Hollander.

Through isotopic or microscopic fingerprinting, Hollander and his USF crew were able to show the oil in the plume came from BP’s blown-out oil well. The surface oil’s so-called fingerprint matched the tiny underwater droplet’s fingerprint.

“We’ve taken molecular isotopic approaches which is like a fingerprint on a smoking gun,” Hollander said.

BP has not commented on the latest development but in the past denied underwater oil plumes exist.

“The oil is on the surface,” said BP’s Chief Executive Officer Tony Hayward. “There aren’t any plumes.”

Yet BP’s Managing Director Bob Dudley said recently, “We’re all absolutely taking these ideas seriously and looking at them.”

Scientists on board the university’s research vessel Weatherbird II were not able to find the dissolved hydrocarbon or oil by sight. Instead the crew received sensor signatures from the equipment deployed into the water since the plumes appear to be clear.

USF is unsure on the exact size of the plumes.

“There are indications this is fairly wide spread,” said the USF oceanographer. “There is probably more than one leg of this plume.”

Scientist are concerned what effect the oil, not to mention the dissolvents used to break up the oil, will have on marine life.

Laboratory tests show bacteria have begun eating some elements of the dissolved hydrocarbons. But the effect on fish “is what needs to be understood,” said Hollander. “We are in uncharted territory.”

Water samples collected by USF were sent to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration labs. NOAA has yet to comment on their conclusions.

NOAA and USF will hold a joint press conference Tuesday morning at the university’s St. Petersburg campus to release their final findings.

Special thanks to Craig Q

Going on a tip from Sky Truth, world renowned photographer Henry Fair, SouthWings pilot Tom Hutchings and Hurricane Creekkeeper, John L. Wathen Flew a photo mission over the BP Slick and beyond. At about 12 miles off the mouth of the Mississippi River we encountered another leaking oil rig! The plume was either coming from the drilling operation or the boat itself. In any case it is large enough to be reported.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vWHLrcxLVkg
Spread it around
John L. Wathen
Hurricane Creekkeeper,
Friends of Hurricane Creek

Members of
WATERKEEPER Alliance
http://www.waterkeeper.org

Who has the authority to say someone else
is not being a good steward of the environment?

Anyone who notices.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

June 7th, 2010

This post was received from a “friend of the wilderness” who wishes not to be identified, but tells a revealing story about how oiled seabirds are treated in Louisiana.  DV

I returned from Ft. Jackson after days with Tri-State and IBRRC.  Very impressive, hard-working and organized groups I might add.  They were contracted by BP to handle the oiled wildlife (some exceptions like sea-turtles, dolphins etc). 

I will tell you that when I arrived last Monday morning there had been about 52 birds processed to date (excuse the word ‘process’ – I couldn’t think of another).  Some  wild guesses would be that they had maybe 25 still there and 14 of those were taken on Saturday by Fish and Wildlife to be released somewhere in Florida. .. the turn around time being around 10 days.
 
That was the entire spill total after what, 5 weeks?  Something seemed very wrong, at least to us few volunteers (the rest were all staff from California, Delaware and elsewhere).   But…..
 I think it was Thursday night……….they started coming by truck, boat and helicopter.  It was like MASH.
 

By the time I left last night (Sunday night) there were over 300 badly oiled birds logged, mostly pelicans, (and during their nesting season).  They are the lucky ones.  The staff was busy building new cages, adapting the physical plant to accommodate the space needed and bringing in more staff and volunteers.    Think of over 300 mostly pelicans, badly oiled or recuperating, in one place.  Their fish needs alone are staggering.
 
It was very hard work.  If I were 30 again I would still be there.  But I am going back.

June 7th, 2010

Text and photos by DeeVon Quirolo dquirolo@gmail.com  www.reefrelieffounders.com

Key Westers braved the 90 degree noon day sun to take to the street–Duval Street–to join hands and wave handmade signs to express love for the ocean.  Some called for an end to offshore oil.   Residents, business people and even tourists all gathered along Duval Street to join hands at 12:15 am today in a relatively spontaneous event dubbed “Sea to Shining Sea”.   Duval Street runs from the Gulf of Mexico to the Atlantic Ocean.   

Realtor Joanne Tarantino stepped out of her office on Lower Duval to take part.  “We’ve all worked so hard to protect our coral reefs.  We paid extra to have the best waste treatment for Key West.  It’s just a shame that this oil spill happened,”  she noted.

Buco Pantelis ran the length of Duval Street capturing it all on video.  “It was really positive,” he noted.   ”A good reaction from everyone.   People were shoulder to shoulder at the lower end of Duval and more spread out as you headed toward the other end;  I’d say at least a few hundred people were there.”

Sophia Skoglund, a sophomore at Key West High School, said she had written to President Obama.  Her letter included a special request:  “ I am asking you, as a teenager who should have been worrying about finals and summer plans of going to the beach, as a daughter much like your own, and as someone who wanted you in office to represent the people including myself, to do something about the oil spill. I am not unaware at your own frustration and anxiety in the matter. I feel the same. But I am only 15 and have little say in the world. But I do have a right to say how much I love our earth, and would do anything to protect the mangroves to the fish to the beaches that I am fortunate enough to call home.”

Here’s a letter from the daughter of a friend I met at the Sea to Shining Sea demonstration against offshore oil today on Duval Street in Key West.  Everyone joined hands from one end of Duval Street to the other to show support for protecting our gulf and ocean waters.  It was inspiring.   DV

June 7th, 2010

President Obama,
    My name is Sophia. I am going to be a sophomore in High School this upcoming year. When politics affect me specifically I care. I’ve grown up in Key West, FL. It’s an island surrounded by water.
    My entire life I have grown up in the water, I’ve spent so much of my life going to the beach, sailing, going out on the boat, snorking, diving and swimming in these waters. These waters are the home of the third largest reef in the entire world, and home to thousands of life that is not found anywhere other than here.
   I’m sure as a father, souly a father, you have great memories of your family and yourself spending days at the beach, and teaching your children how to swim, and feeling the sand squish between your toes. I am also aware that as a elected representative of our nations people, here to do what right and wanted by the people, you understand the predicament we are in due to the deep water horizon oil spill. It has been about 48 days in counting that the leak has not been stopped. From the views on effect on economy, to the recession, to our waters, to tourism, to the very politics of BP’s responsibility on this matter, we all know there is a major problem in our mitts.
     I am asking you, as a teenager who should have been worrying about finals and summer plans of going to the beach, as a daughter much like your own, and as someone who wanted you in office to represent the people including myself, to do something about the oil spill. I am not unaware at your own frustration and anxiety in the matter. I feel the same. But I am only 15 and have little say in the world. But I do have a right to say how much I love our earth, and would do anything to protect the mangroves to the fish to the beaches that I am fortunate enough to call home.
    BP has not done much about stopping/cleaning up the spill, and who knows when they will. Please, as our President, as a person, as someone who has more resources to do something about this that I, do something about the spill. Listen to the ideas suggested at it all, there are thousands. And we have only failed if we did not try at all.
Please don’t let our nation fail.
Please, I would like this to actually make it to the President’s own eyes. I am not just another person asking him to do something, I am asking him as a real person. A living breathing individual not to just be a face in the crowd.
Respects,
Sophia Skoglund

 http://blogs.wsj.com/source/2010/06/07/bp-captures-more-oil-spill-consequences-grow/

June 7, 2010, 9:42 AM GMT
By James Herron and Jeffrey Sparshott

BP has reported some success in capturing oil leaking from the Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico, but the cost continues to escalate and political pressure mounts on all sides for the embattled company.

CONTAINMENT

BP said Monday that on June 5 the cap it has attached to the top of the leaking well captured 10,500 barrels of oil out of an estimated 12,000 to 19,000 barrels a day gushing from the wellhead. Analysts hailed this as a long overdue success for the embattled company.

“At last BP is able to show some progress on tackling the leak and this will put it in a less damaged position in tackling the political pressure which still remains a threat,” said NCB Stockbrokers analyst Peter Hutton, who upgraded BP to hold from reduce on the news.

CLEANUP

More than 2,600 vessels, 2.2 million feet of containment boom and 2.4 million feet of sorbent boom have been deployed in the response effort. Approximately 368,000 barrels of oily liquid have been skimmed from the surface.

The containment success was providing little comfort to people already affected by oil contamination. In the resort of Gulf Shores, Ala., local officials lamented a flood of vacation cancellations and what they see as a second-rate clean-up operation since tar balls began hitting the white sands over the weekend.

Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal continued political pressure for the construction of 128 miles of sand barrier islands to protect delicate marshes. The Army Corps of Engineers has approved a scaled down version of the plan and BP said it has set aside $360 million to pay for it.

Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour struck a different note, telling Fox News Sunday that the media’s tendency to lump all of the Gulf coastlines and beaches together as victims of the spill was hurting the state’s tourism industry. “We have had virtually no oil,” he said.

COST AND CONSEQUENCES

The cost of cleanup and the efforts to cap the leaking well has now reached $1.25 billion, BP said Monday. [Read BP's latest statement here.]

Estimates of the ultimate bill keep rising as the likelihood of significant compensation payouts and civil or criminal penalties increases. “Our model assumes $12 billion impact on operating costs from the clean-up and weaker ability to progress on cost savings,” said Hutton. “But the majority of assumed litigation costs are beyond 2011,” he added.

BP reassured investors Friday that it has the financial strength to meet this cost, but, “the political backdrop makes it difficult for BP to maintain its existing level of dividend even if the balance sheet does,” said Hutton

Congressional Democrats plan an aggressive legislative response to the oil disaster bringing much stricter regulations. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said he wants a “comprehensive clean-energy bill” on the Senate floor by July, aimed at pushing the economy to “kick the oil habit.”

Other initiatives likely to be considered are raising the cap on oil-spill liability to $10 billion, improvements in oil-worker safety, a toughening of environmental protections for offshore drilling and a further revamping of the Minerals Management Service. Republicans plan to counter with legislation targeting BP rather than the oil industry as a whole.

BP was one of the few companies to see its shares rise in London Monday morning, following the containment success. However, it remains at less than two-thirds its price before the disaster and analysts remain cautious about whether the company is a good investment.

WHAT’S NEXT?

BP plans to increase the efficiency of the containment cap and the volume of oil it is capturing by using hoses attached to the blowout preventer manifold to transport some of the leaking oil through a separate pipeline to the surface. This method is expected to be deployed mid-June, the company said.

BP plans by early July to have attached a more flexible hose linking the surface vessel storing the oil to the top of the pipeline coming from the cap on the well. This will allow, “greatest flexibility for operations during a hurricane,” BP said. The impact a hurricane could have on the containment operation has become a major concern.

BP also plans a new advertising campaign aimed at salvaging its image in the U.S. The $50 million campaign features Chief Executive Tony Hayward, who has come under severe and personal criticism in the U.S., apologizing and promising to pay the full bill for the spill. U.S. President Barack Obama has already criticized BP for spending on advertising while oil continues to leak.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://weblogs.baltimoresun.com/sports/outdoors/blog/2010/06/obama_should_fire_ken_salazar.html
JUNE 4, 2010
It’s time for him to go.

We’ve seen enough of Ken Salazar.

President Obama should take his Interior secretary with him to the Gulf today and forget to bring him back.

He’s been useless, and never more so than right now. He casts no shadow.
The president has already admitted he screwed the pooch on the spill response. What’s one more mea culpa when the entire Gulf region is starting to smell like a gigantic Jiffy Lube?

It’s not as if Obama couldn’t find a replacement. Arizona Congressman Raul Grijalva immediately comes to mind. How about Sen. Maria Cantwell of Washington, who has fought big oil and has a business background? Pick a Udall–Tom or Mark–both senators and both with a family history of caring for the environment.

Salazar, the former Colorado senator, has already proven he’s out of his league. Pressed last month by a Congressional panel about his response to the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster, Salazar responded that he sent a top aide to the region “without a change of underwear.”

What a twofer: pitifully lacking in detail AND too much information.

Let’s review his tenure as a member of Obama’s cabinet.

He assumed the post in January 2009, knowing that during six of the last eight years, his department was run by Gale Norton, a political hack who fled to take a cushy job at Shell Oil.

Further, there’s a scathing 2007 report sitting on his desk that says the Minerals Mangement Service office in Denver is “a dysfunctional organization that has been riddled with conflicts of interest, unprofessional behavior and a free-for-all atmosphere” that included some of your employees doing drugs and having sex with the very people they’re supposed to be keeping an eye on.

But instead of taking a blowtorch to the infected parts of the operation, he scooted about the country doing photo opportunities in front of really groovy places run by his National Park Service.

In March 2009, he called the controversy surrounding an 11th-hour Bush administration decision to allow people to carry concealed, loaded guns in national parks a “distraction” to Americans and his department.

The folks who know better–the ones who raise money for parks and former employees–disagreed. The National Parks Conservation Association and the Coalition of National Park Service Retirees filed suit, asking that the no loaded guns policy established under the Reagan administration be restored.

Salazar hired Sylvia Vaca, a former BP executive, to be deputy administrator for land and minerals management.

Meanwhile, the MMS allowed the operators of the BP Deepwater Horizon rig to cut corners.

And even with oil erupting into the Gulf, Salazar’s underlings approved other underwater drilling permits.

Last week, the Inspector General issued another MMS report that found employees in Louisiana took tickets to sports events, indulged in free lunches and other gifts from oil and gas companies. Thirteen employees had porn on their government computers and others did drugs.

Salazar called the report, “deeply disturbing.”

Really? Is that the best he could do?

The secretary has a plan. He wants to replace MMS with a new bureaucracy to separate the enforcement function from the oil and gas revenue collection operation. In that way, there will be one hand out instead of two.

The name Minerals Management Service would be but a memory. Salazar should be in that category, too.

Cleaning up this mess should start at Interior and with Salazar, who wears a big cowboy hat, but can’t talk the talk or walk the walk.

Posted by Candus Thomson at 8:30 AM

www.1Sky.org

This is well worth reading through; an important summary of what’s going on to address the BP and climate change legislation.  DV

The Senate returns from recess today, and according to Majority Leader Reid (D-NV), discussing energy-related legislation is at the top of their agenda. The BP Spill has the potential to transform the energy debate in Congress. Leadership in the Senate and the White House have an opportunity to pivot off of the BP spill and drive our energy policy in a new direction.   Ironically, that process will begin with a vote on Senator Lisa Murkowski’s (R-AK) “Dirty Air Act,” which would roll back regulations on the oil industry, and make our nation more dependent on oil for years to come. 1Sky and others in the climate community are campaigning to defeat the Dirty Air Act, and sending a clear message to Senators that we need to pivot off of this disaster toward a comprehensive solution that will reduce our tragic dependence on oil and other dirty fossil fuels.
Senate Timeline:

6/7: Congress returns from Memorial Day recess
6/10: Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) meets with relevant committee chairs to chart a path forward on “energy-related” legislation
6/10: Murkowski’s Dirty Air Act up for a vote, needs 51 votes to pass
6/15: Senate Majority Leader Reid meets with Democratic caucus on energy and climate legislation
7/3-7/11: Independence Day Recess
Murkowski’s Dirty Air Act Vote on Thursday

Senator Murkowski will bring her “Dirty Air Act” up for a vote on Thursday, June 10.
Murkowski’s “resolution of disapproval” (S.J.Res. 26), which would gut the Clean Air Act, currently has 41 co-sponsors, and only needs 51 votes to pass.
The vote will be extremely close and advocacy this week is critical. Winning as many votes as possible against Murkowski is a crucial show of support for Clean Air Act regulations that will reduce our dependence on dirty fossil fuels like oil and coal.  It will also embolden Majority Leader Reid (D-NV) in his efforts to move climate and energy reform before the mid-term elections (see below).  http://www.nytimes.com/cwire/2010/05/25/25climatewire-sen-murkowskis-epa-resolution-on-greenhouse-23579.html
1Sky and other climate advocacy organizations will continue to mobilize in opposition to the Dirty Air Act throughout the next week http://www.1sky.org/calls  and http://www.1sky.org/murkowski  
For more information, check out USCAN’s Dirty Air Act page: http://www.usclimatenetwork.org/policy/dirty-air-act-amendment
Comprehensive Legislative Responses to the BP Oil Disaster

On Thursday, Senate Majority Leader Reid (D-NV) wrote a letter to Committee Chairs calling for comprehensive energy legislation and asking them to “provide any recommendations or report legislation, if desired, in your Committee’s jurisdiction, before the Fourth of July recess…” http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/677-e2-wire/101307-reid-pushes-to-move-energy-bill-in-july
The Hill published a story laying out a possible Democratic strategy for passing a comprehensive energy and climate bill that mirrors the strategy used for Wall St Reform:
A Senior Democratic Aide said “The reason we were successful on Wall Street reform is that we were able to show a sharp contrast. We had a foil – Wall Street – and we had an enabler – the Republicans.” To idea is to frame those who vote no as supporters of Big Oil, much like the Democrats used Wall Street to generate the votes for Financial Regulatory Reform. http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/100743-democrats-see-big-oil-as-foil-in-energy-and-climate-debate
The disaster that continues to unfold in the Gulf is increasing political pressure to address our dependence on oil. There are several pieces of legislation already being introduced in the House and Senate that address our oil dependence and the BP disaster.
Senator Dorgan (D-ND) and Senator Alexander (R-TN) introduced the Electric Vehicle Deployment Act of 2010 in the Senate. The same bill was introduced by a bi-partisan group in the House .  http://dorgan.senate.gov/newsroom/record.cfm?id=325317
Senator Sanders (I-VT) introduced the Clean Coasts and Efficient Cars Act which would place a permanent moratorium on offshore drilling and boost fuel-economy standards from 35 mpg to 55 mpg by 2030.  http://sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/news/?id=A90354DF-2892-4EF7-8BAF-F8899521CCA1
Senator Lautenberg (D-NJ) has been blocked 3 times by Senate opposition to his moves to eliminate the $75 million dollar cap on oil companies’ liability. http://lautenberg.senate.gov/newsroom/record.cfm?id=325249&
Senator Merkley (D-OR) joined Senator Menendez (D-NJ) and Senator Nelson (D-FL) to introduce the Close Big Oil Tax Loopholes Act, which would crack down on a series of loopholes that amount to over $20 billion for Big Oil.  http://merkley.senate.gov/newsroom/press/release/?id=F68FED0D-08C0-4DC4-9035-211E28DD9B7E
The EPA announced that their analysis of the Kerry-Lieberman American Power Act Discussion Draft will be finished this week and released to the Senate on Wednesday June 9 (See http://www.1sky.org/files/1Sky-Kerry-Lieberman-APA-Bill-Analysis-May-17-2010.pdf)
BP Oil Disaster Update

BP’s latest attempt to stop the oil leak, called the “cut-and-cap” is progressing according to plan. The “cut” has been successful, and a loosely-fitting “cap” is now in place. This plan is considered risky because slicing away a section of the pipe could increase the flow of oil by as much as 20 percent. Over the weekend, BP engineers captured more than 500,000 gallons of oil but oil continues to leak at an alarming rate.  Meanwhile, U.S. Coast Guard Commander Thad Allen warned that the spill could last well into the fall. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/07/us/07spill.html?hp
BP continues to claim that there are no sub-surface plumes of oil, while Good Morning America visits researchers with discovering proof of their existence. http://wonkroom.thinkprogress.org/2010/06/02/lubchenco-doubts-plumes/
Workers cleaning up the oil are experiencing flu-like symptoms which they claim may be a resultant of the chemical dispersants used to dissipate the oil in the water, although BP and the U.S. Coast Guard continues to say that it is likely food poisoning or dehydration http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/37489625/ns/disaster_in_the_gulf/
1Sky ally, Southern Alliance for Clean Energy, reported on their trip over the Gulf of Mexico in this eye-opening blog: http://blog.cleanenergy.org/2010/05/28/sace-flies-over-gulf/
Less than 2 weeks after Obama’s “6-month ban on deepwater offshore drilling”, there is confusion, even in the media, on the extent of the Obama Administration’s drilling ban.
·         On Wednesday, the Obama Administration approved a new shallow water drilling permit 50 miles off the coast of Louisiana while thousands of barrels continued to pour into the ocean. http://motherjones.com/blue-marble/2010/06/obama-admin-approves-new-drilling-gulf-disaster-continues

There is no moratorium on shallow water drilling according to an Interior Department spokeswoman.  However, the regional supervisor of field operations at the Minerals Management Service (“MMS”) “told a company seeking a permit that ‘until further notice’ no new drilling is being allowed in the Gulf no matter the water depth.”  The contradiction has yet to be clarified by the Obama Administration. http://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory?id=10818393
1Sky and our allies are working to pivot off of the BP Oil Disaster to end our addiction to dirty fossil fuels:
MoveOn.org is hosing vigils across the country on the 50th day since the oil rig explosion.  http://pol.moveon.org/event/events/create.html?action_id=213&id=&t=5
Seize BP is calling for a seizure of BP’s assets to pay for the environmental and economic impacts of the spill on the Gulf Coast.  http://www.seizebp.org
A broad coalition of groups is sponsoring an event called “Hands Across the Sand” on June 26, to call for the protection of our coastal economies and communities and a clean energy economy. http://www.handsacrossthesand.org/

President Obama Calls for Comprehensive Energy and Climate Legislation in Response to BP Disaster

President Obama spoke at Carnegie-Mellon University in Pittsburgh, PA on Wednesday and focused much of his speech the BP Oil Disaster and the need for clean energy legislation in the Senate.  1Sky and our allies nationwide are pushing President Obama hard for more engaged leadership in the debate.
Obama: “The House of Representatives has already passed a comprehensive energy and climate bill, and there is currently a plan in the Senate — a plan that was developed with ideas from Democrats and Republicans — that would achieve the same goal. And, Pittsburgh, I want you to know, the votes may not be there right now, but I intend to find them in the coming months. (Applause.) I will continue to make the case for a clean energy future wherever and whenever I can. (Applause.) I will work with anyone to get this done — and we will get it done.  The time has come, once and for all, for this nation to fully embrace a clean energy future…. And the only way to do that is by finally putting a price on carbon pollution. . . . But the only way the transition to clean energy will ultimately succeed is if the private sector is fully invested in this future — if capital comes off the sidelines and the ingenuity of our entrepreneurs is unleashed. And the only way to do that is by finally putting a price on carbon pollution.”http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/remarks-president-economy-carnegie-mellon-university
 
Gillian Caldwell
Campaign Director, 1Sky
T (301) 270-4550 x221  *  C (202) 446-8811
www.1sky.org  * gillian@1sky.org * www.twitter.com/gillian1Sky
 
1Sky: 1 Climate. 1 Future. 1 Chance.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.bnd.com/2010/06/05/1282619/oil-drilling-a-defining-issue.html

Saturday, Jun. 05, 2010

By WILLIAM E. GIBSON – Sun Sentinel

 WASHINGTON — While oil washing up on Florida Panhandle beaches from the BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico poses the most immediate danger to the state, marine scientists warn that the most frightening threat to much of Florida is a future disaster if offshore drilling spreads farther south.

The spill has turned a long-standing national debate over the hazards and rewards of offshore drilling into a hot-button campaign issue, starting with Florida’s nationally watched Senate race.
Just three weeks before the spill, President Barack Obama proposed opening a vast tract to energy exploration directly in the path of a powerful loop current that carries water from the Gulf of Mexico to the East Coast.

Since the spill, Obama has put that plan on hold by suspending for six months new energy exploration in deep waters along the nation’s coastline. Obama’s future policy may be swayed by the findings of a special commission co-chaired by former Florida Senator Bob Graham.

Yet once the nation’s largest spill is contained, pressures to drill are bound to resume as the energy industry and its allies in Congress press to meet the rising demand for oil and natural gas. Florida’s next senator likely will play a prominent role in that debate.

Marco Rubio, a Republican candidate, reflects those who want to learn from this disaster, take safety precautions and move ahead to tap coastal waters. He is intent on making the United States less dependent on foreign oil, especially from nations like Venezuela that have strained relations with this country.

The energy industry has reinforced Rubio’s position with $44,400 of campaign contributions, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a watchdog group.

Democrat Kendrick Meek sees the spill as a warning of worse disasters to come if drilling is allowed to spread. He is touting his long-standing opposition to near-shore drilling, hoping voter revulsion to the spill will carry him to the Senate.

Meek has received just $5,900 from oil and gas interests during the 2009-2010 campaign.

Gov. Charlie Crist, an independent Senate candidate, reflects Floridians who once welcomed the prospect of jobs and revenue from a growing energy industry but have become disillusioned by the spill and its impact on tourism. Crist has received $13,600 from the energy industry.

Crist has gone from receptiveness to drilling near Florida to trying to ban it forever. He has called for a constitutional ban on drilling in state waters, which extend 10 miles from the Gulf shore.

The current spill defeated the notion that drilling comes without risk, but it leaves the political question of whether the need and reward are so great that the risk is worth taking.

Scientists say they hope political leaders in Washington and Tallahassee take into account the ocean currents when they determine where drilling will be allowed.

“It’s going to be hard to wean ourselves from oil,” acknowledged Frank Muller-Karger, an oceanographer and expert on Gulf currents at the University of South Florida. “People want cheap gas and don’t want to import from other nations.”

“But we need to better understand the risks,” Muller-Karger said. “If there’s a spill and it enters the loop current, it will spread the mess much farther, quicker. We in Florida would be in the same situation that Louisiana is in right now. The areas closer to the spill will get the worst of it almost always.”

Those tracking the spill say it still poses dangers for South Florida, especially if the destroyed well keeps gushing for months and underwater plumes reach the East Coast.

But they say this region may be spared the worst of the spill because it occurred north of the loop current. So far, only small patches have drifted into its path.

The most likely result for South Florida will be tar balls that pass through the Florida Straits, baked by the sun and less toxic after weeks of exposure to water and weather.

If so, the environmental damage to Florida south of the Panhandle will be limited, but the debate over the future of offshore drilling will continue.

Whoever wins the Senate race will find a toxic political environment on Capitol Hill, where pressures to drill are relentless but opposition has hardened.
U.S. Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, D-Weston, Fla., calls the disaster an “I-told-you-so moment” that should reunite Florida’s congressional delegation against offshore drilling.

The state’s once-solid opposition fragmented in recent years when some Florida Republicans bowed to party pressure to expand offshore resources. Republicans in Tallahassee, Fla., and Washington hoped that exploration would produce jobs and oil revenue to plug gaps in the state budget.

Since the spill, drilling proponents have focused on finding the cause and developing precautions that would allow exploration to safely continue.

For those who believe offshore production is a fact of life, it’s just a matter of time before drilling regains political momentum.
“I think the politicians recognize that you just can’t stop production,” said Eric Hamilton, associate director of the Florida Petroleum Council, an industry group that lobbies in Tallahassee for more drilling. “The oil and gas has to come from somewhere.”

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN0613745520100606?type=marketsNews
Protesters at BP gas station call for boycott of company
* Protest called after oil washes up on Pensacola beach
Sun Jun 6, 2010 5:55pm EDT
12:00am PDT

By Michael Peltier
PENSACOLA, Fla., June 6 (Reuters) – Demonstrators converged on a BP (BP.L) service station in Pensacola on Sunday to protest the massive Gulf of Mexico oil spill now affecting northwest Florida.

Several dozen people, including an Elvis impersonator, joined in the protest aimed at mobilizing support for a boycott of the company now responsible for sending oil onto their prized Panhandle beaches.

“I’ve been trying to keep drilling out of Florida waters since the 1990s,” said Pamela Corey, a high school English teacher.

“But so what. You can still drill in Louisiana and it shows up here,” Corey said.

For many, the man-made environmental disaster is the latest in a series of misfortunes to hit Florida including hurricanes and a housing market bust.

“(Hurricane) Ivan (in 2004) took my roof off, the housing market took my business and my house and now this is hampering my comeback,” said Bill Paul, a Pensacola resident with three young children who has scrapped plans to open a restaurant.

“But that’s my personal situation,” Paul added. “To me, this is more about the environment.”

Protester Chris Slick said he felt compelled to help organize Sunday’s demonstration after seeing tar balls wash up on Pensacola Beach and its famous sugar-white sands on Friday.
Until then, Florida had escaped the oil spewing into the Gulf since the April 20 explosion and fire aboard the BP Deepwater Horizon oil rig.

“BP had more than 40 days to get an effort ready and it’s not ready,” Slick said.
Others said government oversight was lacking.

“The bottom line is deregulation caused this,” Pensacola resident Gwen Ward said. “And now we have to put regulation back in force and do whatever we can to clean it up.”

Elvis Presley impersonator David Suhor stopped by the BP station to support the protesters and drum up some business.

“It’s now or never,” Suhor crooned to passersby, many of whom honked horns in support.
(Editing by Eric Beech)  Special thanks to Richard Charter

URL: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/06/magazine/06fob-wwln-t.html?emc=tnt&tntemail0=y

By DAVID LEONHARDT
       

Published: May 31, 2010

In retrospect, the pattern seems clear. Years before the Deepwater Horizon rig blew, BP was developing a reputation as an oil company that took safety risks to save money. An explosion at a Texas refinery killed 15 workers in 2005, and federal regulators and a panel led by James A. Baker III, the former secretary of state, said that cost cutting was partly to blame. The next year, a corroded pipeline in Alaska poured oil into Prudhoe Bay. None other than Joe Barton, a Republican congressman from Texas and a global-warming skeptic, upbraided BP managers for their “seeming indifference to safety and environmental issues.”

Much of this indifference stemmed from an obsession with profits, come what may. But there also appears to have been another factor, one more universally human, at work. The people running BP did a dreadful job of estimating the true chances of events that seemed unlikely – and may even have been unlikely – but that would bring enormous costs.              

Perhaps the easiest way to see this is to consider what BP executives must be thinking today. Surely, given the expense of the clean-up and the hit to BP’s reputation, the executives wish they could go back and spend the extra money to make Deepwater Horizon safer. That they did not suggests that they figured the rig would be fine as it was.        

For all the criticism BP executives may deserve, they are far from the only people to struggle with such low-probability, high-cost events. Nearly everyone does. “These are precisely the kinds of events that are hard for us as humans to get our hands around and react to rationally,” Robert N. Stavins, an environmental economist at Harvard, says. We make two basic – and opposite – types of mistakes. When an event is difficult to imagine, we tend to underestimate its likelihood. This is the proverbial black swan. Most of the people running Deepwater Horizon probably never had a rig explode on them. So they assumed it would not happen, at least not to them.         

Similarly, Ben Bernanke and Alan Greenspan liked to argue, not so long ago, that the national real estate market was not in a bubble because it had never been in one before. Wall Street traders took the same view and built mathematical models that did not allow for the possibility that house prices would decline. And many home buyers signed up for unaffordable mortgages, believing they could refinance or sell the house once its price rose. That’s what house prices did, it seemed.           

On the other hand, when an unlikely event is all too easy to imagine, we often go in the opposite direction and overestimate the odds. After the 9/11 attacks, Americans canceled plane trips and took to the road. There were no terrorist attacks in this country in 2002, yet the additional driving apparently led to an increase in traffic fatalities.           

When the stakes are high enough, it falls to government to help its citizens avoid these entirely human errors. The market, left to its own devices, often cannot do so. Yet in the case of Deepwater Horizon, government policy actually went the other way. It encouraged BP to underestimate the odds of a catastrophe.             

In a little-noticed provision in a 1990 law passed after the Exxon Valdez spill, Congress capped a spiller’s liability over and above cleanup costs at $75 million for a rig spill. Even if the economic damages – to tourism, fishing and the like – stretch into the billions, the responsible party is on the hook for only $75 million. (In this instance, BP has agreed to waive the cap for claims it deems legitimate.) Michael Greenstone, an M.I.T. economist who runs the Hamilton Project in Washington, says the law fundamentally distorts a company’s decision making. Without the cap, executives would have to weigh the possible revenue from a well against the cost of drilling there and the risk of damage. With the cap, they can largely ignore the potential damage beyond cleanup costs. So they end up drilling wells even in places where the damage can be horrific, like close to a shoreline. To put it another way, human frailty helped BP’s executives underestimate the chance of a low-probability, high-cost event. Federal law helped them underestimate the costs.               
In the wake of Deepwater Horizon, Congress and the Obama administration will no doubt be tempted to pass laws meant to reduce the risks of another deep-water disaster. Certainly there are some sensible steps they can take, like lifting the liability cap and freeing regulators from the sway of industry. But it would be foolish to think that the only risks we are still underestimating are the ones that have suddenly become salient.              

The big financial risk is no longer a housing bubble. Instead, it may be the huge deficits that the growth of Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security will cause in coming years – and the possibility that lenders will eventually become nervous about extending credit to Washington. True, some economists and policy makers insist the country should not get worked up about this possibility, because lenders have never soured on the United States government before and show no signs of doing so now. But isn’t that reminiscent of the old Bernanke-Greenspan tune about the housing market?        

Then, of course, there are the greenhouse gases that oil wells (among other things) send into the atmosphere even when the wells function properly. Scientists say the buildup of these gases is already likely to warm the planet by at least three degrees over the next century and cause droughts, storms and more ice-cap melting. The researchers’ estimates have risen recently, too, and it is also possible the planet could get around 12 degrees hotter. That kind of warming could flood major cities and cause parts of Antarctica to collapse.           

Nothing like that has ever happened before. Even imagining it is difficult. It is much easier to hope that the odds of such an outcome are vanishingly small. In fact, it’s only natural to have this hope. But that doesn’t make it wise.

 David Leonhardt is an economics columnist for The Times and a staff writer for the magazine.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

ON BARATARIA BAY, La. – The wildlife apocalypse along the Gulf Coast that everyone has feared for weeks is fast becoming a terrible reality.

Pelicans struggle to free themselves from oil, thick as tar, that gathers in hip-deep pools, while others stretch out useless wings, feathers dripping with crude. Dead birds and dolphins wash ashore, coated in the sludge. Seashells that once glinted pearly white under the hot June sun are stained crimson.

Scenes like this played out along miles of shoreline Saturday, nearly seven weeks after a BP rig exploded and the wellhead a mile below the surface began belching millions of gallon of oil.

“These waters are my backyard, my life,” said boat captain Dave Marino, a firefighter and fishing guide from Myrtle Grove. “I don’t want to say heartbreaking, because that’s been said. It’s a nightmare. It looks like it’s going to be wave after wave of it and nobody can stop it.”

The oil has steadily spread east, washing up in greater quantities in recent days, even as a cap placed by BP over the blownout well began to collect some of the escaping crude. The cap, resembling an upside-down funnel, has captured about 252,000 gallons of oil, according to Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen, the government’s point man for the crisis.

If earlier estimates are correct, that means the cap is capturing from a quarter to as much as half the oil spewing from the blowout each day. But that is a small fraction of the roughly 24 million to 47 million gallons government officials estimate have leaked into the Gulf since the April 20 explosion that killed 11 workers, making it the nation’s largest oil spill ever.

Allen, who said the goal is to gradually raise the amount of the oil being captured, compared the process to stopping the flow of water from a garden hose with a finger: “You don’t want to put your finger down too quickly, or let it off too quickly.”

BP officials are trying to capture as much oil as possible without creating too much pressure or allowing the buildup of ice-like hydrates, which form when water and natural gas combine under high pressures and low temperatures.

President Barack Obama pledged Saturday in his weekly radio and Internet address to fight the spill with the people of the Gulf Coast. His words for oil giant BP PLC were stern: “We will make sure they pay every single dime owed to the people along the Gulf coast.”

But his reassurances offer limited consolation to the people who live and work along the coasts of four states — Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida — now confronting the oil spill firsthand.

In Gulf Shores, Ala., boardwalks leading to hotels were tattooed with oil from beachgoers’ feet. A slick hundreds of yards long washed ashore at a state park, coating the white sand with a thick, red stew. Cleanup workers rushed to contain it in bags, but more washed in before they could remove the first wave of debris.

Alabama Gov. Bob Riley and Allen met for more than an hour Saturday in Mobile, Ala., agreeing to a new plan that would significantly increase protection on the state’s coast with larger booms, beachfront barriers, skimmers and a new system to protect Perdido Bay near the Florida line.

Riley, who was angered by a Coast Guard decision to move boom from Alabama to Louisiana, said the barriers must be up within days for him to be satisfied. Allen said he needed to report to the president before confirming more details of the agreement.

The oil is showing up right at the beginning of the lucrative tourist season, and beachgoers taking to the region’s beaches haven’t been able to escape it.

“This makes me sick,” said Rebecca Thomasson of Knoxville, Tenn., her legs and feet smeared with brown streaks of crude. “We were over in Florida earlier and it was bad there, but it was nothing like this.”

At Pensacola Beach, Erin Tamber, who moved to the area from New Orleans after surviving Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, inspected a beach stained orange by the retreating tide.

“I feel like I’ve gone from owning a piece of paradise to owning a toxic waste dump,” she said.

Back in Louisiana, along the beach at Queen Bess Island, oil pooled several feet deep, trapping birds against containment boom. The futility of their struggle was confirmed when Joe Sartore, a National Geographic photographer, sank thigh deep in oil on nearby East Grand Terre Island and had to be pulled from the tar.

“I would have died if I would have been out here alone,” he said.

With no oil response workers on Queen Bess, Plaquemines Parish coastal zone management director P.J. Hahn decided he could wait no longer, pulling an exhausted brown pelican from the oil, the slime dripping from its wings.

AP – Plaquemines Parish coastal zone director P.J. Hahn lifts an oil-covered pelican which was stuck in oil …

“We’re in the sixth week, you’d think there would be a flotilla of people out here,” Hahn said. “As you can see, we’re so far behind the curve in this thing.”

After six weeks with one to four birds a day coming into Louisiana’s rescue center for oiled birds at Fort Jackson, 53 arrived Thursday and another 13 Friday morning, with more on the way. Federal authorities say 792 dead birds, sea turtles, dolphins and other wildlife have been collected from the Gulf of Mexico and its coastline.

Yet scientists say the wildlife death toll remains relatively modest, well below the tens of thousand of birds, otters and other creatures killed after the Exxon Valdez ran aground in Alaska’s Prince William Sound. The numbers have stayed comparatively low because the Deepwater Horizon rig was 50 miles off the coast and most of the oil has stayed in the open sea. The Valdez ran aground on a reef close to land, in a more enclosed setting.

Experts say the Gulf’s marshes, beaches and coastal waters, which nurture a dazzling array of life, could be transformed into killing fields, though the die-off could take months or years and unfold largely out of sight. The damage could be even greater beneath the water’s surface, where oil and dispersants could devastate zooplankton and tiny invertebrate communities at the base of the aquatic food chain.

“People naturally tend to focus on things that are most conspicuous, like oiled birds, but in my opinion the impacts on fisheries will be much more severe,” said Rich Ambrose, director of the environmental science and engineering at program at UCLA.

The Gulf is also home to dolphins and species including the endangered sperm whale. A government report found that dolphins with prolonged exposure to oil in the 1990s experienced skin injuries and burns, reduced neurological functions and lower hemoglobin levels in their blood. It concluded, though, that the effects probably wouldn’t be lethal because many creatures would avoid the oil. Yet dolphins in the Gulf have been spotted swimming through plumes of crude.

Gilly Llewellyn, oceans program leader with the World Wildlife Fund in Australia, said she observed the same behavior by dolphins following a 73-day spill last year in the Timor Sea.

“A heartbreaking sight,” Llewellyn said. “And what we managed to see on the surface was undoubtedly just a fraction of what was happening.”

The prospect left fishing guide Marino shaking his head, as he watched the oil washing into a marsh and over the body of a dead pelican. Species like shrimp and crab flourish here, finding protection in the grasses. Fish, birds and other creatures feed here.

“It’s going to break that cycle of life,” Marino said. “It’s like pouring gas in your aquarium. What do you think that’s going to do?”

___

Flesher reported from Traverse City, Mich. Contributing to this report were Associated Press writers Holbrook Mohr on Barataria Bay, La.; Melissa Nelson in Pensacola Beach, Fla.; and Jay Reeves in Gulf Shores, Ala.

Gulf oil spill: Jimmy Buffett tells Florida beachgoers to stay upbeat despite looming oil slick

Musician Jimmy Buffett, wearing his Margaritaville-brand flip-flops, stood Saturday on a pier at tar-ball blotched Pensacola Beach and led a pro-beach rally, urging Floridians to “not get a ‘sky is falling’ attitude” over the looming oil slick.

Buffett said he has survived hurricanes, getting shot at in Jamaica and a plane crash, and he insisted he’s ready to ride out the oil-spill disaster that in the last two days has hit the white sand beaches of the Florida Panhandle.

“This is an environmental disaster nobody asked for, but Floridians are a tough people,” Buffet said to the crowd of 1,000 beachgoers.

Tar balls swept along by strong winds hit more of the Panhandle coast Saturday, including Perdido Key at the far west end of the state and Grayton Beach, about 60 miles east of Pensacola Beach. A dozen tar mats — slabs of thickened crude as long as 30 feet  — were found near Navarre Beach.

As spill-response workers collected oil blobs in the background, Buffett was joined by Gov. Charlie Crist. Although the expanding slick is largely offshore, it continues to drift east and threatens to devastate the state’s crucial tourism industry.

For Crist, a sharp decline in visitors could drive up coastal unemployment and drive down state tax revenues. And for Buffett, crude oil washing ashore could spoil summer revenues as he opens his $50-million Margaritaville Beach Hotel in Pensacola Beach.

“People ought to come out here — it’s beautiful,” said Crist, putting up with an already hot and humid morning and sweating through his shirt. “Jimmy’s opening a hotel here next week.”

“Just batten down the hatches,” Buffett said.

–Kevin Spear, Orlando Sentinel, reporting from Pensacola Beach, Fla.

Photo: Musician Jimmy Buffett, left, with Florida Gov. Charlie Crist. Credit: Associated Press

Yesterday, I visited Caminada Bay in Grand Isle, Louisiana — one of the first places to feel the devastation wrought by the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. While I was here, at Camerdelle’s Live Bait shop, I met with a group of local residents and small business owners.

Folks like Floyd Lasseigne, a fourth-generation oyster fisherman. This is the time of year when he ordinarily earns a lot of his income. But his oyster bed has likely been destroyed by the spill.

Terry Vegas had a similar story. He quit the 8th grade to become a shrimper with his grandfather. Ever since, he’s earned his living during shrimping season — working long, grueling days so that he could earn enough money to support himself year-round. But today, the waters where he has worked are closed. And every day, as the spill worsens, he loses hope that he will be able to return to the life he built.

Here, this spill has not just damaged livelihoods. It has upended whole communities. And the fury people feel is not just about the money they have lost. It is about the wrenching recognition that this time their lives may never be the same.

These people work hard. They meet their responsibilities. But now because of a manmade catastrophe — one that is not their fault and beyond their control — their lives have been thrown into turmoil. It is brutally unfair. And what I told these men and women is that I will stand with the people of the Gulf Coast until they are again made whole.

That is why, from the beginning, we have worked to deploy every tool at our disposal to respond to this crisis. Today, there are more than 20,000 people working around the clock to contain and clean up this spill. I have authorized 17,500 National Guard troops to participate in the response. More than 1,900 vessels are aiding in the containment and cleanup effort. We have convened hundreds of top scientists and engineers from around the world. This is the largest response to an environmental disaster of this kind in the history of our country.

We have also ordered BP to pay economic injury claims, and this week, the federal government sent BP a preliminary bill for $69 million to pay back American taxpayers for some of the costs of the response so far. In addition, after an emergency safety review, we are putting in place aggressive new operating standards for offshore drilling. And I have appointed a bipartisan commission to look into the causes of this spill. If laws are inadequate, they will be changed. If oversight was lacking, it will be strengthened. And if laws were broken, those responsible will be brought to justice.

These are hard times in Louisiana and across the Gulf Coast, an area that has already seen more than its fair share of troubles. The people of this region have met this terrible catastrophe with seemingly boundless strength and character in defense of their way of life. What we owe them is a commitment by our nation to match the resilience they have shown. That is our mission. And it is one we will fulfill.

Thank you,

President Barack Obama

Paid for by Organizing for America, a project of the Democratic National Committee — 430 South Capitol Street SE, Washington, D.C. 20003. This communication is not authorized by any candidate or candidate’s committee.

http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20100605/ARTICLE/6051061/-1/RSS02

The blobs — some are as small as nickels and dimes, others more than 7 inches in diameter — marked the ominous arrival of the Gulf of Mexico spill that has been creeping toward Florida’s vast coastline since the April 20 explosion of a BP oil rig near Louisiana.

It marked the first time a spill of this magnitude has scarred Florida. Yet the oil that washed up across the Panhandle is expected to be only a sliver of what will be seen across the state in coming weeks.

The impact of the oil spill could potentially be devastating to beachfront communities all along the Florida coast, including the Atlantic if the Gulf currents take the oil spill around the Florida Keys. It could undermine the state’s economy, which remains critically linked to the tourism trade, and could decimate fragile beaches, marshes and coves.

University of Central Florida economist Abraham Pizam said the oil slick could become the worst disaster in the history of Florida tourism.

“It could be the beginning of a major catastrophe for this state,” said Pizam, dean of the Rosen College of Hospitality Management at UCF. “Florida survives on the back of the hospitality industry. For us it’s do or die.”

State Sen. Don Gaetz, R-Niceville, said he is hopeful the tourism industry can recover but believes it will take time.

“Picking up tar balls is going to be a way of life on at least some Florida beaches for months and maybe years,” said Gaetz, in line to become the Senate president in 2012, whose district includes the popular beach town of Destin, where oil is expected soon. “People here have faced extraordinary natural disasters. We’ve rebuilt. We’ve come back and I think we’ll come back from this as well.”

But Gaetz conceded this has the potential to be an unprecedented challenge for Florida

“How could anyone prepare for a catastrophe of this magnitude?” he asked. “This is like a year-long hurricane. The consequences could be much more far reaching than anything I’ve thought about so far.”

In the Pensacola region, the state is countering the spill with an of strategies, among them a flotilla of skimming vessels, booms to block the oil flow into inlets, conservation efforts to save injured animals, and cleanup crews to respond quickly to reports of oil.

Yet the arrival of the tar balls Friday showed those efforts may only deflect and not blunt the oil, which is being pushed toward Florida’s coastline by a strong prevailing wind from the southwest.

State environmental officials said the immediate threat is expected to continue through Tuesday, stretching from Escambia County eastward to other Gulf areas, including Santa Rosa and Okaloosa counties.

Tourists, residents and local officials woke up Friday morning in this beachfront community to find tar balls along the beach. Floating tar mats were found and removed from the Pensacola Pass, which leads into the bays and estuaries surrounding Pensacola.

In less than five minutes, Kaycee Klisart, a bartender at The Dock, a beachside bar, picked up enough tar balls to fill a 16-ounce cup, saying the largest were about the size of her palm although they dissolved when she handled them.

“This is really my livelihood,” Klisart said about the potential impact on the local tourist trade.

Klisart said the beach was “crowded but not like it would be.”

But she also said as a mother of a 10-year-old and a 13-year-old she would not let her children go into the water, although local officials, who are testing the waters, said they remained safe as of Friday.

Lee Mullikin, a retired contractor, and his wife, Pamela Kaster, a retired carpenter’s helper, who have been coming to Pensacola Beach for years, went swimming Friday morning and reported seeing no oil in the water, although they had seen lifeguards picking up small objects earlier in the day.

Mullikin, who went through Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, said he remembers tar balls on the beach in the late 1970s.

“We’ve come full circle,” he said. “There’s an air of apprehension. It’s like we’re on a death watch here.”

County Commissioner Grover Robinson waded knee deep into the Gulf waters, calling the tar balls an “inconvenience.”

“The beach was open and it looked like a beautiful Escambia County day otherwise,” Robinson said. “We’ve gotten through a number of tragedies and catastrophes. We will do that and we will overcome this issue.”

Robinson said local officials are relying on a strategy to stop the oil at the Pensacola Pass, with plans for as many as 17 booms to block oil if it gets through the pass and starts to threaten the inland marshes and bays.

BP-hired cleanup crews were visible at Pensacola Beach, carrying shovels, plastic bags and gloves as they searched the beach for tar balls.

“We’re doing everything possible,” said Lucia Bustamante, a spokeswoman for BP.

She said 120 workers had been deployed to scour the beaches, beginning Thursday night, with more available if needed and more cleanup crews ready in Panama City if the oil moves further east.

“We have enough resources,” she said.

Mike Sole, secretary of the state Department of Environmental Protection, told local emergency officials that the state had requested more vessels to skim the oil before it reaches the shores and BP has agreed to provide another 20 boats — although Sole said it was not clear when they would arrive.

Dire predictions were the order of the day, as environmentalists woke up in tears and economists worried about the oil spill’s impact on the state’s $66 billion tourism industry.

Environmental activist and Navarre Beach resident Linda Young cried for an hour in the morning, 20 years after founding an anti-oil drilling group in the Panhandle in the hopes of never experiencing a day like Friday.

“It feels like one of your best friends is dying,” said Young, director of the Clean Water Network of Florida, after photographing tar balls on the beach near her home.

Young said the stakes for Florida are enormous as oil keeps gushing from the blown well.

“This is just the beginning. It’s coming wave after wave, and there’s no place on Florida’s coast that’s not at risk,” Young said. “It’s just a nightmare that you can’t wake up from. The full impact of the spill may be felt for years.”

The feds had banned fishing there, including portions of the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary, on Wednesday after projecting an oil sheen from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill would move into that area within the next several days.

The agency on Friday essentially moved the fishing ban boundary 100 miles west throughout the Gulf. The ban had been 20 miles from the Dry Tortugas park boundary. The move reopened an additional 3,000 square miles elsewhere in the Gulf.

“This is extremely good news,” said Capt. Bill Kelly, executive director of the Florida Keys Commercial Fishermen’s Association. “We hope that Mother Nature continues to watch out for us. … My telephone was ringing off the hook yesterday. These guys [fishermen] were scared, and understandably so. There were all kinds of rumors running around about the feds shutting down fishing in the Florida Straits. I think people realized how quickly the economy of the Florida Keys could be shut down.”

Kelly said he has urged federal fishery managers for more stringent water-sampling and fish-testing before they close off areas to fishing.

Several members of the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary Advisory Committee have contacted sanctuary Superintendent Sean Morton asking what criteria is used to ban fishing, he wrote to members on Friday. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) is the parent organization over both the National Marine Fisheries Service and the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary.

The criteria is based on computer models that produce trajectory maps of where the oil is likely to be in 24, 48 and 72 hours, based on weather, satellite imagery, ocean buoy data and ocean currents, Morton said. The trajectory is “truth-tested” by daily flights over the Gulf.

The feds review the data daily and by noon determine whether a fishing ban is needed and where, Morton said. 

They will continue to monitor the trajectory of the oil spill, sheens and tar balls, and close and open areas as needed, said Roy Crabtree, southeast regional director of the National Marine Fisheries Service.  Crabtree, who oversees fishing rules throughout the Gulf, said he understands the need to ensure areas free of oil remain open to fishing, as fishermen are being hit by more regulations than ever before.

“It’s been a tough year for fishermen,” Crabtree said. “We are taking this day by day.”

Also on Friday, the U.S. Department of Commerce issued a Fishery Failure Determination for Florida, which opens the door for the state’s fishermen to receive federal funding because of lost wages. Gov. Charlie Crist requested the determination on Thursday. 

“The quick response of the federal government to this request is a positive step toward protecting Florida’s hardworking citizens,” Crist said in a prepared statement Friday. “We are continuing to keep a close watch on the oil spill and are prepared to respond to any impacts we may experience. Florida is still open and we encourage everyone to go fishing and enjoy Florida seafood products.”

Commerce Secretary Garcy Locke granted Crist’s request to establish a regional economic transition program, which allows fishermen and other businesses to qualify for economic injury loans through the U.S. Small Business Administration.

tohara@keysnews.com

http://www.petroleumworld.com/

HOUSTON
Petroleumworld.com, June 4, 2010

Here are some potential scenarios facing BP:
BP RUNS OUT OF CASH – UNLIKELY
BP and the White House have said the oil giant has the financial muscle to cover the cost of cleaning up the oil spill and compensating those affected.
All analysts consulted by Reuters agree on this, and that the key determinant of how much it does finally cost depends on how long the oil continues to flow.
Analysts and investors have started to factor in that the spill lasts until August, when a relief well is expected to be completed. The relief well would end the spill even if earlier efforts to cap the ruptured well have failed.
BP’s market capitalization has fallen by around $65 billion since the Deepwater Horizon rig sank on April 22 after exploding two days earlier, unleashing a torrent of oil into the Gulf of Mexico .
Most analysts believe this more than factors in the total cost to BP.
“It’s not going to be anything in that ball park,” Alex Morris, oil analyst at Raymond James in Houston said.
Estimates for the total cost start at around $5.3 billion, an estimate from Dutch bank ING, assuming the current effort to fit a cap on the well to capture the oil works.
However, estimates run to up to $37 billion — the forecast from investment bank Credit Suisse.
As costs, especially those for damages, will be absorbed over a period of years, BP is seen as able to handle them.
The company generated cash of $7.7 billion from operating activities in the first quarter. Even after capital investment of $3.8 billion, it had $3.9 billion of free cash.
Most analysts believe the company can foot the bill without cutting its dividend or raising debt levels.
However, Credit Suisse said if its $37 billion estimate is accurate, the company can only maintain its dividend by raising its gearing ratio by 10 percentage points, something it may not wish to do.
And even if BP can afford to maintain its dividend, it may cut it as a political gesture to bolster its flagging reputation. Democratic Senators Charles Schumer and Ron Wyden said on Wednesday BP should cut its dividend until the full costs for cleaning up the spill can be calculated.
BP, which owns 65 percent of the leaking well, its partners Anadarko Petroleum, which owns 25 percent and Japan ‘s Mitsui & Co, which owns 10 percent, are legally liable for the clean-up on the basis of their shareholdings. BP has undertaken to cover all damages itself.
CEO Hayward said in an interview with Britain’s The Daily Mail newspaper on Wednesday that clean-up costs could hit $3 billion if the leak continues until August.
This is based on BP’s estimate of around $950 million spent in the first 41 days after the explosion.
However, Credit Suisse estimated in a research note on Wednesday that clean-up costs could total $15-23 billion. Other analysts put the number as low as the $2 billion estimated by Panmure Gordon’s Peter Hitchens.
BP has agreed to compensate all those affected by the spill for all legitimate costs, even though under the law BP and its partners are only liable to pay up to $75 million. BP has undertaken to pay this money itself, rather than in conjunction with its partners, so the full liability may fall to it.
BP has offered no estimate but Hitchens at Panmure said on Wednesday he estimates compensation claims will be $10 billion. Credit Suisse estimates this at $23 billion.
BP BECOMES A TAKEOVER TARGET – UNLIKELY
The collapse in its share price means BP could become a takeover target, Dougie Youngson, oil analyst at brokerage Arbuthnot said on Tuesday.
However, most analysts do not expect this to happen.
Exxon Mobil, Royal Dutch Shell and Chevron are the only fully publicly traded oil companies larger than BP and deemed financially strong enough to buy it.
The U.S. government blocked the takeover of Asia-focused U.S. oil company Unocal by China’s CNOOC for strategic reasons, so most analysts doubt it would allow BP — the largest oil producer in the Gulf of Mexico — to be taken over by a state-backed oil company.
Antitrust issues could arise over BP’s refineries if it were acquired by Exxon, Shell or Chevron, Alex Morris said. This could force the sale of the refineries but in the current depressed refining environment that would be difficult.
BP’s significant U.S. gas production assets could also cause regulatory problems for any of the above, Jason Kenney at ING said.
However, the biggest barriers to an acquirer making a move are the unknown liabilities that arise from the spill.
“It would be hard to see one of the other supermajors taking on such an unknown liability,” Raymond James’s Morris said.
Similarly, selling of BP piecemeal may not attract buyers because the individual parts would still be liable for the spill.
Washington may also block any deal seen to strengthen anyone in the oil industry.
“The last thing that President (Barack) Obama needs today is “bigger oil,” ING’s Kenney said in a research note.
CEO HAYWARD LOSES HIS JOB – UNLIKELY, FOR THE MOMENT
Inevitably, there have been questions over whether Hayward should stay. He told the Daily Mail “…it would be ridiculous to resign at this point” and most analysts have defended the CEO’s position.
John Hofmeister, former president of Shell Oil Company, Shell’s U.S. unit, and author of “Why We Hate the Oil Companies,” told Reuters it was unreasonable to blame the CEO.
“Ultimately the CEO is accountable and responsible … but the individual on the rig may have a made a bad judgment.”
Investors had been happy with Hayward’s efforts as CEO. In the almost three years before the Deepwater Horizon rig sunk, he had improved refinery operations, boosted oil production and cut a lot of management overheads.
“People were happy with him — he had done a good job turning around BP,” Alex Morris said.
So far, investors and analysts seem to be backing Hayward.
However, documents and testimony submitted to government investigations into the incident have prompted some in Washington and Louisiana to question BP’s decisions about the drilling of the oil well.
Hayward took up his role promising to standardize and streamline the way BP built facilities and drilled oil wells. If the structures he put in place are deemed to have led to any decisions that contributed to the accident, then the CEO’s position could come under pressure.
BP IS BARRED FROM DOING SOME BUSINESS IN THE U.S. AT LEAST TEMPORARILY – SOMEWHAT LIKELY
Some commentators have called for BP to be banned from drilling in the United States, which would seriously damage the company’s business given that 40 percent of its assets are in the United States and it depends on the country for its growth plans.
Analysts are divided on whether some debarment is likely.
“There are going to be heavy fines. The regulator is going to be tough on them getting permits but all companies have to be treated by the rules. This isn’t Venezuela ! ” said Morris.
However, under federal law BP would have to be banned from government contracts for a period of time if convicted of a criminal offense under the Clean Water Act. The company could also be barred from contracts if civil judgments are entered against it for violations of environmental laws.
BP has already faced partial bans on receiving federal contracts because of past violations of U.S. laws. After the pipeline leaks at its Prudhoe Bay Unit in Alaska and a fatal explosion at a Texas refinery, the company was ineligible to receive federally funded contracts for services from those two facilities.
The company had been negotiating with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency over those bans but those talks were halted after the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico .
While BP could face such a penalty in the latest oil spill, one law professor and private practitioner, Anthony Sabino, noted that there were not a lot of other oil producers so it might only be a short-term debarment.
That could be viewed as a punitive and politically motivated action, but regardless such a ban would likely “be a short-term hit and not substantial,” he said.
BP TO FACE FINES AND PENALTIES – LIKELY
In addition to facing billions of dollars in costs from the economic liability and damages, BP could also potentially face billions of dollars in civil and criminal penalties if the Justice Department’s investigation finds wrongdoing.
Some legal experts have said that proving some criminal charges may be more difficult because it requires showing intent, negligence or other malfeasance. However, some environmental laws have simple criminal violations, including the one banning harm to migratory birds.
For each barrel of oil that prosecutors can prove has spilled into the Gulf, BP could be fined $1,100 or as much as $4,300 if they are able to prove negligence was the cause.
Prosecutors could use estimates from a team of scientists and experts who found between 12,000 barrels per day and 19,000 bpd are flowing from the broken well. That could equal as much as $81.7 million in fines per day at the high end. With 44 days of oil spewing from the well, that would equal $3.6 billion as of Wednesday.
Additionally, U.S. laws protect endangered species and migratory birds, with fines of up to $25,000 per violation. Already more than 100 birds have been found oiled or dead, according to the Unified Area Command for the spill response efforts. There are also criminal fines associated with such violations, which could be as much as $50,000.
If other companies are also found to be responsible for the spill as well, the penalties could potentially be imposed on each violator. In some cases, most significantly the Exxon Valdez spill in 1989, companies try to negotiate a settlement with the federal government, as is expected with BP.
Two years after the Valdez spill, Exxon settled U.S. civil and criminal charges in a plea agreement that included just over $1 billion in penalties, damages and restitution.
At the time, the $125 million in criminal penalties was the largest of its kind while $900 million went to reimburse federal and state governments for responding to the spill and later restoration projects. The federal government and state of Alaska in 2006 sought another $92 million from Exxon, however that request has not been resolved.
BP TO FACE GROWTH HEADWINDS IN THE FUTURE – LIKELY
BP’s targets for expanded production will become tougher to achieve following the oil spill, and its financial performance will suffer from higher costs — even after spill costs and fines are paid.
BP said earlier this year it was targeting oil and gas output growth of 1-2 percent over the medium term. This plan relies heavily on BP’s U.S. projects and especially the Gulf of Mexico , where it was leading the push into ever-deeper waters.
The dislocation caused by dealing with the spill, including the diversion of vessels from other fields means BP will face a particular challenge in keeping its drilling plans on track.
A moratorium imposed by Obama on new deepwater drilling after the spill will also slow development plans at BP and across the industry.
Even when the oil spill has been dealt with and the drilling moratorium is lifted, BP’s damaged reputation is likely to mean more scrutiny from regulators than other companies, analysts said.
This means it will likely take longer than it would have expected in the past to bring fields to production.
“The Gulf of Mexico position was much heralded by management as a differentiated position for BP relative to its peers only 12 months ago … the full monetization of these assets is likely to take longer,” Morgan Stanley oil analyst Theepan Jothilingam said in a research note.
Lower-than-expected production would hit BP’s financial performance but in addition to this, higher costs could weigh on BP’s profits. Analysts at Bernstein estimated the company could face 10 percent higher operating costs in the United States after the spill, in part due to the need to impose tougher safety standards.
 
Story by Tom Bergin , additional reporting by Jeremy Pelofsky and Ayesha Rascoe in Washington from Reuters

Reuters Thu Jun 3, 2010 8:34am

Special thanks to Richard Charter

from: razvlekatsa zabavlatsa
http://oilprice.com/Environment/Oil-Spills/White-House-Covers-Up-Mena… White House Covers Up Menacing Oil “Blob” \
Friday, May 21, 2010
Written by Wayne Madsen

In an exclusive for Oilprice.com, the Wayne Madsen Report (WMR) has learned from Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers sources that U.S. Navy submarines deployed to the Gulf of Mexico and Atlantic Ocean off the Florida coast have detected what amounts to a frozen oil blob from the oil geyser at the destroyed Deep Horizon off-shore oil rig south of Louisiana. The Navy submarines have trained video cameras on the moving blob, which remains frozen at depths of between 3,000 to 4,000 feet. Because the oil blob is heavier than water, it remains frozen at current depths.

FEMA and Corps of Engineers employees are upset that the White House and the Pentagon remain tight-lipped and in cover-up mode about the images of the massive and fast-moving frozen coagulated oil blob that is being imaged by Navy submarines that are tracking its movement. The sources point out that BP and the White House conspired to withhold videos from BP-contracted submersibles that showed the oil geyser that was spewing oil from the chasm underneath the datum of the Deep Horizon at rates far exceeding originally reported amounts. We have learned that it was largely WMR’s scoop on the existence of the BP videos that forced the company and its White House patrons to finally agree to the release of the video footage. The White House is officially stating that it does not know where the officially reported 10 miles long by 3 miles wide “plume” is actually located or in what direction it is heading. However, WMR’s sources claim the White House is getting real-time reports from Navy submarines as to the blob’s location.

We have learned that the blob is transiting the Florida Straits between Florida and Cuba, propelled by the Gulf’s Loop Current, and that parts of it that is encountering warmer waters are breaking off into smaller tar balls that are now washing ashore in the environmentally-sensitive Florida Keys and Dry Tortugas. Corps of Engineers and FEMA officials are also livid about the cover-up of the extent of the oil damage being promulgated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and its marine research vessel in the Gulf, RV Pelican. NOAA stands accused by the aforementioned agencies of acting as a virtual public relations arm for BP. NOAA is a component of the business-oriented Department of Commerce. Similarly, the Coast Guard, which takes its orders from the cover-up operatives at the Homeland Security Department, is denying the tar balls washing up on the Florida Keys are from the oil mass.

WMR has been told the Coast Guard is lying in order to protect the Obama administration, which has thoroughly failed in its response to the disaster. The White House’s only concern is trying to limit political damage to its image in the electorally-important state of Florida while the Pentagon has spent between $25 and $30 billion on oil spill operations in the Gulf and the Atlantic to date. WMR sources also report that the oil mass has resulted in dead zones in the Gulf of Mexico that have cut off oxygen and killed massive numbers of marine creatures and plant life. Seafood wholesalers from the Gulf Coast to New Jersey and New York have been told that the supply of shrimp, oysters, and other seafood from the Gulf is severely in short supply and that they can expect a possible total cut-off as the situation worsens. The shortage will also affect the supply of seafood, especially shrimp, to national seafood restaurant chains like Red Lobster and Long John Silver’s.

There is also evidence that BP, Halliburton, and Transocean sank a drill to a depth of 35,000 feet at the Deep Horizon site some six months ago without the required permits from the federal government. WMR has learned from U.S. government sources that the drilling at 35,000 feet caused a major catastrophic event that required the firms’ oil rig personnel to quickly pull up the drill and close the drill hole. However, the Deep Horizon re-sank the drill some six months after the unspecified “catastrophe,” resulting in another, more destructive chain of events following the explosion that destroyed the rig, killing eleven workers. When the Deep Horizon blew up, WMR has been told it also “blew down,” cracking the the sub-seabed pipe that may have been re-drilled to a depth of between 25,000 to 30,000 feet, again, without a government permit. Government sources also report that BP is intent on recovering as much oil as possible from the undersea geyser rather than simply plugging and capping the well, which would then place it off-limits to further drilling.

The Corps of Engineers reports that BP is playing a game with Obama, convincing him of the feasibility of “shooting junk” into the subterranean pipe, which would stop up the pipe with a manufactured chemical compound called “MUD.” However, WMR has been informed that BP actually intends to shoot cement into the pipe in an attempt to cap the well with the later intention of digging a trench for side drilling from the pipe to recover as much oil as possible. The technology that would be employed by BP is the same technology that was used by Kuwait to conduct slant drilling of Iraq’s Rumallah oil field — an event that helped trigger Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait.

Corps of Engineers and FEMA sources also give a failing grade to both Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, who stands accused of being woefully incompetent in handling the disaster, and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar. Government sources say both secretaries should immediately step down or be fired.

Read Wayne’s first breakthrough article on the Oil Spill and other interesting pieces: The Cover-up: BP’s Crude Politics and the Looming Environmental Mega-Disaster http://oilprice.com/Environment/Oil-Spills/The-Cover-up-BP-s-Crude-Po… 8 Long Term Economic and Environmental Effects of the Gulf Oil Spill http://oilprice.com/Environment/Oil-Spills/8-Long-Term-Economic-and-E… Could There Be A Bright Side To the Gulf of Mexico Disaster http://oilprice.com/Environment/Oil-Spills/Could-There-Be-A-Bright-Si… 10 Geopolitical Predictions for 2010 & Short Term Strategic Outlook http://oilprice.com/Geo-Politics/International/10-Geopolitical-Predic… By. The Wayne Madsen Report for Oilprice.com http://oilprice.com/Environment/Oil-Spills/White-House-Covers-Up-Mena…

Special thanks to Dave Curtis

ttp://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20006874-503544.html

June 4, 2010 6:30 PM
Posted by Brian Montopoli
CBS News Poll analysis by the CBS News Polling Unit: Sarah Dutton, Jennifer De Pinto, Fred Backus and Anthony Salvanto.
With oil continuing to stream into the Gulf, a majority of Americans – 51 percent — say the costs and risks of increased offshore drilling are too great, according to a new CBS News poll.

That’s ten points higher than one month ago and an increase of 23 points from a poll taken in August 2008, when Republican rallies regularly broke out in chants of “drill, baby, drill.”

In the new poll, 40 percent said they favor increased offshore drilling. That’s a drop of five points from last week and 22 points from August 2008.

Most Americans believe that BP will ultimately be successful in stopping the flow of oil – 56 percent say yes, while 29 percent say no. They do not, however, expect it to happen anytime soon.

Among those who expect BP to stop the oil flow, just 32 percent expect it to happen in the next few weeks. Roughly half say it will be in the next few months, while 14 percent way it will take longer than that.

Americans increasingly see the oil spill not as an isolated incident but rather part of a broader problem with offshore drilling. Last month, 51 percent saw the spill as an isolated incident. That figure has now dropped to 45 percent. The percentage that see the spill as part of a broader problem, meanwhile, has increased ten percent to match that 45 percent figure.

Most Republicans see the spill as an isolated incident, while most Democrats see it as part of an overall problem.
Americans are paying attention to the spill: Two in three say they have heard or read “a lot” about the incident, up from 56 percent last month.

As Hotsheet reported this morning, the poll also found that 63 percent of Americans believe the Obama administration should be doing more to clean up the spill. Just 28 percent say it is doing all it can.

Seventy percent, meanwhile, say BP should be doing more.

Thirty-eight percent approve of the Obama administration’s handling of the spill, up slightly from last week. Forty-four percent disapprove. BP’s approval rating on handling the spill has also improved slightly, but it stands at just 21 percent.
________________________
Read the Complete Poll
Poll: Obama, BP Should be Doing More on Gulf Spill
This poll was conducted among a random sample of 960 adults nationwide, interviewed by telephone June 1-3, 2010. Phone numbers were dialed from random digit dial samples of both standard land-line and cell phones. The error due to sampling for results based on the entire sample could be plus or minus three percentage points. The error for subgroups is higher.

This poll release conforms to the Standards of Disclosure of the National Council on Public Polls.  Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.fpif.org/articles/gulf_oil_spill_americas_chernobyl
Foreign Policy In Focus
A project of the Institute for Policy Studies
A think tank without walls
Issues / Financial Flows
Gulf Oil Spill: America’s Chernobyl
By Alejandro Nadal, June 3, 2010
A version of this FPIF commentary will also appear on the Triple Crisis Blog, global perspectives on finance, development, and the environment.

The Deepwater Horizon disaster has the familiar ingredients of deregulation, deception, and destruction that characterize the relations between governments and multinational corporations. It was a man-made disaster, like Chernobyl.

And like the global financial crisis, it all started with the explosion of a bubble, this time of methane gas.

The Wages of Deregulation

In 2008 the Bush-Cheney duo lifted the executive order banning offshore drilling, and the House of Representatives agreed to let a 26-year-old moratorium on offshore drilling expire. Deregulation was moving full speed ahead.

Monitoring agencies were unable to keep pace with British Petroleum’s (BP) operations. Marine biologist Rick Steiner, an expert on oil spills from the University of Alaska, has documented how BP cut corners in its hurry to disconnect and prepare for a production rig. In addition Steiner reveals the blowout preventer (BOP) was not built as designed, included some demonstration parts, and had a failed battery.

Offshore drilling operations in Norway and Brazil use acoustic triggers and remote control cut-off devices to enhance the capacity of BOPs to work adequately. But a report commissioned by the Minerals Management Service (MMS) stated “acoustic systems are not recommended because they tend to be very costly.” Was former vice president and oil man Dick Cheney behind the Department of Interior’s decision not to mandate the valve for off-shore oil rigs? Nor did the U.S. government mandate the simultaneous drilling of relief wells, as required in Canada’s Arctic. Only now, with the failure of the “top kill” technique, is BP drilling these wells, and they won’t be functional before August.

The MMS also routinely overruled its staff of biologists and engineers, who had raised concerns about the safety and environmental impact of certain drilling proposals in the Gulf and in Alaska. The U.S. government permitted BP and other oil companies to drill with cutting-edge technologies without the usual permits.

Were the government regulators doing their job of regulating, or were they in bed with the industry?

Parallels to Financial Crisis

British Petroleum bragged about being at the frontier of technology. Goldman Sachs and the other behemoths of the financial world also claimed to be at the cutting edge of financial innovation. They all lied, hid information, and speculated behind a facade of corporate professionalism built through their advertising campaigns.

Just like the derivatives that took junk assets into every balance sheet of financial institutions, the Deepwater Horizon disaster has no frontiers. The gushing oil will eventually threaten not only Cuba and Mexico, but it will end up reaching the Gulf Stream. It might even make it to England and several world financial centers.

Many are the scams concocted in the financial world, from structured investment vehicles carrying subprime mortgages to credit default swaps and short-selling. They call it business on Wall Street, but it’s really weapons of mass financial destruction. British Petroleum also has a long list of accidents and incidents, all leading to the loss of life and oil spills (including the explosion in its refinery in Texas City in 2005 that cost 15 lives). There will probably be no bailout for BP, but there already exists a liability cap of $75 million.
That cap is invalid in cases where criminal negligence exists. The U.S. Attorney General has already launched a criminal investigation. Already there is circumstantial evidence that BP’s technicians altered the sequence of events and ordered the removal of drilling mud before the cement cap was put in place in order to gain time. This was done in spite of the fact that BP was already working with a damaged blow-out preventer. If this is confirmed, BP will have a hard time convincing authorities that this was just an accident
Who’s in Charge?

BP has used more than 800,000 gallons of oil dispersant Corexit on the surface and underwater. Corexit is manufactured by Nalco, whose board includes at least one BP executive. Because Corexit is less efficient and more toxic than other dispersants, the Environmental Protection Agency requested that BP use another dispersant. BP quickly overruled this request, showing who’s in charge.

As he came into the White House, Obama became a hostage of the financial system and essentially gave Wall Street a free hand in solving “its” problems. For weeks after the rig exploded, BP appeared to be the main entity in charge of the response to the oil spill.

Obama’s lack of firm leadership has prompted comparisons with Katrina. But in fact, the similarities with Chernobyl are stronger. Katrina was a natural disaster, while the Deepwater Horizon is a man-made catastrophe related to greed and cost minimization.

Just as the global financial and economic crisis is entering its most dangerous phase, the oil spill is now developing into a catastrophe that will affect ecosystems and livelihoods for decades. It is more like Chernobyl than anything else.
When Unit 4 in Chernobyl exploded on April 26, 1986, it not only caused the worst disaster in the history of nuclear technology. It also shattered the technological prestige of the Soviet Union, boosted concerns about the nuclear safety of the remaining plants and forced Soviet authorities to be less cryptic. Ultimately, Chernobyl ushered in the demise of the Soviet Union. Perhaps the destruction of the Deepwater Horizon will open the way for a new era of accountability and the end of corporate capitalism in the United States.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

Cost to BP should not be a factor in implementing precautions

 By Linda L. Young

 I live in the Florida Panhandle, about 200 feet from the Gulf of Mexico.  Soon I will lose track of the number of times that I’ve smelled the  growing mass of oil that looms out past the southern horizon.  When I go for my evening walk these days, I’m already conditioned to check the air first to make sure that “the smell” is not back.  I learned that lesson a few weeks ago when, after walking in it for over an hour, I returned home with a splitting headache.

It’s been almost six weeks since the BP oil well exploded and took 11 lives.  There has been a lot of criticism of the federal government’s handling of this unprecedented disaster, but my expectations are much closer to home.  I’ve waited and watched for encouraging signs that my state and local governments are gearing up to provide maximum protection for our waters.  I do see a few oil booms stretched out here and there along shorelines and I was able to get a copy of my county’s protection plan, which completely relies on these few booms..  However, the county initially wanted more extensive protections for our fairly pristine, highly productive estuaries, bayous, marshes and rivers, but those plans were scaled back by the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP).  What???  Why would the state agency that is tasked with protecting our environment ask a county to take fewer precautions?

Could it have anything to do with the fact that FDEP signed a no-bid contract with a consulting firm called WRSCompass, which was hired to work with Florida cities and counties in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon oil disaster?  This North Carolina-based company’s chief executive is Kathleen Shanahan, a former chief-of-staff to Jeb Bush and former vice-president Dick Cheney. Cheney’s former company, Halliburton, conducted repairs on the Deepwater site hours before the April 20 explosion which triggered the massive oil spill. Records show that on May 8^th, FDEP awarded the contract, which is worth as much as $250,000 to the company.  General Counsel for WRSCompass is Greg Munson, whose most recent position was General Counsel for the Florida FDEP.  That may sound appropriate for a consulting firm now advising counties as they prepare for the onslaught of toxic oil, but Mr. Munson’s litigation strategies for the Bush administration were often much more friendly to the state’s polluters than to clean water and air advocates.

While I am no expert on keeping oil off of our beaches and out of the intercoastal waterway, I can see from my research that we are not doing anywhere near all that we can do to prepare and protect our waters from the oil that is sure to come.  Additionally, what plans are in place to move people who can’t live in their homes when the oil moves closer and the fumes are overwhelming?  I have heard nothing of these plans so far.

On May 20^th, I served a verified complaint on Mike Sole, Secretary of the Florida DEP.  My complaint reminded Secretary Sole that he is obligated by Florida law to protect Florida’s air, water and land from unlawful pollution.  Our air has already been impacted by BP’s disaster and soon our waters will, as well.  It has been six weeks since this disaster began and our state has not taken enforcement action against BP.  Is this overly-slow reaction further related to the appointment of former Attorney General Jim Smith as a key strategizer for the state’s potential litigation against BP?  Mr. Smith was a registered lobbyist for BP for several recent years.

Whatever the reason, time is wasting and we, the taxpayers of Florida, want assurances that our state officials are doing everything in their power to protect our resources.  As citizens we have the authority to hold the Florida DEP accountable when it fails to enforce our environmental laws.  My verified complaint to Mr. Sole gives him notice that legal actions may result if his sluggish response to this disaster continues, and any citizen of Florida can join me in this effort.  For more information go to my organization’s website: www.cleanwaternetwork-fl.org.

Linda Young is the director of the Clean Water Network of FL, a non-profit environmental organization with 300 member groups and thousands of individuals that are working together to protect Florida’s waters.

http://www.counterpunch.org/doe06042010.html

Weekend Edition
June 4 – 6, 2010

By PHILLIP DOE
Last week Secretary of Interior Ken Salazar threw an old friend of mine, Liz Birnbaum, from Obama’s creaky Hope-Express.  For ten months she was the head of the Mineral Management Service.  Not exactly a lifetime you say?

Well, according to Salazar, who has been on the job 16 months, that should have been enough time to clean up a dysfunctional agency that has been in the news repeatedly over recent years because of its habit of sleeping with the oil industry, both figuratively and physically–the same industry it was established to baby sit after being spun off from the Bureau of Land Management, the mother agency which was also criticized for being unable to fully protect the public from the all-powerful oil drilling fraternity.

Despite what is reported in the press, and megaphoned by the headline seeking, platitude prone Salazar, MMS is not uniquely dysfunctional among Interior agencies, for none of the other regulatory agencies within Interior have ever received awards for protecting the public interest either.  The BLM is notorious throughout the west for being owned by the ranching industry.
The Bureau of Reclamation has always been the captive of the water buffaloes, as a library of books like Cadillac Desert and Rivers of Empire demonstrate.  Plus, I’d lay good money that more than one bureaucrat from the upper reaches of these agencies has spent less than an innocent evening with those they were supposed to be giving the bad news to, and that they’ve done it recently and repeatedly.

Good reasons abound.   All three constitute a daisy chain of aligned interests: the agencies get congressional funding for being compliant, the congressmen and senators get campaign money from the regulated for being friendly, and the regulated get pretty much what they want as long as they don’t overreach.  The overreaching at MMS during the Bush administration was one of those moments, and it provided a precious opportunity for Salazar, with his hometown newspaper, The Denver Post, acting as front man, to come out west, cowboy hat on pate, bolo tie on neck, cowboy boots on feet, and oversized belt buckle over navel to announce to a great and hushed audience that he was the “new sheriff in town.”   Salazar’s Wyatt Earp moment played well on the editorial page of The Denver Post, which has always said that Salazar is just right for Colorado, while other more discerning voices have muttered nervously that he seemed better suited for the role of Grand Marshal at Cheyenne Frontier Days.  The Post’s never varying assessment is code, meaning that Salazar is just right for The Denver Post and its shameless Chamber of Commerce boosterism.  He still is.
Unfortunately for the nation, and Salazar, the largest environmental disaster in the country’s history took place on his watch.  Still, Deepwater is not his fault, but neither is it Birnbaum’s, nor Obama’s.  The tragedy is that Obama has not moved forcefully to permanently close down deep-ocean drilling as too risky, with too many potentially disastrous unknowns to be even remotely necessary or economic.  (A word of warning to environmental types who argue that had environmental documentation been faithfully carried out on every well head, this tragedy could have been averted.  Take off your bespattered blinders!  NEPA, the law requiring environmental consideration in federal decision making, has rarely stopped big projects and has never stopped one when really big money, accompanied by the irresistible drum beat of more, more, more, has been called upon to drown out the voices of the people and common sense.  NEPA would have to be strengthened mightily for it to stop Washington from making campaign decisions rather than common-good decisions.)

The greater tragedy is that the oil spill has killed people and a huge swath of the Gulf’s environment, ruined countless lives through lost jobs and incomes, and will continue to wash its aftermath over people and the environment for decades to come.

The greatest tragedy of all is that similar disasters will inevitably reoccur if we don’t change.  The chances of reasoned change seem remote and certainly not something to believe in.

As for Salazar, he has shown himself to be just another contemptible politician by making Birnbaum the scapegoat for Deepwater. The desperation in his wager is shown by the fact that he presented a new organizational chart for MMS the day after meeting with Obama for two hours about Deepwater.  His intention, announced at a press conference the next morning, where he also announced Birnbaum’s resignation, is to divide the MMS into three agencies.
This comes pretty close to management by press conference. It is palpably idiotic, being nothing more than the midnight spawn of a desperate politician.  The result surely will be more dysfunction, more hierarchy and grade creep, and less transparency, for the left hand will seldom know what the other two hands are doing.  Moreover, the MMS does not make energy policy, the real culprit in this drama.  Washington does, or should.

Illustrative of how much Salazar has depended on carefully managed press for his climb up the greasy pole–Disraeli’s term to describe the comedy of political aspiration–an organization calling itself Sportsmen for Responsible Energy Development took out a half page ad in The Denver Post just two days after Salazar had accepted Birnbaum’s resignation and announced his new controls over MMS.  This is the minimum time it would take to get something to the paper in the form of a quasi press release.

In the ad, Salazar is shown facing a sepia toned Teddy Roosevelt.  Salazar is in living color, quaffed in the cowboy hat and bolo tie, which he has left on the bedroom floor since the Deep-Water disaster, probably on advice from the White House.  The bold headline declares Teddy and Ken to be “Two of a Kind.”  The print is necessarily skimpy, inversely proportional to the outrageousness of the claim perhaps. Here is most of it.

“No one has a better opportunity to continue Theodore Roosevelt’s legacy than Interior Secretary Ken Salazar.  His common-sense oil and gas leasing reforms will help conserve our public land and places where families have hunted and fished for generations.

Secretary Salazar, thanks for protecting our outdoor heritage for our children and grandchildren.  We think T.R. would be proud. ”

Holy Toledo, can canonization or the White House be far behind?  I couldn’t find out much about the sponsors of this ad.  Their web page doesn’t disclose who is on their board of directors.  They appear to be primarily a front organization for corporations in the recreation industry.  But Trout Unlimited and the National Wildlife Federation are also listed as admirers.  The sheer chutzpah of the claim makes it Colbert Report material.  The timing makes it clear that friends of the “new sheriff in town” are pulling out all the stops to keep their man atop the greasy pole.
 
So what of the real Salazar, the presumed environmentalist selected by Obama to head the Department controlling much of the nation’s land and water resources?   How does he stack up?  How does he compare to the summarily cashiered Birnbaum?  Not very well I’d say.

I know Birnbaum to be intelligent, sane, and honest.   Her bone fides include editor of the Harvard Environmental Law Review and legal counsel for American Rivers.  American Rivers had listed the Animas River in Colorado as among the world’s most endangered rivers because of the Animas-La Plata (ALP) project.  She co-authored a paper while working for the House Natural Resources Committee entitled “Taking from the Taxpayers,” which highlighted the outrageous subsidies tied to federal natural resource development, chief among them is western water development.

Salazar, on the other hand, has been a lifelong champion of federal farm and water programs.  When he ran for the senate, he often said he was going to be the senator for farm and ranch interests even though Colorado is among the most urbanized states in the union.  Colorado may be naturally splendorous, but it takes a hell of a lot of handouts at both the federal and state level to keep the big boys in pickups.  His brother, Congressman John Salazar, received $175,000 in farm subsidies for running the family ranch, this in addition to his upfront congressional salary of $174,000, plus benefits. He stopped taking them in 2007.  He was elected to Congress in 2004.  Other family members have been blessed with smaller farm subsidy checks floating in from the Treasury as well.

In Colorado, Ken Salazar has been an outspoken, lifelong supporter of ALP, the project American Rivers saw as threatening a river.  He supported it while Colorado Governor Roy Romer’s chief legal advisor and head of the Department of Natural Resources, then as Colorado Attorney General, then as U.S. Senator, and now as head of Interior.  He even used ALP to help propel himself into the senate seat through the spectacle of publicly kissing the ring of the lawyer who was the project godfather, of course with an adoring and uncritical press in tow.  On that occasion he declared with great humility that everything he knew about western water law he learned at the knee of the godfather.  I’m not kidding.

As for ALP, it is a shocker of a water project, even by western pork barrel standards.  It has no uses, just some laughable nonbinding scenarios for uses published in the project’s final EIS, of which 5 were written as due diligence smoke screens for this monument to mindless federal pork.  The construction costs of the project are over $600 million already, with hundreds of million more needed to move even a small portion of the water to any conceivable point of use since, at present, only a reservoir perched on a hillside exists with a complement of energy guzzling pumps needed to lift the water 500 feet from the river to the reservoir.  Billions more in interest payments will ultimately be added to the fiscal insanity since the public pays for all but a sliver of the costs.

The reservoir is fittingly named for Salazar’s predecessor in the senate, Ben Nighthorse Campbell.  He resigned from the Senate while under felony investigation for influence peddling, thus opening the way for Salazar’s relentless climb.

As for project funding and repayment, it was such a dog that Congress had to suspend federal law regarding the cost sharing obligations of project beneficiaries; otherwise, it was DOA.  The project backers couldn’t or wouldn’t pay.  The public wasn’t asked, but they got the bill. At the forefront of these decisions and other indelicacies too numerous to mention was David Hayes, then Secretary of Interior Bruce Babbitt’s ALP chief negotiator, now, Ken Salazar’s Deputy at Interior and second in command.  He also led the selection committee for political appointees to Interior for Obama’s transition team.  The water world over which Salazar is the titular head gets ever smaller, for another principal in the ALP negotiations, Michael Connor, is now head of the Bureau of Reclamation.  He too is a lawyer.

The latest in the sorry saga of ALP is that the state of Colorado passed a bill this last session to dedicate $12 million this fiscal year and in each of two years hence to buy water from ALP.  The state has no use for the water, but somebody’s got to buy a little of the stuff stored in Nighthorse just to maintain the appearance of rectitude; thus the state has been bamboozled into buying the water on speculation, and never mind that speculative buying and storing of water is expressly forbidden under state law.  Claiming dire poverty, the state legislature earlier in the session had cut $260 million from education funding.  It will have to cut more next year.

Bruce Whitehead, the legislator who spearheaded the legislative effort and leader of the bamboozling, is a former water district engineer who testified in court in support of the project.  He is now a manager of one of the water organizations created to disperse ALP pork.  The head of the state agency through which the money will flow, and collaborator-in-chief in the bamboozling, had been employed by the BOR.  She, Jennifer Gimbel, is another lawyer and reputedly an acolyte of former Secretary of Interior Gale Norton through whom she found employment at BOR.

Whoa, is this change we can believe in or what?

Salazar was also heavily involved in Colorado’s largest modern environmental catastrophe, Summitville Mine.  It seems that the Governor during this period, Roy Romer, had taken the mine’s equipment in lieu of a bond.  Normally a surety bond is required by state law to protect against damages resulting from environmental accidents or mismanagement.  But Romer claimed jobs were needed and took the alternate bonding route.  The mine, a cyanide leach operation to recover gold, leaked cyanide and heavy metals into an adjoining stream, destroying, according to press reports, all life in 18 miles of mountain stream and threatening farming and ranching operations even further downstream. The mining equipment proved useless in recovering costs.

What advisory role Salazar may have played early on in this environmental disaster is unknown and shall probably forever remain so, but he was Romer’s legal adviser, then head of the state Department of Natural Resourses, and then Attorney General during this period.  What is known is that Salazar announced to the press, with typical fanfare, when he became AG that he would personally take over negotiations with the mining company to recover costs for the state.  He professed he was unafraid of billionaire mine owner Robert Friedman, known as Toxic Bob to his detractors.

In the end, EPA assumed management of Summitville as a Super Fund site, mitigating Romer’s dunderheaded deal making.  Hundreds of million in costs were thus transferred from 3 million Coloradoans to 300 million Americans, saving Romer and Salazar considerable embarrassment and explaining.  Oh, and Toxic Bob is still a billionaire, having managed to effectively pay none of the cleanup or damage costs.

So, Salazar’s environmental record is colored, a blushing red at best.   Should he be fired for Deepwater?  Of course not.  He isn’t directly responsible.  But a good case can be made that in firing Birnbaum for Deepwater, he has shown himself to be a career chasing scoundrel.  His environmental record in Colorado is supportive of this assessment.  In my book that is more than enough.  Maybe Rahm Emmanuel can make a few phone calls and get him a gig as permanent Grand Marshal at Cheyenne Frontier Days.  He’s already got the hat.

Admission:  I was chair of a small grassroots organization that went to court over ALP.  We sought the court’s aid in answering two questions project backers and Interior refused to answer.  We wanted to know what the 120,000 acre feet of public water to be stored in Nighthorse Reservoir was to be used for, since beneficial use is the essential test in state law for granting a water right.  We also asked why the 1970 Supreme Court decision telling the Ute Indians they were barred from making further claims against the United States was not controlling in ALP-the project backers had morphed ALP into a quasi Indian project as every other option to them was closed down or rejected.
We were held hostage in water court for 6 years while Interior continued to build the project.  We never got an answer to our questions from a judge, Gregory Lyman, who after all those years was still trying to figure out what consumptive use meant, a fundamental measurement of water use.  Our appeal to the state Supremes was rejected out of hand by rubber-stamping the opinion rendered by Lyman, the man who seemed flummoxed by basic water engineering terminology.  But we did get one thing.  We were hit with substantial court costs, which project backers knew we could not pay, thus ending our pursuit of the truth about ALP.

 
Phillip Doe lives in Colorado. He can be reached at: ptdoe@comcast.net

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
JUNE 4, 2010
 
CONTACT: GOVERNOR’S PRESS OFFICE
850-488-5394
 
Governor Crist’s Request for Fishery Failure Determination for Florida
Granted by U.S. Department of Commerce
~Fisherman and affected businesses can now qualify for economic injury loans ~
 
TALLAHASSEE – Governor Charlie Crist, continuing his commitment to recovery efforts in the Gulf of Mexico, announced that his request for a Fishery Failure Determination for Florida has been granted by the United States Department of Commerce. The Governor made the request yesterday, based on the growing impact of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill on fishing communities throughout the state.
 
“The quick response of the federal government to this request is a positive step towards protecting Florida’s hard-working citizens,” said Governor Crist. “We are continuing to keep a close watch on the oil spill and are prepared to respond to any impacts we may experience. Florida is still open and we encourage everyone to go fishing and enjoy Florida seafood products.”
 
Under the Magnuson-Stevens Fishery Conservation and Management Act, Governor Crist urged Secretary Locke to establish a regional economic transition program. By granting the Governor’s request, impacted fisherman and affected businesses can now qualify for economic injury loans through the U.S. Small Business Administration.
 
For more information on Florida’s response to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, visit www.dep.state.fl.us/deepwaterhorizon, follow www.Twitter.com/FLDEPalert or call the Florida Oil Spill Information Line at 888-337-3569.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

So, why isn’t BP and the Coast Guard preventing the oil from killing the birds by using more and more absorbents, oil skimmers, booms, tankers to contain the spill??  DV

June 4, 2010

 http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gDzR9FfvXxFe-C6rdCAAYNjp5sSwD9G4532O2

Graham: Spill panel would have subpoena power
By WILL LESTER (AP)  11 hours ago

WASHINGTON  A leader of the presidential commission investigating the Gulf oil spill said Thursday he has been told his panel will have subpoena power to get a full accounting of the disaster.

Former Fla. Sen. Bob Graham, a co-chairman of the commission, said he’s not sure if that subpoena power will be necessary for the panel to do its work.

Graham told the CBS Evening News, that “the whole industry was largely unprepared” for such an oil spill and said a great deal of development of deep-sea drilling technology was not accompanied by a similar investment in the safety of oil rigs and the ability to respond to an accident.

Former Environmental Protection Agency chief William Reilly, the other co-chairman, said he’s surprised he hasn’t seen more progress in the technology available to handle a spill more than 20 years after the Exxon Valdez ran aground and spilled its cargo. Reilly was in charge at EPA at the time of the Exxon Valdez spill off the Alaska coastline in 1989.

“I’m appalled that we’re in that stage of primitive response capability,” Reilly said.

BP sliced off a pipe with giant shears Thursday in the latest bid to curtail the worst oil spill in U.S. history, but the cut was jagged and placing a cap over the gusher will now be more challenging. Several earlier efforts to stem the flow have failed.

Reilly said it’s time to reassess the laws passed after Exxon Valdez intended to hold companies accountable for a spill. The update is needed in case a company is not willing to cover cleanup expenses, he said, adding that Exxon was willing to pay its expenses and BP has expressed a willingness to pay.

So far, anywhere between 21 million and 46 million gallons of oil have spewed into the Gulf, according to government estimates.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service reported 522 dead birds  at least 38 of them oiled  along the Gulf coast states, and more than 80 oiled birds have been rescued. It’s not clear exactly how many of the deaths can be attributed to the spill.

Oil drifted six miles from the Florida Panhandle’s popular sugar-white beaches, and crews on the mainland were doing everything possible to limit the damage.

Reilly said the spill has been catastrophic for people’s lives and their livelihoods. And he said he has concerns about what effects chemical dispersants will have on the Gulf and its wildlife.

“There’s nothing worse than a slow-moving catastrophe,” Reilly said, “and that’s what we’ve got.”

Xxxxxxxxxxxxx

 http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5gGyt_zfjX_sVsaMTgnOtGnrEXTMwD9G43JO00

Gulf spill workers complaining of flulike symptoms
By NOAKI SCHWARTZ and MATTHEW BROWN (AP)  13 hours ago

NEW ORLEANS  For days now, Dr. Damon Dietrich and other physicians have seen patients come through their emergency room at West Jefferson Medical Center with similar symptoms: respiratory problems, headaches and nausea.

In the past week, 11 workers who have been out on the water cleaning up oil from BP’s blown-out well have been treated for what Dietrich calls “a pattern of symptoms” that could have been caused by the burning of crude oil, noxious fumes from the oil or the dispersants dumped in the Gulf to break it up. All workers were treated and released.

“One person comes in, it could be multiple things,” he said. “Eleven people come in with these symptoms, it makes it incredibly suspicious.”

Few studies have examined long-term health effects of oil exposure. But some of the workers trolling Gulf Coast beaches and heading out into the marshes and waters have complained about flu-like symptoms  a similar complaint among crews deployed for the 1989 Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska.

BP and U.S. Coast Guard officials have said dehydration, heat, food poisoning or other unrelated factors may have caused the workers’ symptoms. The Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals is investigating.

Brief contact with small amounts of light crude oil and dispersants are not harmful. Swallowing small amounts of oil can cause upset stomach, vomiting and diarrhea. Long-term exposure to dispersants, however, can cause central nervous system problems, or do damage to blood, kidneys or livers, according to the Centers For Disease Control and Prevention.

In the six weeks since the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded, killing 11 workers, an estimated 21 million to 45 million gallons of crude has poured into the Gulf of Mexico. Hundreds of BP contractors have fanned out along the Gulf, deploying boom, spraying chemicals to break up the oil, picking up oil-soaked debris and trying to keep the creeping slick out of the sensitive marshes and away from the tourist-Mecca beaches.

Commercial fisherman John Wunstell Jr. spent a night on a vessel near the source of the spill and left complaining of a severe headache, upset stomach and nose bleed. He was treated at the hospital, and sued  becoming part of a class-action lawsuit filed last month in U.S. District Court in New Orleans against BP, Transocean and their insurers.

Wunstell, who was part of a crew burning oil, believes planes were spraying dispersant in the middle of the night  something BP disputes.

“I began to ache all over …” he said in the affidavit. “I was completely unable to function at this point and feared that I was seriously ill.”

Dozens of complaints, most from spill workers, have been made related to oil exposure with the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals, said spokeswoman Olivia Watkins, as well as with the Louisiana Poison Center, clinics and hospitals. Workers are being told to follow federal guidelines that recommend anyone involved in oil spill cleanup wear protective equipment such as gloves, safety glasses and clothing.

Michael J. Schneider, an attorney who decided against filing a class-action lawsuit in the 1990s involving the Valdez workers, said proving a link between oil exposure and health problems is very difficult.

“As a human being you listen to enough and you’ve got to believe they’re true,” he said. “The problem is the science may not be there to support them … Many of the signs and symptoms these people complained of are explainable for a dozen different reasons  it’s certainly coincidental they all shared a reason in common.”

Similar to the Valdez cleanup, there have been concerns in the Gulf that workers aren’t being supplied with enough protective gear. Workers have been spotted in white jumpsuits, gloves and booties but no goggles or respirators.

“If they’re out there getting lightheaded and dizzy every day then obviously they ought to come in, and there should be respirators and other equipment provided,” said LuAnn White, director of the Tulane Center for Applied Environmental Public Health. She added that most of the volatile components that could sicken people generally evaporate before the oil reaches shore.

BP PLC’s Chief Operating Officer Doug Suttles said reports of workers getting sick are being investigated but noted that no one has pinpointed the cause. Suttles said workers were being given “any safety equipment” needed to do their jobs safely.

Unlike with Exxon Valdez, in the Gulf, the oil has been lighter, the temperatures warm and humid, and there have been hundreds of thousands of gallons of chemicals used to break up the oil.

Court records showed more than 6,700 workers involved in the Exxon Valdez clean up suffered respiratory problems which the company attributed to a viral illness, not chemical poisoning.

Dennis Mestas represented the only known worker to successfully settle with Exxon over health issues. According to the terms of that confidential settlement, Exxon did not admit fault.

His client, Gary Stubblefield, spent four months lifting workers in a crane for 18 hours a day as they sprayed the oil-slicked beaches with hot water, which created an oily mist. Even though he had to wipe clean his windshield twice a day, Stubblefield said it never occurred to him that the mixture might be harming his lungs.

Within weeks, he and others, who wore little to no protective gear, were coughing and experiencing other symptoms that were eventually nicknamed Valdez crud. Now 60, Stubblefield cannot get through a short conversation without coughing and gasping for breath like a drowning man. He sometimes needs the help of a breathing machine and inhalers, and has to be careful not to choke when he drinks and eats.

Watching the Gulf situation unfold, he says, makes him sick.

“I just watch this stuff everyday and know these people are on the very first rung on the ladder and are going to go through a lot of misery,” said Stubblefield, who now lives in Prescott, Ariz.

Associated Press writers John Flesher from Michigan, Brian Skoloff and Kelli Kennedy from Miami contributed to this report.

Thanks to Richard Charter

June 4th, 2010

MODIS images today were too cloudy to be useful, but an excellent radar satellite image was taken today of the ongoing Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. This image, taken from the Envisat satellite using the ASAR radar sensor, shows oil apparently making landfall in Alabama on the east side of Mobile Bay, in the Fort Morgan – Gulf Shores area. An article on the Washington Post website today seems to confirm what we’re seeing on the image:

Envisat ASAR satellite radar image, June 3, 2010. Image courtesy CSTARS.

Oil slicks and sheen spread across a total area of about 11,505 square miles (29,796 km2) on this image, which doesn’t extend very far west of the Mississippi Delta, and doesn’t cover the approach to Florida Straits where we saw possible indications of oil on May 27.

Dr. Ian MacDonald and Dr. Oscar Garcia-Pineda at Florida State University have also been systematically analyzing the radar images of this spill. The animated graphic below shows a detailed look at the northeastern portion of the oil slick as it moves eastward off the Alabama coast and the Florida Panhandle on May 31, June 1 and June 3:

Animation showing oil slicks moving eastward along the Alabama and Florida coasts. Image courtesy Florida State University / MacDonald Image Lab.

Posted By John to SkyTruth at 6/03/2010 08:13:00 PM
–
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John@skytruth.org
P.O. Box 3283
Shepherdstown, WV 25443-3283
phone: 304-260-8886
skype: skytruth.amos
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SkyTruth:  Satellite images and digital mapping for
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A 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization – http://www.skytruth.org
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Special thanks to Richard Charter

Yeah, it’s ONLY about the money………..DV
For Immediate Release:                                                        Contact:  Nicolette Nye
Wednesday, June 2, 2010                                                         (202) 347-6900
 
Thousands of Jobs and Billions of Dollars in Government Revenue at Risk
From Six-month Gulf Drilling Halt Says National Ocean Industries Association Chairman
 
Washington – Preliminary estimates show crippling job loss and significant economic impacts will result from the President’s recent order to halt work on 33 exploratory wells in the deepwater Gulf of Mexico and institute a six-month moratorium on all drilling in water depths greater than 500 feet.
 
“The immediate impacts of the order will be felt by the families of tens of thousands of offshore workers who will be unemployed,” said Burt Adams, Chairman of the National Ocean Industries Association.   
 
For each platform idled by the work stoppage, up to 1,400 jobs are at risk, and lost wages could reach $10 million per month per platform and up to $330 million per month for all 33 platforms, preliminary estimates from the Louisiana Mid-Continent Oil and Gas Association (LMOGA) show.  
 
“At a time when the spill is already causing economic stress for key industries in the region, the president’s action will make things much worse by putting more Gulf citizens out of work,” said Adams.
 
The LMOGA estimates show the six-month halt would defer four percent of anticipated 2011 deepwater Gulf of Mexico production (80,000 barrels per day), and  likely render seven current discoveries sub-economic, putting $7.6 billion in future government revenues at risk.  Additionally, drilling rigs idled by the order will be contracted overseas, and will not be available to work in the Gulf once the halt is lifted, making the U.S. even more dependent on foreign oil.   “Other countries are apparently more confident in the overall safety of the oil and gas industry and will no doubt fill the potential void created by less domestic production,” said Adams.
 
“The need to act in the face of the ongoing crisis in the Gulf of Mexico is understandable, but the 33 rigs affected by the presidential order are the very ones successfully inspected in early May at the order of Interior Secretary Ken Salazar,” Adams said.  “Nobody wants to just rush into deepwater drilling during this ongoing crisis, but it appears that less draconian and potentially less harmful solutions such as increased inspection and recertification of equipment would be an acceptable compromise.”
 
“Considering that the deepwater regions generate 80 percent of the Gulf’s oil production and 45 percent of its natural gas production, a six-month work stoppage will have severe and perhaps long lasting impacts on our domestic energy supply and economic security,” said Adams. “When you couple this ‘no less than six-month’ moratorium with the cancelled Western Gulf lease sale, the potential for long term job loss and economic hardship for the Gulf of Mexico looms even greater.”
 
The offshore industry is responsible for nearly 200,000 jobs in the Gulf of Mexico alone, and provides 30 percent of our nation’s domestic oil production and 11 percent of our domestic gas production.  Offshore oil and gas production accounts for an average $13 billion a year in non-tax revenues to states and the Federal government and has made over $24 billion available to the Land and Water Conservation Fund over the last 28 years.
###
NOIA is the only national trade association representing all segments of the offshore industry with an interest in the exploration and production of both traditional and renewable energy resources on the nation’s outer continental shelf.  The NOIA membership comprises more than 250 companies engaged in business activities ranging from producing to drilling, engineering to marine and air transport, offshore construction to equipment manufacture and supply, telecommunications to finance and insurance.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.citizen.org/Page.aspx?pid=183

Protest BP this Friday in D.C.!

Join activists from Public Citizen, Friends of the Earth, Greenpeace, Energy Action Coalition, Hip Hop Caucus, 350.org, Chesapeake Climate Action and Center for Biological Diversity.

Click here to let us know you plan to attend.

And check out our Facebook event page for the protest, where you can connect with other activists: Citizen’s Arrest at BP Headquarters, Washington, D.C.

WHAT: Demonstration and citizen’s arrest at BP’s Washington, D.C., headquarters

WHEN: Friday, June 4, at 12:00 p.m.

WHERE: BP headquarters, 1101 New York Ave., NW, Washington, D.C.

Meet at the green space right across the street from BP’s office building at 11:45 a.m. We’ll have signs, but we encourage you to bring your own.

Join us at noon on Friday to hold BP accountable for its crimes!

Thank you for your commitment and your action,

Allison Fisher
Organizer, Energy Program

P.S. If you haven’t yet, take the “Beyond BP” pledge to boycott BP at www.BeyondBP.org and join our Facebook group 1,000,000 Strong to Boycott BP.

To get regular e-alerts about opportunities for activism and other ways to help with Public Citizen’s work, sign up for the Public Citizen Action Network.

http://www2.ucar.edu/news/ocean-currents-likely-to-carry-oil-spill-along-atlantic-coast

June 03, 2010

The research was supported in part by the National Science Foundation, NCAR’s sponsor. The results were reviewed by scientists at NCAR and elsewhere, although not yet submitted for peer-review publication.

“I’ve had a lot of people ask me, ‘Will the oil reach Florida?’” says NCAR scientist Synte Peacock, who worked on the study. “Actually, our best knowledge says the scope of this environmental disaster is likely to reach far beyond Florida, with impacts that have yet to be understood.”

The computer simulations indicate that, once the oil in the uppermost ocean has become entrained in the Gulf of Mexico’s fast-moving Loop Current, it is likely to reach Florida’s Atlantic coast within weeks. It can then move north as far as about Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, with the Gulf Stream, before turning east. Whether the oil will be a thin film on the surface or mostly subsurface due to mixing in the uppermost region of the ocean is not known.

The scientists used a powerful computer model to simulate how a liquid released at the spill site would disperse and circulate, producing results that are not dependent on the total amount released. The scientists tracked the rate of dispersal in the top 65 feet of the water and at four additional depths, with the lowest being just above the sea bed.

“The modeling study is analogous to taking a dye and releasing it into water, then watching its pathway,” Peacock says.

The dye tracer used in the model has no actual physical resemblance to true oil. Unlike oil, the dye has the same density as the surrounding water, does not coagulate or form slicks, and is not subject to chemical breakdown by bacteria or other forces.

Peacock and her colleagues stress that the simulations are not a forecast because it is impossible to accurately predict the precise location of the oil weeks or months from now. Instead, the simulations provide an envelope of possible scenarios for the oil dispersal. The timing and course of the oil slick will be affected by regional weather conditions and the ever-changing state of the Gulf’s Loop Current—neither of which can be predicted more than a few days in advance. The dilution of the oil relative to the source will also be impacted by details such as bacterial degradation, which are not included in the simulations.

What is possible, however, is to estimate a range of possible trajectories, based on the best understanding of how ocean currents transport material. The oil trajectory that actually occurs will depend critically both on the short-term evolution of the Loop Current, which feeds into the Gulf Stream, and on the state of the overlying atmosphere. The flow in the model represents the best estimate of how ocean currents are likely to respond under typical wind conditions.

Picking up speed

Oil has been pouring into the Gulf of Mexico since April 20 from a blown-out undersea well, the result of an explosion and fire on an oil rig. The spill is located in a relatively stagnant area of the Gulf, and the oil so far has remained relatively confined near the Louisiana and Alabama coastlines, although there have been reports of small amounts in the Loop Current.

The model simulations show that a liquid released in the surface ocean at the spill site is likely to slowly spread as it is mixed by the ocean currents until it is entrained in the Loop Current. At that point, speeds pick up to about 40 miles per day, and when the liquid enters the Atlantic’s Gulf Stream it can travel at speeds up to about 100 miles per day, or 3,000 miles per month.

The six model simulations released today all have different Loop Current characteristics, and all provide slightly different scenarios of how the oil might be dispersed. The simulations all bring the oil to south Florida and then up the East Coast. However, the timing of the oil’s movement differs significantly depending on the configuration of the Loop Current.

The scenarios all differ in their starting conditions, a technique used in weather and climate forecasting to determine how uncertainty about current conditions might affect predictions of the future.

A still from the animation showing the oil trajectory after 130 days.

Additional model studies are currently under way, looking further out in time, that will indicate what might happen to the oil in the Atlantic.

“We have been asked if and when remnants of the spill could reach the European coastlines,” says Martin Visbeck, a member of the research team with IFM-GEOMAR, University of Kiel, Germany. “Our assumption is that the enormous lateral mixing in the ocean together with the biological disintegration of the oil should reduce the pollution to levels below harmful concentrations. But we would like to have this backed up by numbers from some of the best ocean models.”

The scientists are using the Parallel Ocean Program, which is the ocean component of the Community Climate System Model, a powerful software tool designed by scientists at NCAR and the Department of Energy. They are conducting the simulations at supercomputers based at the New Mexico Computer Applications Center and Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

The University Corporation for Atmospheric Research manages the National Center for Atmospheric Research under sponsorship by the National Science Foundation. Any opinions, findings and conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.

 June 03, 2010 

BOULDER—A detailed computer modeling study released today indicates that oil from the massive spill in the Gulf of Mexico might soon extend along thousands of miles of the Atlantic coast and open ocean as early as this summer. The modeling results are captured in a series of dramatic animations produced by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) and collaborators.

This animation shows one scenario of how oil released at the location of the Deepwater Horizon disaster on April 20 in the Gulf of Mexico may move in the upper 65 feet of the ocean. This is not a forecast, but rather, it illustrates a likely dispersal pathway of the oil for roughly four months following the spill. It assumes oil spilling continuously from April 20 to June 20. The colors represent a dilution factor ranging from red (most concentrated) to beige (most diluted).  The dilution factor does not attempt to estimate the actual barrels of oil at any spot; rather, it depicts how much of the total oil from the source that will be carried elsewhere by ocean currents. For example, areas showing a dilution factor of 0.01 would have one-hundredth the concentration of oil present at the spill site.

The animation is based on a computer model simulation, using a virtual dye, that assumes weather and current conditions similar to those that occur in a typical year. It is one of a set of six scenarios released today that simulate possible pathways the oil might take under a variety of oceanic conditions. Each of the six scenarios shows the same overall movement of oil through the Gulf to the Atlantic and up the East Coast. However, the timing and fine-scale details differ, depending on the details of the ocean currents in the Gulf. The full set of six simulations can be found here. (Visualization by Tim Scheitlin and Mary Haley, NCAR; based on model simulations.)  [Download  high resolution video]

The research was supported in part by the National Science Foundation, NCAR’s sponsor. The results were reviewed by scientists at NCAR and elsewhere, although not yet submitted for peer-review publication.

“I’ve had a lot of people ask me, ‘Will the oil reach Florida?’” says NCAR scientist Synte Peacock, who worked on the study. “Actually, our best knowledge says the scope of this environmental disaster is likely to reach far beyond Florida, with impacts that have yet to be understood.”

The computer simulations indicate that, once the oil in the uppermost ocean has become entrained in the Gulf of Mexico’s fast-moving Loop Current, it is likely to reach Florida’s Atlantic coast within weeks. It can then move north as far as about Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, with the Gulf Stream, before turning east. Whether the oil will be a thin film on the surface or mostly subsurface due to mixing in the uppermost region of the ocean is not known.

The scientists used a powerful computer model to simulate how a liquid released at the spill site would disperse and circulate, producing results that are not dependent on the total amount released. The scientists tracked the rate of dispersal in the top 65 feet of the water and at four additional depths, with the lowest being just above the sea bed.

“The modeling study is analogous to taking a dye and releasing it into water, then watching its pathway,” Peacock says.

The dye tracer used in the model has no actual physical resemblance to true oil. Unlike oil, the dye has the same density as the surrounding water, does not coagulate or form slicks, and is not subject to chemical breakdown by bacteria or other forces.

Peacock and her colleagues stress that the simulations are not a forecast because it is impossible to accurately predict the precise location of the oil weeks or months from now. Instead, the simulations provide an envelope of possible scenarios for the oil dispersal. The timing and course of the oil slick will be affected by regional weather conditions and the ever-changing state of the Gulf’s Loop Current—neither of which can be predicted more than a few days in advance. The dilution of the oil relative to the source will also be impacted by details such as bacterial degradation, which are not included in the simulations.

What is possible, however, is to estimate a range of possible trajectories, based on the best understanding of how ocean currents transport material. The oil trajectory that actually occurs will depend critically both on the short-term evolution of the Loop Current, which feeds into the Gulf Stream, and on the state of the overlying atmosphere. The flow in the model represents the best estimate of how ocean currents are likely to respond under typical wind conditions.

Picking up speed

Oil has been pouring into the Gulf of Mexico since April 20 from a blown-out undersea well, the result of an explosion and fire on an oil rig. The spill is located in a relatively stagnant area of the Gulf, and the oil so far has remained relatively confined near the Louisiana and Alabama coastlines, although there have been reports of small amounts in the Loop Current.

The model simulations show that a liquid released in the surface ocean at the spill site is likely to slowly spread as it is mixed by the ocean currents until it is entrained in the Loop Current. At that point, speeds pick up to about 40 miles per day, and when the liquid enters the Atlantic’s Gulf Stream it can travel at speeds up to about 100 miles per day, or 3,000 miles per month.

The six model simulations released today all have different Loop Current characteristics, and all provide slightly different scenarios of how the oil might be dispersed. The simulations all bring the oil to south Florida and then up the East Coast. However, the timing of the oil’s movement differs significantly depending on the configuration of the Loop Current.

The scenarios all differ in their starting conditions, a technique used in weather and climate forecasting to determine how uncertainty about current conditions might affect predictions of the future.

A still from the animation showing the oil trajectory after 130 days.

Additional model studies are currently under way, looking further out in time, that will indicate what might happen to the oil in the Atlantic.

“We have been asked if and when remnants of the spill could reach the European coastlines,” says Martin Visbeck, a member of the research team with IFM-GEOMAR, University of Kiel, Germany. “Our assumption is that the enormous lateral mixing in the ocean together with the biological disintegration of the oil should reduce the pollution to levels below harmful concentrations. But we would like to have this backed up by numbers from some of the best ocean models.”

The scientists are using the Parallel Ocean Program, which is the ocean component of the Community Climate System Model, a powerful software tool designed by scientists at NCAR and the Department of Energy. They are conducting the simulations at supercomputers based at the New Mexico Computer Applications Center and Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

The University Corporation for Atmospheric Research manages the National Center for Atmospheric Research under sponsorship by the National Science Foundation. Any opinions, findings and conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

Here’s the link to the Central Command Center  Suggestions website:

http://www.deepwaterhorizonresponse.com/go/doc/2931/546759/

Here’s the link to the simple form to fill out:

http://www.horizonedocs.com/artform.php

It was easy; I sent in a suggestion to utilize bioremediation, i.e. oil-eating microbes especially for the Dry Tortugas and Florida Keys coral reefs. I’m sure they are getting lots of these and may or may not care/listen/respond.     DV

http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/

June 3, 2010, 10:47 am

As my colleague William Broad reports, the United States is not planning to heed calls from armchair engineers to fire a nuclear weapon at the damaged BP well still gushing into the Gulf of Mexico — simply because, in the words of one official, “It’s crazy.” That said, as Mr. Broad notes, ideas about how to cap the well are flowing onto the Web nearly as fast as oil into the water.

While thinking outside the box, and even the bun, comes naturally to many Americans who spend a lot of time online, some of this brainstorming has been generated in response to requests for help from BP, the government and news organizations like CNN.

BP’s Web site has a “citizen response” section appealing for information and ideas. One blogger, a lawyer named Michael J. Evans who runs BPOilNews.com, reported this week that the company “finally opened a telephone hot line to take oil spill suggestions from the public.” He added:

Whether the suggestions will be seriously considered by BP remains to be seen, but I am happy to report that I had a satisfactory experience when I checked out the Oil Spill Suggestion Hot Line. When I called (281) 366-5511, the phone was actually answered by a live person (in my case, after only two rings) who was polite and actually seemed to be putting my information into a computer. The operator took my name, city and state of residence, ZIP code, telephone number, and e-mail address. She then asked for my suggestion and requested that I speak slowly so she could write it all down.

According to the “Suggestions” page of the Deepwater Horizon Unified Command Web site:

Thousands of people have submitted possible ideas on how to stop or contain the oil in the Gulf of Mexico. More than 20,000 ideas on how to stop the flow of oil or contain the oil spill have been sent to BP since the Gulf of Mexico incident. These ideas have flooded in from people across the world, ranging from ordinary members of the public to oil industry professionals, and in many languages from Arabic to Russian.

According to the site, “BP has implemented a process to review and evaluate all of these suggestions.” Callers are asked to submit their ideas in written form, and then each scheme “is sent for triage by a team of 30 technical and operational personnel who will review its technical feasibility and application.” Although “the technical review can take some time,” eventually:

Each idea is sorted into one of three categories:

* Not possible or not feasible in these conditions;
* Already considered/ planned or;
* Feasible.

The feasible ideas are then escalated for a more detailed review, potential testing and field application. So far, around 100 ideas are under further review.

CNN’s call for ideas encouraged readers of its Web site to “share a video or photo explaining your thoughts — bonus points for awesome visuals.” After several hundred responses came in, the network asked Bill Nye to explain why none of the suggestions for cleaning up the spill or capping the well were better than those already devised by experts.

After looking at several of the proposed solutions, Mr. Nye urged viewers to keep in mind that “the people working on these problems are engineers, these are people who nominally can do calculus, people who are very good at physics, people who’ve studied chemistry, people who have dedicated their lives to learning about nature, to learning about science, to learning about the process by which we understand the world.”

Although The Times has not joined CNN in soliciting ideas, that has not stopped our readers from submitting dozens of possible fixes in just the past week. My colleagues who usually field helpful notes about typos or angry screeds about split infinitives and our coverage of ethnic conflicts from readers of our Web site have lately been getting notes they’re filing under “I Know How to Fix the Oil Spill.”

Here, with some corrections of spelling errors, are a few of the more creative ideas to come over our transom in recent days:

Recently when they were widening the roadway 287, whenever they would use explosives they would lay a very heavy steel woven blanket over the area to protect the public. These blankets were 40’ x 40’ hoisted into place with cranes. Why not put several of these blankets over the hole then several steel roadway plates over them! Or why not just sink a ship over the hole! — C. Guntner

My dad, an old barge owner, suggests (and I concur with changes) that an upside-down barge (or I say circular, bowl-like object) filled with concrete (or other heavy material that pours into a mold, then hardens), is lowered onto sea floor on top of and encircling pipe end. Then other heavy objects added on top if needed until the pressure of escaping oil is equalized and spill stops. Further encapsulating and stabilizing measures can then be added to bunker the area down. — Pat Hoffstatter

Create, by sewing, a mile-long tube of impermeable fabric with enlarged ends, a two-ended funnel, the bottom end circus tent sized, the top lake-reservoir sized. The bottom is loosely floated over the leak, then tacked to the ocean floor. The top gradually fills with the rising oil-water mixture floating up to become a lake-reservoir held in place by buoys, increasingly oil rich, as the seal at the bottom is improved. The lake-reservoir is emptied continuously by a tanker fleet. CONTAMINATION OF THE GULF CEASES. — Dr. Lawrence F. Wasser

I came up with a SPINNING TOP PLUG with toggle clamps. The spinning top has grooves on it, like a tap and wings to make it spin from the oil flow. Once the top is over the the pipe, it is lowered very fast or dropped into the out flow pipe. And the toggles hole the top in place. It also has a movable coupling holding the SPINNING TOP SYSTEM. Good Luck. — Jim Fox

It is difficult to add a cap on top of a high-pressure tube. However, it is relatively easy to insert a long metal stick with a long thin tip and gradually increased radius and backward hooks into the well. First put the thin tip of the stick into the well and then push the stick into the well and let the thick part matching the well’s radius deeply into the well and the backward hooks to keep the stick in the well. — Xinhang Shen

I have one suggestion to stop oil flow. BP may consider using clay and/or sand in their top kill effort. These are natural constituents of the sea bed and perhaps heavier than oil. I am not an engineer or a geophysicist, but I am tossing with this idea. I am deeply concerned as is everybody and offer this naïve suggestion. — S.K. Dey

Please! Seal the Gulf Oil Leak quickly and at low cost by immediately dropping 100s to 1000s of tons of plastic bagged capsules of either cement/ concrete/ clay/ etc. select best available/effective material from readily available bottom door opening DREDGING BARGES towed to the site from nearby ports. – Jerry Pospisil

Could the riser pipe be squeezed shut, much as a soda straw be squeezed between thumb and finger? — Joe Kellen

I am engineer and I would like to suggest for BP to stop oil leak, an alloy of zinc of low-point fusion, like Zamak in Portuguese. — J.M. Solis

I LIVE IN RUSSIA. I KNOW HOW TO STOP CONTAMINATION OF MEXICAN BAY. I WOULD LIKE TO SELL THE IDEA. BUT I BADLY TALK FOR ENGLISH AND I DO NOT KNOW HOW TO CONTACT WITH GUIDANCE OF COMPANY. YOU WOULD NOT COULD TO ME HEREIN TO HELP. IT IS VERY GOOD IDEA. YOU WILL BE SORRY ME FOR BAD KNOWLEDGE OF ENGLISH. WITH KIND REGARDS. DMITRY

It seems the easiest solution would be to put a bladder on the end of a pipe, as far into the pipe as possible (to get past sharp edges). Pump air into the bladder, it’s done. The bladder can be designed to spread out into the pipe with the pressure from the oil.

Depending on how deep you have to go, you could also make it a mechanical seal instead of pumping air. Put the largest steel tube into the pipe that will still allow the oil to come out of the pipe, push a bladder through the tube, the bladder is anchored to the inner tube, like a parachute, oil pushes open the bladder. The bladder has to be designed to expand with the pressure.

Don’t know if it can be done, but from my armchair it seemed logical.
— John Cole

I don’t pretend to be an expert with this type of problem. However, I remind myself of the story about the truck stuck under the bridge because it was a few inches too tall. As the experts and engineers devised elaborate plans to remove the bridge or cut away the truck, a child asked, why don’t you just let the air out of the tires?

Therefore, I submit two different ideas for consideration to slow or stop the flow of oil:

The first idea uses a large clamp to crimp or crush the pipe at the break. I envision a tool similar to the jaws of life used by Fire and Rescue workers to pull apart cars. The difference here being the machinery would squeeze instead of expand. This procedure isn’t the final solution, but could dramatically reduce the flow of oil until the relief wells can be completed.

The second idea is to provide a splice over the top of the break in the pipe. Similar to how plumbers fix breaks in water pipes. The splice plate could be equipped with additional pipes or hoses to relieve the pressure and draw the oil up to ships on the surface of the gulf. Again, this would not be the final fix, but could provide a temporary solution until the relief wells are completed. — Jim Viviano

http://thephoenixsun.com/archives/9943

After some setbacks, BP has successfully severed a riser pipe, preparing the way to lower a containment dome over the well in the Gulf of Mexico, that should, according to BP’s plan, capture a large quantity of the oil that has been gushing out of control since April 20th.  Operators are now (11:15 CDT) using a circular saw to smooth the edges of the pipe to ensure a tighter fit for the dome.

Special thanks to Osha Davidson

http://wonkroom.thinkprogress.org/2010/06/02/lubchenco-doubts-plumes/

Why is NOAA in such denial?  They should be out there spraying microbes to eat the oil now in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary’s Tortugas Ecological Reserve, home to spawning groupers.  DV
The foreign oil giant BP has come under withering fire for questioning the existence of vast undersea oil plumes from the Deepwater Horizon disaster. BP’s skepticism is nearly matched by the federal government’s top ocean official, Dr. Jane Lubchenco, the ocean scientist in charge of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), raising more questions about the wisdom of the unnecessary federal collaboration with this environmental criminal.

In a teleconference with reporters, Lubchenco said that numerous teams of ocean scientists have found only “anomalies” that might or might not be oil which might or might not be from the BP disaster. She said that only chemical analysis to fingerprint water samples as being contaminated with the Deepwater Horizon’s oil should be considered confirmation of the plumes. Questioned by the Wonk Room, Lubchenco dismissed the findings of the University of Georgia research vessel Walton Smith team – who took physical samples of water contaminated with oil – as “circumstantial evidence.” After further questioning by Huffington Post’s Dan Froomkin, she then conceded:

It is quite possible there is oil under the surface. I think there is reason to believe that may be the case.

Although it is certainly true that chemical analysis of water samples will be definitive, the evidence for these “possible” oil plumes is far stronger than “circumstantial,” as today’s ABC News report about the Walton Smith mission shows:

Lubchenco’s expressed doubt of the existence of oil plumes is consistent with NOAA’s approach to other scientific questions about this environmental calamity. Like BP, she has dismissed the oil entrained in the loop current as a “very small amount of light sheen” which is “likely to be very, very diluted.” Like BP, Lubchenco claimed the 210,000-gallon-a-day guess for flow rate – which was questioned by independent scientists the day it came out on April 28 – was the “best estimate” for an entire month. Eventually NOAA admitted the actual flow rate was at least 240 to 500 percent greater.

Below is a timeline of the scientific research about these undersea plumes:
A 2001 experiment of a deepwater discharge of oil conducted by an industry consortium that included BP found that “a portion of the most toxic compounds is left in the water column.”

An April 26 BP document estimates that “at least half of the oil released” will “evaporate or disperse in the water column.” The document was made public on May 27 after an investigation by House global warming committee chair Ed Markey (D-MA).

On May 6, BP retracted its request that Woods Hole scientist Richard Camilli lead a team to directly measure the undersea plume at the Deepwater Horizon wellhead.

On May 10, the environmental consulting company Applied Science Associates took the NOAA-commissioned research vessel Jack Fitz and found the “presence of oil beneath the surface.” The final laboratory tests were completed Monday but are being held by NOAA.

On May 16, the multi-institution Pelican mission led by Samantha Joye of the University of Georgia and Vernon Asper of the University of Southern Mississippi reported plumes based on multiple instruments from 2300 to 4200 feet below sea level, flowing southwest of the Deepwater Horizon wellhead.

On May 25, Good Morning America correspondent Sam Champion and Philippe Cousteau Jr., the chief ocean correspondent for Planet Green, filmed dispersed globules of oil “forming large plumes under the surface of the water as deep as twenty-five feet.”

On May 28, the multi-institution Walton Smith mission led by Samantha Joye of the University of Georgia and Vernon Asper of the University of Southern Mississippi detected plumes of suspended oil at three different depths west of the Deepwater Horizon wellhead.

On May 28, the University of South Florida research vessel Weatherbird II mission detected a “6-mile-wide plume of invisible oil” more than two miles below the surface in the DeSoto Canyon, about 20 miles northeast of the Deepwater Horizon wellhead. They found the plume guided by computer modeling by USF oceanographer Robert Weisberg.

On May 30, NOAA released a map of a “subsurface plume detected” traveling southwest from the Deepwater Horizon wellhead by the R/V Brooks McCall mission using a CDOM fluorometer.

On May 30, BP CEO Tony Hayward claimed, “The oil is on the surface. There aren’t any plumes.”

UPDATE
Dr. Asper tells the Wonk Room in an email:
The samples from these “features” look like oil and sure smell like oil and of course they fluoresce like oil. But it might be something else. Honestly, we are after the truth so any leads we can get will be greatly appreciated.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://rawstory.com/rs/2010/0603/bp-paid-officials-meals-airfare-polar-bear-trip/
By John Byrne
Thursday, June 3rd, 2010 — 9:42 am
The embattled oil and gas giant BP paid for a slew of travel and dining arrangements for senior government officials in the years leading up to the massive oil leak in the Gulf.
Critics say BP got too close with regulators, neutering the government’s safety watchdogs.
The Washington-based newspaper The Hill revealed a series of BP-funded trips after a review of files at the Office of Government Ethics.

Among the more notable was a BP-sponsored trip to Alaska for officials of the Food and Wildlife Service, which involved “maintenance of video surveillance at polar bear den” and a “polar bear study.”

The paper adds:
In June 2004, BP paid for meals and airfare for a trio of Interior Department officials, including then-deputy secretary J. Steven Griles, while they visited an offshore oil rig off New Orleans, La. BP split the cost with the National Ocean Industries Association.
Story continues below…

Griles later pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice for his involvement in the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal, and was sentenced to 10 months in prison.

In February 2005, then-Interior Secretary Gale Norton and then-Minerals Management Service (MMS) Director Johnnie Burton attended a dedication ceremony for BP’s Thunder Horse oil rig off the coast of Texas. BP paid for travel and meals for the officials.

BP also paid for airfare and lodging in 2006 and 2007 for a trip by officials from the Fish and Wildlife Service to Prudhoe Bay, Alaska, for “maintenance of video surveillance at polar bear den” and a “polar bear study,” according to documents.

In August 2004, six EPA officials attended a meeting on Alaska’s North Slope near Prudhoe Bay, where they stayed at BP facilities. In 2006, BP was responsible for a large oil spill in Prudhoe Bay.

Former government officials are also an important part of BP’s efforts to keep regulators and Congress at bay.

“In the first three months of this year alone, the company at the heart of the current crisis, BP, has hired at least 27 lobbyists who formerly worked in Congress or the executive branch,” Huffington Post’s Sam Stein noted Wednesday. “The revolving door between the oil giant and elected office is spinning fast — so much so that good government officials are hard-pressed to name a comparable organization with that much institutional clout on tap.”

“In the first three months of 2010 — the three months that immediately preceded the explosion of its Deepwater Horizon offshore oil rig — BP spent more than $3.8 million dollars on lobbying the federal government,” Stein added. “The cash was spread around seven prominent lobby shops within the D.C. area (including BP’s own internal operation), who in turn employed 39 lobbyists to help the company push its legislative interests. That nearly 70 percent of those hired guns have experience in elected office doesn’t surprise good government officials because those are after all the most sought-after hires on K Street.”

BP also hired a spokeswoman this week who served in the Bush Administration.
Anne Womack Kolton, former head of public affairs at the Department of Energy and Cheney’s onetime campaign press secretary, took over BP’s public relations message this week.
While at Cheney’s side, Kolton defended the secrecy of the Vice President’s Energy task force, a group which held secretive meetings with energy company executives. When the General Accounting Office — the research arm of Congress — sued the Administraton for records relating to Cheney’s meetings, Kolton (then Womack) was at his side.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

June 3, 2010

 http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704025304575284264222132380.html

U.S. NEWS JUNE 3, 2010, 8:56 A.M. ET
BP Says It Was Unprepared for Gulf Spill
Associated Press

PENSACOLA, Fla.BP PLC’s top executive acknowledged Thursday the global oil giant was unprepared to fight a catastrophic deepwater oil spill as engineers were forced yet again to reconfigure plans for executing their latest gambit to control the Gulf of Mexico gusher.

BP planned to use giant shears to cut a pipe a mile below the sea after a diamond-tipped saw became stuck halfway through the job, another frustrating delay in six weeks of failed efforts to stop or at least curtail the worst oil spill in U.S. history. The government’s point man for the disaster, Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen, said on the NBC “Today” show the cut would be made later Thursday.

Once the riser pipe is cut, BP hopes to cap it and start pumping some crude to a surface tanker, which would reduce but not end the spill. The next chance for stopping the flow won’t come until two relief wells meant to plug the reservoir for good are finished in August, after an effort to staunch the gusher with heavy mud failed Saturday.

BP Chief Executive Tony Hayward told the Financial Times it was “an entirely fair criticism” to say the company had not been fully prepared for a deepwater oil leak. Mr. Hayward called it “low-probability, high-impact” accident.

“What is undoubtedly true is that we did not have the tools you would want in your tool-kit,” Mr. Hayward said in an interview published in Thursday’s edition of the London-based newspaper.

The latest attempt to control the spill, the so-called cut-and-cap method, is considered risky because slicing away a section of the 20-inch-wide riser could remove kinks in the pipe and temporarily increase the flow of oil by as much as 20%.

Oil drifted perilously close to the Florida Panhandle’s popular sugar-white beaches, and crews on the mainland were doing everything possible to limit the catastrophe.

The Coast Guard’s Adm. Allen directed BP to pay for five additional sand barrier projects in Louisiana. BP said Thursday the project will cost it about $360 million, on top of about $990 million it had spent as of its latest expense update Tuesday on response and clean up, grants to four Gulf coast states and claims from people and companies hurt by the spill.

As the edge of the slick drifted within seven miles of Pensacola’s beaches, emergency workers rushed to link the last in a miles-long chain of booms designed to fend off the oil. They were slowed by thunderstorms and wind before the weather cleared in the afternoon.

Forecasters said the oil would probably wash up by Friday, threatening a delicate network of islands, bays and white-sand beaches that are a haven for wildlife and a major tourist destination dubbed the Redneck Riviera.

“We are doing what we can do, but we cannot change what has happened,” said John Dosh, emergency director for Escambia County, which includes Pensacola.

The effect on wildlife has grown, too.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service reported 522 dead birdsat least 38 of them oiledalong the Gulf coast states, and more than 80 oiled birds have been rescued. It’s not clear exactly how many of the deaths can be attributed to the spill.

Dead birds and animals found during spills are kept as evidence in locked freezers until investigations and damage assessments are complete, according to Teri Frady, a spokeswoman for the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration.

“This includes strict chain-of-custody procedures and long-term locked storage until the investigative and damage assessment phases of the spill are complete,” she wrote in an email.

As the oil drifted closer to Florida, beachgoers in Pensacola waded into the gentle waves, cast fishing lines and sunbathed, even as a two-man crew took water samples. One of the men said they were hired by BP to collect samples to be analyzed for tar and other pollutants.

Officials said the slick sighted offshore consisted in part of “tar mats” about 500 feet by 2,000 feet in size.

County officials set up the booms to block oil from reaching inland waterways but planned to leave beaches unprotected because they are too difficult to defend against the action of the waves and because they are easier to clean up.

“It’s inevitable that we will see it on the beaches,” said Keith Wilkins, deputy chief of neighborhood and community services for Escambia County.

Florida’s beaches play a crucial role in the state’s tourism industry. At least 60% of vacation spending in the state during 2008 was in beachfront cities. Worried that reports of oil would scare tourists away, state officials are promoting interactive Web maps and Twitter feeds to show travelersparticularly those from overseashow large the state is and how distant their destinations may be from the spill.

____________
Alaska Dispatch
June 3, 2010

 http://www.alaskadispatch.com/dispatches/energy/5533-bp-plans-to-move-ahead-with-offshore-oil-drilling-in-arctic

BP plans to move ahead with offshore oil drilling in Arctic
Jill Burke | Jun 2, 2010

This fall, BP hopes to pull off a record-setting feat: Using a high-tech drill from a gravel island in the Beaufort Sea, it plans to reach two miles deep, turn and bore another six to eight miles horizontally to tap an oil reservoir in federal waters.

The moratorium imposed on new deep-water drilling and drilling in Arctic waters, imposed in the aftermath of the Gulf spill and BP’s inability to contain the leak, imploded Royal Dutch Shell’s plans to begin exploratory drilling in Alaska this summer. But BP still has hope of seeing its latest Alaska venture succeed.

Wednesday, the U.S. government confirmed the drilling “pause” does not apply to BP’s new project, called Liberty.

“The deep-water moratorium does not apply to this particular project, which is based from a man-made island and would potentially be drilling directionally into formations under shallow water.  If drilling permit applications are submitted for the project, the Department of the Interior will review them at the appropriate  time and determine, based on safety and other considerations, whether the project should move forward with drilling under federal waters,” said Kendra Barkoff, a spokesperson for the U.S. Department of the Interior.

Before it drills, BP will need state and federal drilling permits — permits for which it has not yet applied,  according to the Alaska Oil and Gas Commission, the state permitting agency, and Barkoff, speaking on behalf of the U.S. Minerals Management Service, the federal permitting agency.

Operators typically apply for a permit about one month in advance of the intended drilling date, according to AOGCC commissioner Cathy Forester, adding that Liberty, which launches from state waters to reach a federal reservoir, is an unusually complex project.

“If they want to start in September I’d hope they get us something pretty soon,” she said.

Asked to clarify Liberty’s development timeline, BP spokesman Steve Rinehart said the company, which plans to begin its first development well this fall, “will apply for permits in line with that schedule.”

Guy Schwartz, a senior petroleum engineer with AOGCC who handles BP’s permitting requests, said he hasn’t seen anything yet from the company.

“It appears their timetable is slipping a bit for getting a well spudded with the new rig,” Schwartz said.

In prior interviews BP has said it plans to start producing oil from Liberty next year.

Forester expects AOGCC to take a hard look at the entire project, including segments of the drilling operation that travel outside the state’s jurisdiction, because “if something goes wrong it’s going to affect state land or state water.”

“If we see something that they’re doing outside of state waters that we don’t think is safe, we’re not going to approve the permit,” she said.

While all permitting requests are thoroughly evaluated, with the shadow of the Gulf spill still looming, BP can expect heightened scrutiny with Liberty, according to AOGCC. Gone are the days when regulators, which send inspectors to the sites and check out the drill plans, assume everything has been done top notch, Forester said. Questions will be asked twice, and reviews will be conducted with “a different mindset” — looking for what might be wrong instead of expecting to find that an operator — in this case BP — has done everything right, she said.

“I think everybody trusts BP a little bit less than they did six weeks ago,” Forester said.

Contact Jill Burke at jill@alaskadispatch.com  
_____________
Anchorage Daily News
June 3, 2010

 http://www.adn.com/2010/06/02/1304923/as-bps-spill-efforts-stall-oil.html
As BP’s spill efforts stall, oil creeps toward other states
By CAROL ROSENBERG and RENEE SCHOOF / McClatchy Newspapers

Published: June 2nd, 2010 10:33 PM
Last Modified: June 3rd, 2010 04:24 AM

WASHINGTON  As BP’s latest attempt to capture leaking oil from its crippled rig in the Gulf of Mexico stalled Wednesday, Alabama, Florida and Mississippi braced for what officials said could be the first crude oil to hit their beaches.

With Florida’s Panhandle near Pensacola on track as the spill’s first landfall outside Louisiana, officials put another 20,000 feet of booms in place to protect precious wetlands there. In Mississippi, fishermen dumped their catch after oil washed ashore on Petit Bois Island off the coast and the state closed portions of its coastal fishing areas.

As the oil inched closer, comments by officials in Florida and Mississippi reflected a sense of urgency.

Florida Gov. Charlie Crist told CNN that the arrival of the oil was “imminent.” At a mid-afternoon visit to the state’s Emergency Operations Center in Tallahassee, Crist said: “We need to respond. We need to protect our state.”

After Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour toured Petit Bois Island, he promised to marshal all the resources needed to fight the pollution. Before Wednesday, Barbour’s more common response to the Gulf spill had been to encourage tourism, telling visitors that there was “nothing to worry about here folks.” Now he’s calling the oil on the barrier island “a wakeup call.”

At a Wednesday morning briefing, Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen said BP’s latest effort to stop the gush of oil from a leaking well in the Gulf had to be suspended Wednesday because a diamond saw blade got stuck in the pipe on the ocean floor it was trying to cut. The blade was later freed, and sawing was to resume as a prelude to installing a tight-fitting cap to capture the escaping oil and pump it to a barge on the surface.

Allen also said that tar balls has been found on Alabama’s Dauphin Island, and the White House approved five berm projects in Louisiana to protect delicate marshlands where oil already has begun landing.

The federal government Wednesday also expanded the closed fishing zone to include more than 31 percent of gulf waters, nearly 76,000 square miles, that ran from the western tip of the Florida panhandle southward toward Cuban waters.

Meantime, bad weather made it difficult to determine when the Deepwater Horizon’s oil spill would reach the shores, said Escambia County, Fla., spokeswoman Sonya Daniel, who reported that aerial tracking on Tuesday had detected an oil sheen 9.5 miles off the county’s coastline.

“At this point, we still don’t have any oil on our shores,” she added. “We have done our local booming strategy.”

At midday Wednesday, Crist’s office reported that a “concentration of tar balls” had been detected about 10 miles off the Escambia County coast, but still predicted “no large impacts” to the state before the weekend.

The primary oil plume from the Gulf of Mexico oil spill was 35 miles from Pensacola, according to the “oil plume model” from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The Food and Drug Administration, it said, was developing a “broad-scaled seafood sampling plan” to test seafood from the docks to the markets to the gulf waters themselves.

In Tallahassee, Crist said that skimmers had been deployed near Pensacola to remove “that oil from near-shore waters” and minimize any impact on the state.

The state’s noon advisory noted that forecasts of increased winds and seas this week across the north-central Gulf of Mexico gave a 50 percent chance or better of showers and thunderstorms through Friday, which could hamper surface oil recovery operations.

In Pittsburgh, President Barack Obama said that regardless of the cause of the Deepwater Horizon accident on April 20, deepwater drilling was always risky.

“The catastrophe unfolding in the Gulf right now may prove to be a result of human error  or corporations taking dangerous short-cuts that compromised safety,” he said in a speech at Carnegie Mellon University.

“But we have to acknowledge that there are inherent risks to drilling four miles beneath the surface of the Earth  risks that are bound to increase the harder oil extraction becomes.”

In Mississippi, coastal residents clearly were frustrated when they left a BP oil spill forum Thursday with unanswered questions.

Representatives of several federal and state agencies assured residents that tests have found that shrimp and fish are untainted, dissolved oxygen levels in the water are near normal for this time of year, air samples test normal and the government will stay on the job until the Deepwater Horizon gusher is plugged and the environment is cleaned up.

Representatives of the Environmental Protection Agency and NOAA also acknowledged that long-term environmental consequences are inevitable.

“I do think it’s fair to say that the BP oil spill is one of the greatest environmental challenges of our time,” A. Stanley Meiburg, the EPA’s deputy regional administrator, told 140 coast residents who attended a forum sponsored by the Mississippi-Alabama Sea Grant Consortium.

Barbara Medlock of Keith Huber Inc. in Gulfport wanted to know how much oil has been captured at sea and what is being done with it. She said her company, which manufactures mobile vacuum equipment used to suck up oil, has been unable to find those answers. She didn’t come away from the forum with any.

Her boss, Keith Huber president Suzanne Huber, said company representatives are upset because dozens of vacuum trucks sit unused in a BP staging area. Huber thinks those trucks could be put to work sucking up oil from barges at sea so it doesn’t reach shore.

The Deepwater Horizon response website indicates that 13.8 million gallons have been sucked up so far. A disaster response spokesman, who’d identify himself only as “Will” with the Coast Guard, told the Sun Herald of Biloxi, Miss., that oil mixed with saltwater is being stored in barges at various locations so the oil can be extracted and reused. He didn’t know for what.

Patrick Sullivan, a recreational boater who signed up and trained to help with the cleanup through Vessels of Opportunity, wonders why he’s never received a call to work.

Don Abrams of Ocean Springs, Miss., said he stayed up until 3 a.m. Wednesday researching the oil spill. He was concerned that a Texas laboratory with connections to BP is analyzing environmental samples. He believes the company may have a bias, but he was assured that government agencies are doing their own testing.

Abrams also has been reading about the continuing fallout from the Exxon Valdez oil spill in 1989. He said Alaska residents in the area suffer from immune, respiratory and nerve problems,

Abrams loves to fish and said his seafood is a staple of his family’s diet.

“I’m not eating any fresh fish,” he said. “I still have fish in my freezer.”

(Rosenberg, of the Miami Herald, reported from Miami. Schoof reported from Washington. Geoff Pender and Anita Lee of the Sun Herald in Biloxi, Miss., contributed to this article.)

Special thanks to Richard Charter

United States Department of the Interior

June 3, 2010

All Pending and Approved Plans Must Be Revised Before New Drilling
 

Washington, DC:  Bureau of Land Management Director Bob Abbey, who has been called upon to also serve as Acting Director of the Minerals Management Service (MMS), today announced that, before drilling new oil and gas wells on the Outer Continental Shelf, operators will be required to submit additional information about potential risks and safety considerations in their plans for exploration or development.  Exploration plans and development plans that have already been approved by MMS, including those that were approved using ‘categorical exclusions’ under the National Environmental Policy Act, will need to be resubmitted before any drilling of new wells.
 
“The moratorium on deepwater drilling that Secretary Salazar has ordered is a prudent step that will allow time for the Presidential Commission to complete its review of the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill and for immediate safety and environmental reforms to be implemented,” said Abbey.  “Pulling back exploration plans and development plans and requiring them to be updated with new information is consistent with this cautious approach and will ensure that new safety standards and risk considerations are incorporated into those planning documents.  In the long term, we also need Congress to approve the Administration’s proposal to fix the law that requires MMS to review exploration plans within a 30-day mandatory deadline.”
 
Director Abbey’s directive, which will be communicated to operators and lessees through a Notice to Lessees (NTL), will establish separate requirements for deep water and shallow water exploration and development plans.
 
Deep Water Exploration Plans and Development Plans
 
A six month deep water drilling moratorium implemented by Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar on Sunday, May 29, currently prohibits drilling of new oil and gas wells in water depths greater than 500 feet.
 
Director Abbey’s announcement today makes clear that after the deep water drilling moratorium, any new drilling must be under an exploration plan or development plan that takes into account new safety and environmental requirements and the recommendations of the Presidential Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill.
 
Shallow Water Exploration Plans and Development Plans
 
Oil and gas operations in waters less than 500 feet deep may move forward if they satisfy new safety and environmental requirements identified in Secretary Salazar’s report to the President.  Director Abbey’s announcement today makes clear that any new drilling in shallow water must be under an exploration plan or development plan that includes information demonstrating compliance with the new safety standards.
 
Call for Congressional Action to Lift 30-Day Mandatory Deadline on Exploration Plan Reviews
 
Director Abbey will issue the exploration plan and development plan directive under his authority to ensure that operations on the Outer Continental Shelf are always conducted in a safe and workmanlike manner, to prevent injury or loss of life, and to prevent damage to any natural resource or the environment. 
 
Director Abbey also reiterated, however, that Congress should approve the Administration’s proposal to provide MMS more time to conduct reviews of exploration plans.  Under current law, MMS is required to review exploration plans within 30 days.  In the oil spill response legislation submitted to Congress on May 12, the Obama Administration is proposing to change the 30-day congressionally-mandated deadline to a 90-day timeline that can be further extended to complete additional environmental and safety reviews, as needed. 
 
The Department of the Interior, together with the Council on Environmental Quality, is also conducting a review of MMS’s use of categorical exclusions.
 
“The approach I am announcing today is not an ideal solution, but it is an interim strategy that MMS will employ until Congress fixes the law and until additional reform recommendations from CEQ and DOI are developed and implemented,” said Abbey.
 
The Department of the Interior will be issuing a Notice to Lessees (NTL) describing the interim approach MMS will be taking on reviewing exploration and development plans.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_GULF_SPILL_COMMISSION_FLOL-?SITE=FLPET&SECTION=HOME

The third and fourth commission members are Donald Boesch, president of the University of Maryland’s Center for Environmental Science, and former Alaska Lt. Gov. Fran Ulmer, currently University of Alaska Anchorage chancellor, the AP has learned. The appointments were expected to be announced publicly soon.

Boesch is a native of New Orleans and a biological oceanographer who has been a leader in studying how man affects coastal areas. He helped write two books on oil spills and the environment and was the first executive director of the Louisiana Universities Marine Consortium and a prominent researcher in the Gulf of Mexico dead zone.

Boesch was a co-author of last year’s massive federal study on how global warming will affect Americans’ daily lives. He has chaired four large studies by the National Academies of Sciences, all on coastal environmental and science issues. And he has written more than 70 research studies published in scientific journals.

In a May 9 column for the Washington Post’s website, Boesch wrote that the spill might be part of what he called “the winds of change” on oil and energy. He acknowledged, however, that the amounts of oil spilled from offshore development have been less than spilled in tanker accidents.

Ulmer, who was lieutenant governor from 1994 to 2002 and a Democratic leader in the Alaska House before that, was defeated in 2002 by then Sen. Frank Murkowski.

She later taught at the University of Alaska Anchorage and was named its chancellor, the No. 2 position there. She announced her retirement earlier this year.

Ulmer, a lawyer and former mayor of Juneau, has also been a member of the Commission on Arctic Climate Change run by the Aspen Institute, a Colorado think tank.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

June 3, 2010

 http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/03/us/03lobby.html?src=me

By ERIC LICHTBLAU and JAD MOUAWAD
Published: June 2, 2010

WASHINGTON  When the Obama administration imposed new restrictions last week on offshore drilling in the wake of the BP oil spill, officials carved out an exemption that received little public attention: Companies working in shallow waters, unlike deep-sea operators like BP, could again begin drilling for oil and gas.

The decision, which followed a furious appeal from lawmakers allied with the oil industry, represented a surprising victory for the shallow-water drillers in the midst of what could prove the biggest environmental disaster in United States history. And it reflected the intense lobbying efforts at work from all sides, as Congress and the administration consider ways to prevent another drilling disaster off the nation’s coasts.

Environmentalists and their supporters in Congress, hoping to seize the political momentum, are working to push through measures to extend bans on new offshore drilling, strengthen safety and environmental safeguards and raise to $10 billion or more the cap on civil liability for an oil producer in a spill.

“You don’t want to let a good crisis get away,” said Athan Manuel, the director of lands protection for the Sierra Club’s legislative office, which is pushing for a permanent moratorium on new offshore drilling.

Oil industry executives acknowledge the stiff political resistance that they face. Despite the success of shallow-water drillers in avoiding a continued ban on their end of the industry, executives and industry analysts say the daily images of oil wafting onto the coastline will make it tougher for them to fend off calls for tougher regulations that extend far beyond BP and the Deepwater Horizon spill.

Bruce Vincent, president of the Independent Petroleum Association of America, which represents both deep-sea and shallow-water drillers, said Wednesday that he was concerned about a “domino effect” sweeping through Washington, with new regulations now under discussion threatening to cut oil production, jobs and industry profits.

“It’s amazing to see the impact that one company can have for all sorts of other people,” he said. “When a plane crashes, you don’t just shut down every airline in the fleet until you find out what happened.”

The oil and gas industry is a formidable presence in Washington. It spent more on federal lobbying last year than all but two other industries, with $174.8 million in lobbying expenditures, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a nonpartisan research group.

Political action committees set up by the oil and gas producers contributed an additional $9 million last election cycle to Congressional candidates, with Koch Industries, ExxonMobil, Valero Energy and Chevron leading the way, the data showed. (BP ranked 19th, with $75,500 in contributions, most to Republicans.)

For decades, the oil industry had showcased and developed its latest technology in the Gulf of Mexico. But the spill now casts a pall over offshore oil and gas operations, just as the industry thought it had snatched a major victory from the administration, which agreed to expand oil and gas drilling earlier this year.

Rex Tillerson, the chairman and chief executive of ExxonMobil, admitted last week that the industry faced a huge challenge.

“The most difficult challenge confronting the whole industry at this point is regaining the confidence and trust of the public, the American people, and regaining the confidence and trust of the government regulators and the people who oversee our activities out there,” he said in response to questions from reporters after a shareholder meeting.

The industry was already grappling with the prospect of tighter scrutiny over some of its drilling practices even before the gulf spill. Congress has been looking at the environmental impact of hydraulic fracturing, where water is pumped at high pressure to break rocks and free natural gas, a technique that some environmental groups believe can pollute underground water sources.

Now the industry is facing a much graver threat as it seeks to determine how long the administration’s deepwater drilling ban will last. The Interior Department said last weekend that all drilling activity in the waters deeper than 500 feet was to stop for six months. But some analysts fear the ban could be prolonged until a commission appointed by the president provides its conclusions.

That could extend the ban for a year, and the American Petroleum Institute, the industry’s main trade group, forecasts that a longer delay could crimp future production by as much as 400,000 barrels a day by 2015.

As well as imposing a drilling ban in the Gulf of Mexico, the administration also halted new drilling off Alaska and Virginia for the time being. The announcement stalled plans by Shell to drill three exploration wells in the Beaufort Sea this summer. It also put off a long-awaited sale of new leases off Virginia for the first time since the administration lifted a longstanding moratorium on drilling in the Atlantic.

With the environmental damage growing from the BP disaster, the industry’s most persuasive argument in trying to fend off tougher regulations may prove to be jobs. That was one of the crucial elements used by the shallow-water operators  mostly smaller companies that produce about 20 percent of the gulf’s daily oil production of 1.7 million barrels  to earn an exemption from the new restrictions at the Interior Department.

Representative Gene Green, a Texas Democrat who led about 50 lawmakers in appealing to the administration to lift the ban on shallow-water drillers, said he did not want to see 6,000 employees working in shallow waters risk being put out of work.

The Interior Department said that its decision to lift the restrictions on shallow-water drilling “recognizes that there are different challenges in the deepwater, and our approach with the moratorium recognizes that.”

Kendra Barkoff, a spokeswoman for the Interior Department, said in a statement: “The safety recommendations contained in the 30-day report to the President will be implemented as soon as practicable and will apply to all operators on the Outer Continental Shelf, including in shallow water. Operators will need to demonstrate compliance with the safety requirements in due course.”

The political pressure on the entire industry will keep growing as long as the spill lasts, bringing with it daily images of soiled coastlines.

“The oil companies know that if this is not resolved quickly, the well has been poisoned for everybody,” said Lawrence Goldstein, a veteran energy economist. “They are going to be painted with a broad brush. They are on the hook here.”

Eric Lichtblau reported from Washington, and Jad Mouawad from New York.

Special thanks to  Richard  Charter

http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/

For Immediate Release, June 2, 2010
Contact: Andrea Treece, Center for Biological Diversity, (415) 378-6558; atreece@biologicaldiversity.org
SAN FRANCISCO- The Center for Biological Diversity today filed an official notice of its intent to sue the Environmental Protection Agency for authorizing the use of toxic dispersants without ensuring that these chemicals would not harm endangered species and their habitats. The letter requests that the agency, along with the U.S. Coast Guard, immediately study the effects of dispersants on species such as sea turtles, sperm whales, piping plovers, and corals and incorporate this knowledge into oil-spill response efforts.
“The Gulf of Mexico has become Frankenstein’s laboratory for BP’s enormous, uncontrolled experiment in flooding the ocean with toxic chemicals,” said Andrea Treece, an attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity. “The fact that no one in the federal government ever required that these chemicals be proven safe for this sort of use before they were set loose on the environment is inexcusable.”

Dispersants are chemicals used to break oil spills into tiny droplets. In theory, this allows the oil to be eaten by microorganisms and become diluted faster than it would otherwise. However, the effects of using large quantities of dispersants and injecting them into very deep water, as BP has done in the Gulf of Mexico, have never been studied. Researchers suspect that underwater oil plumes, measuring as much as 20 miles long and extending dozens of miles from the leaking rig, are the result of dispersants keeping the oil below the surface.

On May 24, EPA Administrator Jackson expressed concern over the environmental unknowns of dispersants, which include the long-term effects on aquatic life. Nonetheless, the federal government has allowed BP to pump nearly 1 million gallons of dispersants into the Gulf of Mexico.

“Pouring dispersants into vital fish nursery grounds and endangered species habitat simply trades one evil for another. Had the government first examined dispersants before the disaster, we would not be left wondering what sort of havoc BP is wreaking on the ecosystem just so it can make the oil less visible,” added Treece. “We cannot and will not allow this to happen again.”
Studies have found that oil dispersed by Corexit 9527 damages the insulating properties of seabird feathers more than untreated oil, making the birds more susceptible to hypothermia and death. Studies have also found that dispersed oil is toxic to fish eggs, larvae, and adults, as well as to corals, and can harm sea turtles’ ability to breathe and digest food. Formulations of the dispersants being used by BP, Corexit 9500 and 9527, have been banned in the United Kingdom due to concerns over their impacts on the marine environment. 

The Center for Biological Diversity is a national, nonprofit conservation organization with more than 260,000 members and online activists dedicated to the protection of endangered species and wild places.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.miamiherald.com/2010/06/02/1660594/obama-orders-oil-companies-to.html

June 2, 2010

BY SHASHANK BENGALI

WASHINGTON – The Obama administration late Wednesday moved swiftly to plug a hole in its much touted six-month ban on new deepwater drilling when the Interior Department ordered oil companies to overhaul and resubmit dozens of exploration plans that had already been approved but were virtually identical to BP’s and that called major spills and environmental damage “unlikely.”

The action came after McClatchy informed the White House and Interior officials that it had reviewed 31 deepwater exploration and development plans approved for the Gulf under the Obama administration and found that all of them downplayed the threat of spills to marine life and fisheries.

The language scarcely varied from company to company, suggesting that the plans were pumped out like boilerplate. Of the 31 plans McClatchy reviewed, 14 were approved since the April 20 explosion on BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil rig,

The administration had failed to include the plans in its moratorium, and experts told McClatchy that the filings could clear the way for drilling new wells when the ban was lifted. Following inquiries by McClatchy to White House and Interior officials, the Bureau of Land Management announced late Wednesday that oil companies would need to resubmit the plans with additional safety information before they’d be allowed to drill new wells.

“Pulling back exploration plans and development plans and requiring them to be updated with new information is consistent with this cautious approach and will ensure that new safety standards and risk considerations are incorporated into those planning documents,” BLM Director Bob Abbey said in a brief press release.

In the White House’s initial response to McClatchy’s inquiries, spokesman Ben LaBolt said only that a presidential commission investigating the BP spill would also “assess exploration and production plans and could provide options for ways to improve their development and review.”

Less than half an hour later, the Interior Department issued its press release, which came from the BLM, not the Minerals Management Service.

Even as millions of gallons of crude from BP’s well befouled the Gulf of Mexico, oil companies have continued to submit exploration plans. The MMS had received more than two dozen in the past month.

“Interior has very doggedly refused to address this core problem because they realize that’s where the rubber meets the road and the real reform begins,” said Kieran Suckling, the executive director of the Center for Biological Diversity, an environmental group that has studied the issue.

“It’s a very cynical ploy. They’re staying away from the real environmental review process because that’s where the stakes are highest for the oil industry.”

While the moratorium had blocked new wells and freezes new drilling permits – the last step before drilling begins – it didn’t stop companies from taking the earlier step of filing exploration and development plans. These plans include the most thorough environmental studies that companies must conduct during the entire approval process.

Experts say these plans are often filled with incomplete or overly hopeful statements about the likelihood of spills, blowouts and ecological damage.

On May 18, four weeks after the blowout preventer on BP’s Deepwater Horizon rig exploded and sent oil gushing into the Gulf, the MMS approved an exploration plan by Petrobras America for Block 697 of the Mississippi Canyon area, the same area where BP was drilling. The Petrobras site is 7,150 feet underwater – nearly one-and-a-half times deeper than where BP was operating.

The Petrobras plan states: “In the unlikely event a blowout were to occur during exploratory operations, the well would most likely bridge over very quickly considering information known about (rock) formation types in the Gulf of Mexico.”
 

While investigators don’t yet know what caused BP’s blowout preventer to fail, John Evans, the owner of the Evantech petroleum consulting firm in Fort Worth, Texas, said that it was extremely optimistic to expect that a well would automatically “bridge over,” meaning that loose rocks from the sea floor would slide into the well bore and seal it off.

“That’s a big hope,” Evans said. “It could occur, but as to ‘most likely’ occurring _ I would doubt that.”

Given the water pressure at that depth and the huge volume of uncontrolled oil surging from the blowout, sand and other particles would slide along with the rocks, which could eat into the valves on the blowout preventer that are designed to cut off the flow of oil, Evans said.

The plan also said that a relief well would take “approximately 7-10 days to drill”; BP’s relief wells aren’t expected to be completed before August, 90 days after the accident.

A spokeswoman for Petrobras didn’t return phone calls seeking comment.

In the Interior Department’s 38-page report on increased safety measures for Gulf drilling, issued last week, drilling permits – known as “applications for permits to drill,” or APDs – are mentioned 10 times, while exploration and development plans are mentioned only once. The permits are the final step before new wells are drilled, and experts say that the major environmental review comes at the phase of the exploration plans.

The Obama administration has said that the agency’s ability to scrutinize exploration plans was limited by federal guidelines that they be approved or rejected within a 30-day period, and has proposed extending that deadline to 90 days.

“The drill plan is where all the real substance is,” Suckling said. “One you get approved there, you’ve gotten over the big expensive hurdle. You’ve gotten over the stage where you could be shut down.”

A former MMS official, who didn’t want to be named criticizing the agency, said: “If you want reform it certainly needs to incorporate (the exploration plans). A lot of times the (environmental) analyses are very incomplete and unfocused.”

The exploration plans typically are 50 pages or longer and include lengthy discussions of potential environmental impacts. However, the plans reviewed by McClatchy were often so similarly worded that it appeared that the companies may have cribbed from one another.

At least three plans – by BHP Billiton Petroleum, approved on July 20, 2009; by Noble Energy, approved on Oct. 2, 2009; and by Hall-Houston Exploration III, approved May 14 – use identical wording to describe the impact of a potential spill on water quality. While “the dissolved components and small oil droplets” would “temporarily” affect the waters, “dispersion by currents and microbial degradation would remove the oil from the water column or dilute the constituents to background levels,” all three plans say.

Some scientists disputed that, saying it’s unclear whether the magnitude and depth of the BP spill, and the company’s unprecedented use of chemical dispersants, will make it harder for microbes to break down the oil naturally.

“It’s kind of a lazy statement,” said Andreas Teske, a microbiologist at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. “It’s OK if you just look at an oceanography textbook . . . but on an oil spill of this magnitude, no one has thought about this before.”

Even plans for wells located hundreds of miles apart shared similarities. An exploration plan by Anadarko Petroleum approved on June 17, 2009, noted that from 1980 to 2000, “OCS (Outer Continental Shelf drilling) operations produced 4.7 billion barrels of oil and spilled only 0.001 percent of this oil, or one barrel for every 81,000 barrels produced.”

The identical language appeared in a plan by MCX Gulf of Mexico to develop a site more than 240 miles to the west, off Corpus Christi, Texas, which the MMS approved on April 21 _ the day after the BP explosion.

“These oil companies, if you know the rules, you put down the exact same things. You get the rubber stamp, and the system just plows forward,” Suckling said.

http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/remarks-president-after-meeting-with-bp-oil-spill-commission-co-chairs
 
The White House
Office of the Press Secretary
For Immediate Release
June 01, 2010

Remarks by the President After Meeting with BP Oil Spill Commission Co-Chairs

Rose Garden

11:50 A.M. EDT
THE PRESIDENT:  Good morning, everybody.  I just met with these gentlemen, former Senator Bob Graham of Florida and former EPA Administrator, Bill Reilly.  They will lead the National Commission on the BP oil spill in the Gulf, which is now the greatest environmental disaster of its kind in our history.  Their job, along with the other members of the commission, will be to thoroughly examine the spill and its causes, so that we never face such a catastrophe again.
At the same time, we’re continuing our efforts on all fronts to contain the damage from this disaster and extend to the people of the Gulf the help they need to confront this ordeal.  We’ve already mounted the largest cleanup effort in the nation’s history, and continue to monitor — minute to minute — the efforts to halt or capture the flow of oil from the wrecked BP well.  Until the well is stopped, we’ll multiply our efforts to meet the growing threat and to address the widespread and unbelievably painful losses experienced by the people along the Gulf Coast.  What’s being threatened — what’s being lost — isn’t just the source of income, but a way of life; not just fishable waters, but a national treasure.
There are now more than 20,000 men and women in the region working around the clock to contain and clean up the oil.  We’ve authorized more than 17,000 National Guard members to respond across four states.  More than 1,700 vessels are currently aiding in the response.  And we’ll ensure that any and all responsible means of containing this leak are pursued as we await the completion of the two relief wells.  I’ve also directed Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and Admiral Thad Allen, who is the National Incident Commander, to triple the manpower in those places where oil has hit shore or is within 24 hours of impact.
The economic response continues as well.  We’ve ordered BP to pay economic injury claims, and we will make sure they deliver.  The Small Business Administration has stepped in to help businesses by approving loans and allowing deferrals of existing loan payments.  We’ve stationed doctors and scientists across the region to look out for people’s health and monitor any ill effects felt by cleanup workers and residents.  And we will absolutely continue to hold BP and any other responsible parties accountable for financial losses borne by the people in the region.
But our responsibility doesn’t end there.  We have an obligation to investigate what went wrong and to determine what reforms are needed so that we never have to experience a crisis like this again.  If the laws on our books are insufficient to prevent such a spill, the laws must change.  If oversight was inadequate to enforce these laws, oversight has to be reformed.  If our laws were broken, leading to this death and destruction, my solemn pledge is that we will bring those responsible to justice on behalf of the victims of this catastrophe and the people of the Gulf region.
 
When Interior Secretary Ken Salazar took office, for example, he found a Minerals and Management Services agency that had been plagued by corruption for years — corruption that was underscored by a recent Inspector General’s report that uncovered appalling activity that took place before last year.  Secretary Salazar immediately took steps to clean up that corruption.  But this oil spill has made clear that more reforms are needed.  For years, there’s been a far too cozy relationship between oil companies and the agencies that regulate them.  That’s why we’ve decided to separate the people who permit offshore leases, who collect revenues, and who regulate the safety of drilling.
In addition, we’ve placed a six-month moratorium on drilling new deepwater oil and gas wells in the Outer Continental Shelf.  And now that a 30-day safety and environmental review is complete, we’re making a series of changes.  The review recommended aggressive new operating standards and requirements for offshore energy companies, which we will put in place.  And I’ve also called on Congress to pass a bill to provide critical resources to respond to this spill and better prepare us for any spills in the future.
Now, all that has to do with dealing with the crisis at hand.  But it’s critical that we take a comprehensive look at how the oil and gas industry operates and how our government oversees those operations.  That’s why I signed an executive order establishing this national commission.  And I’m extraordinarily pleased that Bob Graham and Bill Reilly have agreed to be its co-chairs.
Bob served two terms as Florida’s governor, represented Florida in the Senate for almost two decades.  And during that time he earned a reputation as a champion of the environment, leading the most extensive environmental protection effort in the state’s history.  Bill is chairman emeritus of the board of the World Wildlife Fund, and is also deeply knowledgeable of the oil and gas industry.  He also was EPA Administrator during the first Bush administration, serving during the Exxon Valdez disaster.
 
So I can’t think of two people who will bring greater experience or judgment to this task.  I personally want to thank both of them for taking on this arduous assignment — for demonstrating a great sense of duty to this country.
Very soon I’ll appoint five other distinguished Americans, including leaders in science and engineering, to join them.  And they’ll work alongside other ongoing reviews, including an independent examination by the National Academy of Engineers.  And I’ve authorized the commission to hold public hearings and to request information from government, from non-for-profit organizations, and from experts in the oil and gas industry both at home and abroad, as well as from relevant companies — including BP, Transocean, Halliburton, and others.
I just said in our meeting:  In doing this work, they have my full support to follow the facts wherever they may lead — without fear or favor.  And I’m directing them to report back in six months with options for how we can prevent and mitigate the impact of any future spills that result from offshore drilling. 
 
As a result of this disaster, lives have been lost.  Businesses have been decimated.  Communities that had already known great hardship now face the specter of sudden and painful economic dislocations.  Untold damage is being done to the environment — damage that could last for decades.  We owe all those who’ve been harmed, as well as future generations, a full and vigorous accounting of the events that led to what has now become the worst oil spill in U.S. history.  Only then can we be assured that deepwater drilling can take place safely.  Only then can we accept further development of these resources as we transition to a clean energy economy.  Only then can we be confident that we’ve done what’s necessary to prevent history from repeating itself.
Thank you very much, everybody.
END
11:57 A.M. EDT

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.boston.com/news/local/breaking_news/2010/06/pelosi_markey_b.html?comments=all#readerComm
 
 By Jack Nicas, Globe Correspondent
WATERTOWN — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Massachusetts Representative Edward Markey blasted BP today for its inability to stop the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

 
“We have been told that the technology is such that we could go all the way down, miles into the sea Š and that this was safe,” Pelosi said. “Nobody said, ‘But if it doesn’t work, we don’t have the faintest idea what to do.’”
“BP is just making this up as they go along; they have no plan,” Markey said of the company’s efforts to plug the leaking well or capture the oil it is spewing into the ocean, nearly a mile below the surface.
Pelosi and Markey had just taken a tour of A123 Systems, a lithium-ion battery company that received millions in recovery money. The two said clean energy like that produced by the company could reduce the country’s reliance on petroleum — and the need for risky offshore drilling.
The news conference was supposed to address the benefits of stimulus funding but reporters’ questions quickly turned to the spill.
Both Pelosi and Markey also touted the idea of lifting the liability cap on BP, which currently limits BP’s financial responsibility for the spill to $75 million. Markey, chairman of the House Select Committee for Energy Independence and Global Warming, said the legislation would be passed by the end of this year.
“BP reported $6 billion in profit in the first quarter of 2010. They have the money to ensure that the people of Louisiana, the Gulf Coast, and our country don’t have to foot the bill,” Markey said.
BP’s chief executive has said the company would take full responsibility for the spill. BP managing director Robert Dudley said Sunday on NBC-TV’s “Meet the Press” that the company had already spent nearly $1 billion on cleanup efforts.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/state/oil-could-hit-florida-panhandle-by-wednesday-720986.html

I  think it is absurd to wait until the oil destroys the beaches; the Valdez shorelines still have submerged oil in them. Get out the absorbant booms, prevent the oil contamination from reaching the shore so it can’t destroy life in the intertidal zone.    DV

By MELISSA NELSON
The Associated Press
Updated: 7:02 a.m. Wednesday, June 2, 2010
Posted: 5:50 p.m. Tuesday, June 1, 2010
PENSACOLA BEACH, FLA. – A Florida beach might get hit with oil from the Deepwater Horizon accident for the first time Wednesday as sheen likely caused by the accident was reported less than 10 miles off Pensacola Beach.

A charter boat captain reported the oil Tuesday afternoon and state and local environmental officials confirmed that it was about 9.5 miles offshore. Winds are forecast to blow from the south and west, pushing the outer edges of massive slick from the spill closer to western Panhandle beaches.

Emergency crews began Tuesday scouring the beaches for oil and shoring up miles of boom. Escambia County will use it to block oil from reaching inland waterways, but plans to leave beaches unprotected because they are too difficult to protect and easier to clean up.

The spill’s arrival coincides with the beginning of the Panhandle’s summer tourism season, which normally brings millions of dollars to the region.

“It’s inevitable that we will see it on the beaches,” said Keith Wilkins, Escambia’s deputy chief of neighborhood and community services.

The oil has been creeping toward Florida since the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded on April 20, killing 11 workers and eventually collapsing into the Gulf of Mexico. An estimated 20 million to 40 million gallons of oil has spewed into the Gulf, eclipsing the 11 million that leaked from the Exxon Valdez disaster. The rig was being operated for petroleum giant BP, which has tried unsuccessfully for six week to stanch the oil.

The Florida report followed an orange and oily mess washing up on Alabama’s beaches earlier Tuesday. Crews cleaned up the oil that they described as having the consistency of a “tarry mousse,” but health officials closed the beaches to swimming.

Pensacola Beach officials said their request for about $150,000 from BP to buy sifting machines and a tractor to help remove oil from the beach’s famous white sands has lingered unanswered for more than three weeks. BP has promised it will pay any expenses, but Panhandle officials say the bureaucracy has been slow. Some think the Federal Emergency Management Agency should be running the cleanup operation, not BP.

“We need the sifters and we haven’t gotten them approved yet,” said W.A. “Buck” Lee, Santa Rosa Island Authority’s executive director. “It’s been three weeks and the oil is coming. In my opinion, this entire thing should have been a FEMA project all along. If a hurricane blows the roof off your jail, you shouldn’t have to wait and send a letter to BP to replace the roof on your jail.”

Lee said BP has spent money on public relations, but not on preparations for beach cleanup. The company has provided the sate with $25 million to promote tourism. Escambia approved $700,000 in emergency funding for tourism promotion Tuesday, with another $700,000 to be allocated in 45 days.

Lee said the bureaucratic process set up at the federal staging centers in Alabama and Louisiana have also made it difficult to get information about his pending request.
Coast Guard Chief Peter Capelotti, spokesman for the Mobile, Ala.-based command center, did not have an immediate answer late Tuesday about the delay in approving Escambia county’s request for the tractor and other equipment.

Capelotti said command center officials expect more oil to make landfall in Alabama and the Florida Panhandle through Friday.

On Pensacola Beach, emergency crews are prepared for a long summer of oil clean up. They plan to remove oil in cycles after it is pushed onshore and the winds shift. Removing oil while it’s moving onshore doesn’t make sense, Wilkins said.

“It would be like trying to go out and clean up in the middle of a hurricane,” he said. “We will wait until after the bands make their way onshore and the weather shifts and then we will clean up before the next band hits.”

Special thanks to Richard Charter

FOR INFORMATION CONTACT:
Sustainable Fisheries Division
727-824-5305, FAX 727-824-5308

June 2, 2010
FB10-050
BP Oil Spill: NOAA Modifies Commercial and Recreational Fishing Closure in the
Oil-Affected Portions of the Gulf of Mexico
Current revisions to the closure, described below, will be effective on June 2, 2010 at 6 p.m. eastern time (5 p.m. central time). All commercial and recreational fishing including catch and release is prohibited in the closed area; however, transit through the area is allowed.

See Map–click on  Link:
http://sero.nmfs.noaa.gov/sf/deepwater_horizon/BP_OilSpill_FisheryClosureMap_060210.pdf

The closure measures 88,522 sq mi (229,270 sq km), which is about 37% of the Gulf of Mexico exclusive economic zone. The majority of federal waters in the Gulf of Mexico are open to commercial and recreational fishing.

Modeling and mapping the actual and projected spill area is not an exact science. NOAA Fisheries Service strongly advises fishermen not to fish in areas where oil or oil sheens (very thin layers of floating oil) are present, even if those areas are not currently closed to fishing.

Permit holders are reminded to maintain their federal vessel permits by submitting timely reporting requirements and renewal applications, even if the vessel is not currently engaged in fishing activities.

This revised closed area is bounded by rhumb lines connecting, in order, the following coordinates:

Ways To Receive Closure Information:

Southeast Fishery Bulletins, to sign up send an email to: SERO.Communications.Comments@noaa.gov
Call 1-800-627-NOAA (1-800-627-6622) to hear a recording of the current coordinates
Listen to NOAA Weather Radio for updates
Text messages on your cell phone, to sign up text fishing@gulf to 84469
(for more information visit http://www.deepwaterhorizonresponse.com/go/doc/2931/558107)
Follow us on Twitter: usnoaagov to get a tweet when the closed area changes

Links for more information:

Southeast Regional Office’s Web page:
http://sero.nmfs.noaa.gov/deepwater_horizon_oil_spill.htm
NOAA’s National Ocean Service
http://response.restoration.noaa.gov
Deepwater Horizon Response http://www.deepwaterhorizonresponse.com
Fishermen who wish to contact BP about a claim should call 1-800-440-0858.

Special thanks to Joe Murphy

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703406604575278662019860160.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_MIDDLETopStories

This is such bad news; they believe dispersants should be used to sink the toxic oil and the strategy is that it is easier to allow oil ashore onto Florida’s beaches and then clean it up than prevent it from reaching the shore.  What about using microbes along with tankers and skimmers to remove the oil altogether?????DV

JUNE 1, 2010
Scientists to Back Dispersant Use, Despite Concerns

By JEFFREY BALL
A federally convened group of scientists is set to recommend that BP PLC and the government continue spraying chemicals into the Gulf of Mexico to help prevent leaking oil from washing ashore, even though the scientists have serious concerns about the potential long-term damage to sea life.

The group’s report, due this week, comes after BP’s latest efforts to plug the leaking Deepwater Horizon oil well failed. If further interim measures to cap the well don’t work, large additional amounts of the chemicals, known as “dispersants,” could be sprayed into the Gulf until relief wells can be completed and the gusher capped, which could take until late late summer.

Research ships sponsored by the Obama administration and universities have recently found what scientists believe is evidence that clouds of tiny oil droplets are collecting deep underwater.

Tests are under way to determine whether the droplets are oil-and, if so, whether they were caused by the dispersants. Scientists suspect those droplets could harm fish, birds and sea mammals in coming months and years.

But scientists say they can’t make firm predictions about the effects of chronic exposure, in part because dispersants have rarely been used for long periods of time. In addition, funding for research on dispersants has lagged in recent years as concern about oil spills slipped off the political agenda.
“The bottom line is that there hasn’t been political will to fund this, because we haven’t had a spill,” said Nancy Kinner, co-director of an oil-spill-response institute at the University of New Hampshire.

When the Gulf spill began in April, her institute-the Coastal Response Research Center, created in 2003 with funding from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration-hadn’t received any new federal funding for oil-spill research since 2007.

Last week, with only a few days’ notice, the government paid Ms. Kinner’s institute to hold a large meeting on dispersant use in Louisiana. The report from the closed-door meeting will recommend that dispersants continue to be sprayed on the gulf as a “tradeoff” to prevent massive amounts of oil from washing into coastal marshes, she said. The report also will call on the federal government to continue to do environmental testing to monitor whether that tradeoff remains worthwhile.

“We are assuming that keeping it out in the water column is better than letting it into the coastal areas,” Ms. Kinner said of the leaking oil. Louisiana’s marshes are crucial to many species-including to shrimp, a major industry in the state.

Ms. Kinner, other scientists and top administration officials say the tradeoff makes them increasingly uneasy.

Last month, the Environmental Protection Agency ordered BP to find a less-toxic alternative to the dispersant it has been using most, Corexit 9500, or explain why it couldn’t find one.

But Nalco Co., Corexit’s maker, says the dispersant is safe. And when BP told the EPA that it could find no less-toxic dispersant in the quantities necessary to fight this spill, the EPA relented. The agency asked BP to reduce the amount of Corexit 9500 the company is using.

EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson said in testimony to a House subcommittee Thursday that the administration has requested an additional $2 million for research into the environmental and health effects of the spill, including the use of dispersants. The government’s “modest investment” in dispersant research thus far, she said, “must increase to address the uncertainties that have arisen” from the spill.

The ongoing leak from the well on the ocean floor raises two main concerns in the Gulf: the effect of dispersed oil particles and the effect of the chemical dispersants themselves. Particularly unclear is how sea life will fare when exposed to dispersed oil over long periods of time. Past studies have looked at how short-term exposure could kill fish and sea mammals.

The long-term question didn’t get much consideration before April 20, when the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig exploded and unleashed the torrent of oil that has been spewing into the Gulf ever since. Based on government estimates released last week, the well is pouring out 12,000 to 19,000 barrels of oil every day. That would make the Gulf spill bigger than the 1989 Exxon Valdez disaster.

The EPA doesn’t regulate dispersants’ toxicity. It requires dispersant manufacturers to test the amount of dispersant necessary to kill a given quantity of one type of fish and one type of shrimp in lab tests. But it doesn’t impose any maximum toxicity level that dispersants must stay below.

The EPA does require dispersant manufacturers to show that their chemicals break apart and sink a given amount of oil in a given time in a lab test. The dispersants that have that documentation are placed on a list maintained by the EPA, along with the dispersants’ toxicity levels.

Because only small amounts of dispersant were used in the past, “the toxicity of a dispersant has not historically been a driving consideration,” said Chris Piehler, director of the clean-waters project for the Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality and one of the Louisiana officials involved in the current oil-spill response.

BP and the federal government said they have applied more than 900,000 gallons of dispersant onto the oil so far, an unprecedented amount.
The EPA’s Ms. Jackson said she hoped the quantities of dispersant could be reduced as much as 75% from initial levels, and federal officials say the amount of dispersant being applied to the spill is down. But even at those reduced quantities, there will still be a lot of dispersant in the Gulf.

 Write to Jeffrey Ball at jeffrey.ball@wsj.com

Special thanks to Richard Charter

Center for Biological Diversity

http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/

The Center for Biologic Diversity doesn’t fool around; read the list of demands….they rock!!! And they sue.  They’re the ones that got elkhorn and staghorn on the Endangered Species List.  DV

For Immediate Release, May 31, 2010
Contact: Kierán Suckling (520) 275-5960

Interior Formalizes Oil-drilling Moratorium
Center Applauds Deepwater Action, Decries Lifting of Shallow Moratorium and
Continuation of Environmental Waivers
TUCSON, Ariz.- Interior Secretary Ken Salazar yesterday released the Department of the Interior’s written description of the six-month drilling moratorium announced by President Barack Obama last week. Salazar has been heavily criticized for breaches of his previous moratorium – which allowed at least 17 drilling permits to be issued – and for defining the moratorium differently with each new revelation of an approved drilling permit. It was later determined that Salazar’s previous moratorium had only been issued verbally.
The current moratorium lifts limits placed on drilling in waters less than 500 feet deep, which were put in place on May 6, 2010. Such drilling can now continue unabated, while under the May 6 moratorium new wells were not allowed to be initiated in waters less than 500 feet deep. The oil industry and Republican congresspersons have been heavily pressuring Salazar to exempt drilling in shallower waters from his moratorium.

The current moratorium expands limitations on drilling in waters greater than 500 feet deep for the next six months. Oil companies are allowed to continue retrieving oil from already completed wells, but they are not allowed to do any kind of drilling to initiate or complete new wells. This broader scope responds to criticism that Interior’s previous moratorium continued to allow the very same kind of drilling that was occurring on BP’s Deepwater Horizon when it exploded. The new moratorium does not allow such drilling types.

The current moratorium also allows the continued granting of highly controversial environmental waivers to drilling plans. The Deepwater Horizon drilling plan was approved with such a waiver, and at least 19 additional plans have been granted waivers since the Deepwater’s explosion on April 20, 2010. The waivers are being granted under the clearly false declaration that oil drilling poses no threat to the environment.
“We’re glad to see the moratorium has been expanded to cover all deepwater drilling,” said Kierán Suckling, executive director of the Center for Biological Diversity, “but we’re very upset that restrictions on shallower-water drilling have been lifted. All offshore oil drilling, whether deep or shallow, is dangerous and should be suspended.

“It is unbelievable that the Interior Department is continuing to exempt all drilling plans, deep or shallow, from environmental review. There is absolutely no question that offshore oil drilling is a danger to the environment and the fishing economy. Just look at the oil gushing into the Gulf of Mexico. It is not only illegal, it is deeply unethical for Salazar to allow these waivers to continue in the midst of the greatest environmental catastrophe in American history.”

The Center for Biological Diversity called upon Secretary Salazar to take the following actions immediately:

1. Remove former BP executive Sylvia Baca from her job as deputy assistant secretary for land and minerals management. Secretary Salazar expressed outrage at the Inspector General’s finding earlier this week that the revolving door between the oil industry and the Minerals Management Service has undermined the agency’s effectiveness and credibility. He did not mention, however, that in June 2009 he himself appointed a BP executive to oversee the Minerals Management Service.
“Sylvia Baca is a classic example of the revolving door between oil companies and the MMS,” said Suckling. “It was a terrible judgment call to appoint her; it is politically catastrophic to keep her. If Salazar is serious about reform, he needs to start with his own interest-conflicted appointments.”

2. Ban the use of environmental waivers for offshore exploration and production plans. Such waivers are designed for very small-impact projects such as constructing hiking trails and outhouses. There is no possible scenario in which an offshore drilling project – whether deepwater, ultradeepwater, or shallow water – can be considered a non-threat to the environment, economy, and endangered species.

3. Rescind all drilling approvals issued with environmental waivers. Hundreds of dangerous offshore oil platforms are operating today in the Gulf of Mexico without having undergone any environmental review. These dangerous drilling projects are operating illegally and threaten the Gulf with additional oil spills.

4. Rescind the Interior Department’s plan to open up new areas on the Atlantic Coast, eastern Gulf of Mexico, and Alaska to offshore oil drilling. The president’s announcement, made on March 31, 2010, three weeks before the BP explosion, was made on the false premise that offshore oil drilling is safe.
5. Permanently ban all new offshore oil drilling, beginning in Alaska. As a nation, we need to transition to clean energy sources such as sun and wind as fast as possible. Pushing forward with new, dangerous, and dirty offshore oil drilling sends the wrong signal to energy companies and technology developers. Continued subsidizing of Big Oil is a major hindrance to our nation’s development of clean energy.

The Center for Biological Diversity is a national, nonprofit conservation organization with more than 260,000 members and online activists dedicated to the protection of endangered species and wild places.

http://www.dailyfinance.com/article/oil-nears-florida-as-bp-tries-risky-cap/1039683/
Associated Press
Effort to contain Gulf oil stalls with stuck saw
By KEVIN MCGILL
AP
posted: 10:00 AM 06/02/10

SCHRIEVER, La. -Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen is saying that a saw has become stuck as it was cutting through a pipe on a busted well, stalling the latest attempt to contain the Gulf oil gusher.

Allen said Wednesday the goal is to free the saw and finish the cut later in the day. This is the second major cut in the effort to contain – not plug – the nation’s worst spill.
Allen says the first cut with giant shears was successful overnight.

The best chance at plugging the leak involves a relief well that is at least two months from completion.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP’s earlier story is below.

PORT FOURCHON, La. (AP) – The BP oil slick drifted close to the Florida Panhandle’s white sand beaches for the first time as submersible robots a mile below the Gulf of Mexico made the latest risky attempt to control the seafloor gusher.

Even if it works, the current mission to cut a major pipe and cap it would only reduce the flow, not stop it. If it fails, it could make the largest oil spill in U.S. history even worse. The best hope for sealing the leak, until a permanent fix is possible in August, failed Saturday, when engineers were unable to plug it with heavy mud in a maneuver called a top kill.

Investors ran from BP’s stock for a second day Wednesday, reacting to the top kill failure and the Justice Department’s announcement that it was looking at criminal and civil probes into the spill, although the department did not name specific targets for prosecution.

Shares in British-based BP PLC were down 3 percent Wednesday morning in London trading after a 13 percent fall the day before. BP has lost $75 billion in market value since the spill started with an April 20 oil rig explosion and analysts expect damage claims to total billions more.

In Florida, officials confirmed an oil sheen Tuesday about nine miles from Pensacola beach, where the summer tourism season was just getting started.

Winds were forecast to blow from the south and west, pushing the slick closer to western Panhandle beaches.

Emergency crews began scouring the beaches for oil and shoring up miles of boom. County officials will use it to block oil from reaching inland waterways but plan to leave beaches unprotected because they are too difficult to protect and easier to clean up.
“It’s inevitable that we will see it on the beaches,” said Keith Wilkins, deputy chief of neighborhood and community services for Escambia County.

The oil has been spreading in the Gulf since the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded six weeks ago, killing 11 workers and eventually sinking. The rig was being operated for BP, the largest oil and gas producer in the Gulf.

Crude has already been reported along barrier islands in Alabama and Mississippi, and it has polluted some 125 miles of Louisiana coastline.

More federal fishing waters were closed, too, another setback for one of the region’s most important industries. More than one-third of federal waters were off-limits for fishing, along with hundreds of square miles of state waters.

Fisherman Hong Le, who came to the U.S. from Vietnam, had rebuilt his home and business after Hurricane Katrina wiped him out. Now he’s facing a similar situation.

“I’m going to be bankrupt very soon,” Le, 53, said as he attended a meeting for fishermen hoping for help. “Everything is financed, how can I pay? No fishing, no welding. I weld on commercial fishing boats and they aren’t going out now, so nothing breaks.”

Le, like other of the fishermen, received $5,000 from BP PLC, but it was quickly gone.
“I call that ‘Shut your mouth money,’” said Murray Volk, 46, of Empire, who’s been fishing for nearly 30 years. “That won’t pay the insurance on my boat and house. They say there’ll be more later, but do you think the electric company will wait for that?”

BP may have bigger problems, though.

Attorney General Eric Holder, who visited the Gulf on Tuesday, would not say who might be targeted in the probes into the largest oil spill in U.S. history.

“We will closely examine the actions of those involved in the spill. If we find evidence of illegal behavior, we will be extremely forceful in our response,” Holder said in New Orleans.

The federal government also ramped up its response to the spill with President Barack Obama ordering the co-chairmen of an independent commission investigating the spill to thoroughly examine the disaster, “to follow the facts wherever they lead, without fear or favor.”

The president said that if laws are insufficient, they’ll be changed. He said that if government oversight wasn’t tough enough, that will change, too.

BP has tried and failed repeatedly to halt the flow of the oil, and the latest attempt like others has never been tried before a mile beneath the ocean. Experts warned it could be even riskier than the others because slicing open the 20-inch riser could unleash more oil if there was a kink in the pipe that restricted some of the flow.

“It is an engineer’s nightmare,” said Ed Overton, a Louisiana State University professor of environmental sciences. “They’re trying to fit a 21-inch cap over a 20-inch pipe a mile away. That’s just horrendously hard to do. It’s not like you and I standing on the ground pushing – they’re using little robots to do this.”

Engineers have put underwater robots and equipment in place this week after a bold attempt to plug the well by force-feeding it heavy mud and cement – called a “top kill” – was aborted over the weekend. Crews pumped thousands of gallons of the mud into the well but were unable to overcome the pressure of the oil.

The company said if the small dome is successful it could capture and siphon a majority of the gushing oil to the surface. But the cut and cap will not halt the oil flow, just capture some of it and funnel it to vessels waiting at the surface.

BP’s best chance to permanently plug the leak rests with a pair of relief wells but those won’t likely be completed until August.
-
Bluestein reported from Covington, La. Associated Press writers Darlene Superville and Pete Yost from Washington, Curt Anderson from Miami, Brian Skoloff from Port Fourchon, Mary Foster in Boothville, and Michael Kunzelman also contributed to this report.
Copyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
2010-06-02 10:00:37

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2010/jun/01/barack-obama/obama-blames-30-day-limit-law-role-oil-spill/

Yeah, I’ve been on the other side of this when getting state permits in Florida; the agency “asks” you to seek an extension of time in which to reply while they get it together.   DV

Politifact: The Truth-O-Meter Says:

“The Interior Department has only 30 days to review an exploration plan submitted by an oil company. That leaves no time for the appropriate environmental review. The result is, they are continually waived.”    Barack Obama on Thursday, May 27th, 2010 in a press conference at the White House.

As anger grows over the massive, uncontained oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, the procedure for issuing federal drilling permits for the Gulf Coast has begun to attract intense scrutiny. During a May 27, 2010, press conference, President Barack Obama — under pressure for the failure to stem the underwater leak — laid a large portion of the blame on the existing law that governs the permitting process, as well as the regulations to implement that law, which were drawn up by the Minerals Management Service, the Interior Department office that oversees oil and gas leases.

“What’s also been made clear from this disaster is that, for years, the oil and gas industry has leveraged such power that they have effectively been allowed to regulate themselves,” Obama said. “One example, under current law, the Interior Department has only 30 days to review an exploration plan submitted by an oil company. That leaves no time for the appropriate environmental review. The result is, they are continually waived. And this is just one example of a law that was tailored by the industry to serve their needs instead of the public’s. So Congress needs to address these issues as soon as possible, and my administration will work with them to do so.”

We wondered whether the president is correct that the law mandates such a short period for an environmental review.

The law in question is the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act. The law was originally passed in 1953, though the amendments relevant to the Obama’s statement were added in 1978.

Under the law, a proposal to drill must pass through several stages before it can be approved. First, the Interior Department must choose the locations it will open to leasing. Then, the department puts those areas up for lease.

Once a lease is purchased by an energy company, the leaseholder must submit an “exploration plan” to the Interior Secretary before exercising its right to drill. Interior Department regulations specify that the regional supervisor of MMS has 15 working days after receiving a proposed plan to rule a submission packet complete. At that point, a 30-day clock starts ticking. If the secretary finds problems during this period, modifications can be ordered or, if modifications are insufficient to solve the problem, the lease can be canceled. But if the secretary finds the plan acceptable, it must be approved within that same 30-day window.

So Obama is correct about the law’s 30-day limit. He’s also correct that waivers are common. The Interior Department says that in recent years, MMS has granted 250 to 400 waivers annually for Gulf of Mexico projects alone. (The department was unable to provide PolitiFact with the number of cases in which a waiver was not granted.) The Deepwater Horizon project had been given a “categorical exclusion” from detailed environmental review more than a year before the disaster occurred — a decision that is supposed to be granted to projects that are expected to have minimal environmental impact.

Meanwhile, on Obama’s assertion that 30 days is too short a window to conduct a credible environmental review — much less a plan to respond to a major malfunction — many experts we spoke to agreed with the president.

In general, then, Obama’s statement is on target. But we think it’s worth noting that the 30-day limit is not the only factor that explains the failure of MMS to study the environmental impact of Gulf of Mexico projects.

The exploration plan Obama referenced is not the only environmental study that is supposed to be conducted during this process. Studies are also required when the lease locations are chosen and when the leases are sold, and they don’t have statutory time limits.

Critics say that, in their current form, these earlier-stage studies do not include enough detail on the specific drilling locations to qualify as a full-scale environmental assessment. But if MMS — or Congress, or the industry — had wanted to beef up these earlier studies as a way of getting around the 30-day limit, they could have done so. But they never did. In their absence, the courts have sometimes stepped in: In 2009, a federal appeals court threw out the initial five-year leasing plan for drilling in Alaska’s Chukchi Sea, citing shortcomings in the plan’s environmental assessment.

Holly Doremus, a law professor at the University of California-Berkeley who has studied the MMS permitting process, called it “a bit disingenuous” for Obama to focus solely on the 30-day limit.

“The categorical exclusion has never been formally justified by the short time line, and so far as I know MMS has never — until after this blow-out — asked Congress for more time to review exploration plans,” she said in an interview. “I think rather that MMS has thought, and acted, as if it didn’t need to do detailed environmental review at the exploration plan stage” because it does them at the two earlier stages. “If that review were more thorough, and considered true worst-case scenarios, it might well be the case that 30 days would be enough to look at the environmental impacts of exploration in a particular location,” she said.

Meanwhile, some say that Congress ought to shoulder a portion of the blame for letting an inadequate permitting process fester for more than 30 years.

“If that is too short for a review, then Congress should change it,” Gary Wolfram, an economics and public policy professor at Hillsdale College. “My suspicion is that, as with all central planners, Congress doesn’t know the proper amount of time it takes to review a project.”
Belatedly, Congress — prodded, also belatedly, by the Obama administration — is looking to change the rules. On May 11, 2010, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar released a legislative package that includes a proposal to eliminate the 30-day deadline. “Changing this 30-day mandatory deadline to a 90-day timeline that can be further extended to complete environmental and safety reviews, as needed, would provide MMS more time to conduct additional environmental analysis on an exploration plan,” the department said in its announcement.

Sen. Jeff Bingaman, D-N.M., the chairman of the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, sought to attach the change to a supplemental spending bill before the congressional Memorial Day recess, but the effort was unsuccessful. Supporters vow to push on. “I am not aware of any pending free-standing legislation on this, but I do know that Congress will revisit the topic when it gets back,” said Bill Wicker, a spokesman for Bingaman.

Ultimately, Obama was correct on everything he said about the law — the 30-day limit, the difficulties of conducting a full study in that time frame, and the frequent waivers. But we’re marking him down slightly for implying that the 30-day limit tied the administration’s hands. If the administration had wanted to change MMS procedures short of rewriting the law, it could have done so by proposing more stringent requirements for the other environmental assessments undertaken during the permitting process, which are not time-limited under the law. And it could have pushed earlier to rewrite the law. On balance, we rate his statement Mostly True.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.floridaoilspilllaw.com/crist-appoints-former-bp-lobbyist-to-spearhead-floridas-legal-response-to-bp-oil-spill

Jim Smith 

With Louisiana’s shoreline turning blacker by the day, an elite team of two former attorneys general is cautiously laying the groundwork for Florida’s legal response to BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

Gov. Charlie Crist appointed the political odd couple – Democrat Bob Butterworth and Republican Jim Smith – almost two weeks ago to spearhead what could be the biggest and most complex lawsuit ever attempted by the state. So far, the beaches remain clear and a state lawsuit, if there ever is one, is nowhere in sight.

BP has paid out more than $2 million to Floridians for individual lost-income claims, and kept most of the cases open for future payment. That’s on top of the $50 million it gave the state for emergency preparations and a tourism promotion campaign.

So far, that’s good enough for Smith.

“At this point, I’m satisfied that BP is trying to do the right thing,” Smith said. “My sense is that this thing is still unfolding. Nobody could really even assess damages at this point.”

That’s not good enough for environmentalists who see only foot-dragging and politics as usual. They complain that Smith wasn’t a good choice to direct the legal charge because he was a registered BP lobbyist on and off between 2001 and 2005.

Smith acknowledges that his lobbying firm, one of the largest and most influential in the state, represented BP, but that he had no personal involvement with that client and has no loyalty to it today. He said he only registered as a BP lobbyist out of an abundance of caution.

The environmentalists want the state to haul BP into court now, and force it to pay for more booms and skimmers so Florida will be better prepared than Louisiana if and when the devastation rolls ashore.

The $25 million BP paid to help local governments prepare area contingency plans is a drop in the bucket, the critics charge. They also point out that last week, when BP CEO Tony Hayward traveled to Louisiana, he acknowledged that the company didn’t do enough to protect the beaches.

Special thanks to Progress Florida

http://readersupportednews.com/off-site-news-section/49-49/2085-fisherman-files-restraining-order-against-bp

By Elizabeth Cohen, CNN
May 31, 2010 11:32 a.m. EDT

New Orleans, Louisiana (CNN) — A fisherman who was hospitalized after becoming ill while cleaning up oil in the Gulf of Mexico has filed a temporary restraining order in federal court against oil company BP.

John Wunstell Jr., is asking BP to give the workers masks and not harass workers who publicly voice their health concerns.

Wunstell, a shrimper, said he was paid by BP to use his boat, Ramie’s Wish, to clean up oil that has been gushing into the Gulf since an oil rig sank about 40 miles off the Louisiana coast, gushing an estimated 19,000 barrels (798, 000 gallons) of crude a day.

In an affidavit, Wunstell wrote he started experiencing severe headaches and nasal irritation on May 24. Over the next few days, he also developed nosebleeds, an upset stomach, and aches.

On Friday, Wunstell was airlifted to West Jefferson Medical Center in Marrero, Louisiana, where he remained hospitalized Sunday.

Eight other workers were brought to the hospital this week and were all released.

“We need to start protecting these guys,” said Jim Klick, Wunstell’s lawyer.

In his affidavit, Wunstell described his experience at the hospital.

“At West Jefferson, there were tents set up outside the hospital, where I was stripped of my clothing, washed with water and several showers, before I was allowed into the hospital,” Wunstell said. “When I asked for my clothing, I was told that BP had confiscated all of my clothing and it would not be returned.”

The restraining order requests that BP refrain from “altering, testing or destroying clothing or any other evidence or potential evidence” when workers become ill.

Graham MacEwen, a spokesman for BP, said he could not comment on the restraining order, or on allegations that BP confiscated clothing.

He denied accusations from Clint Guidry, president of the Louisiana Shrimpers Association, that BP has been threatening workers who speak out about health concerns.

Fishermen contacted by CNN have declined to speak publicly.

Some, who are making as much as $3,000 a day cleaning up the oil, have said they fear losing their jobs with BP.

“The BP oil spill wiped out their professions and their jobs this year and possibly years down the road,” Klick said. “The only work they can get right now is with BP.”

The BP spokesman said there have been no threats against workers for speaking out.

“If they have any concerns, they should raise them with their supervisors,” MacEwen said. “They can also call the joint information center and make complaints anonymously.”

Wunstell is one of nine clean-up workers who were sent to the hospital with symptoms such as shortness of breath, nose and throat irritation, headaches, and dizziness.

The restraining order requests that BP stop using dispersants without providing “appropriate personal protective equipment” to workers.

Corexit, a dispersant, is being sprayed into the Gulf to break down the oil. The safety data information sheet from the manufacturer states that people should “avoid breathing in vapor” from Corexit, and that masks should be work when Corexit is present in certain concentrations in the air.
BP has not supplied workers with masks when they work near the oil and dispersants.

“We’re been carrying out very extensive air quality since early on in this exercise, to make sure that we have working safe conditions, and thus far not found situations where there are air quality concerns that would require face masks,” MacEwen said.

He added that workers who want to wear masks are “free to do so” as long as they receive instructions from their supervisors on how to use them.

According to Guidry from the shrimpers’ association, BP told workers they were not allowed to wear masks.

“Some of our men asked, and they were told they’d be fired if they wore masks,” he said.

Tony Hayward, the chief executive officer of BP, offered another explanation for the fishermen’s illness: spoiled food.

“Food poisoning is clearly a big issue,” Hayward said Sunday. “It’s something we’ve got to be very mindful of. It’s one of the big issues of keeping the Army operating. You know, the Army marches on their stomachs.”

An expert on foodborne illness cast doubt on Hayward’s theory.

“Headaches, shortness of breath, nosebleeds — there’s nothing there that suggests foodborne illness,” said Dr. Michael Osterholm, a professor at the University of Minnesota School of Public Health. “I don’t know what these people have, but it sounds more like a respiratory illness.”

– CNN’s Jennifer Bixler contributed to this report

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.publicnewsservice.org/index.php?/content/article/14260-1
              
June 1, 2010
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. – Conservation groups want to get to the bottom of the chemicals being poured into the Gulf of Mexico in an effort to break up the oil gushing from the Deepwater Horizon spill. Earthjustice, the Florida Wildlife Federation, and the Gulf Restoration Network are demanding disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) of the actual formula of the 800,000 gallons of dispersants that have been pumped into the Gulf in the last month.

David Guest, managing attorney for Earthjustice, says they’ve also requested proof of effectiveness and toxicity reports for the dispersant, called Corexet, because they’re concerned about its threat to people, wildlife, and the environment.

“It’s so toxic that you can’t touch it with your bare skin, and if it’s something that is that powerful, we should have our eyes open about putting hundreds of thousands of gallons of it into the sea.”

Guest says the spill, which now has spread over 10,000 square miles, will have long-term economic and ecological effects on Florida and the entire Gulf region. He says once the EPA discloses the ingredients used in the dispersants, researchers can begin studying the impact of the chemicals.

“You need to know things like: If a school of fish swims through a plume of Corexet do they all die? Does it sink to the sea bottom and kill all the shrimp eggs so you wipe out the shrimp fisheries for many years? Those are the things you need to know.”

The groups are calling on the EPA to make this information public, in spite of the objections of the oil company BP and the dispersant manufacturers. Guest says the chemicals are being dumped into the Gulf in unprecedented amounts, and more knowledge is critical to protecting the Gulf from further damage.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

 http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2010/05/30/bloomberg1376-L3AKFD0UQVI9-1.DTL

May 31 (Bloomberg) — BP Plc said in permit applications for drilling in the Gulf of Mexico that it was prepared to handle an oil spill more than ten times larger than the one now spewing crude into the waters off the southern United States.

“Proper execution of the procedures detailed in this manual will help to limit environmental and ecological damage to sensitive areas as well as minimizing loss or damage to BP facilities in the event of a petroleum release,” the company said in its oil-spill response plan, filed with the U.S. Minerals Management Service in 2008.

The company listed as its worst-case scenario a blowout in an exploratory well 57 miles west of the disaster, in a valley on the seafloor known as Mississippi Canyon. It’s about 33 miles off the coast of Louisiana. Such a blowout could have spewed 250,000 barrels a day, according to the 582-page plan.

The representations show that BP overestimated its ability to control an oil spill in waters where it’s the biggest player in a Gulf energy extraction industry worth $52 billion a year, said Bob Deans, a spokesman with the Natural Resources Defense Council in Washington.

“BP has obviously overpromised and underdelivered,” Deans said. “They told us they had a plan that could deal with the consequences of a worst-case scenario. They don’t.”

The plan was posted on the Minerals Management Service website and was incorporated by reference into BP’s application with the agency for a permit to drill the Macondo well. The company said in that application that a worst-case blowout from that well could spew at most 162,000 barrels a day.

BP’s ‘Plan in Place’

On April 20, a blowout there caused the drilling rig, Deepwater Horizon, to explode and then sink, leaving an open wellhead spewing as much as 19,000 barrels of oil a day into the Gulf waters. The company has failed so far to stop the gusher.

“Clearly we do have an oil-spill response plan in place, it was an integral part of our permitting with the MMS and it was specifically agreed with and approved by the MMS,” BP spokesman David Nicholas said in an e-mailed statement. “It sets out the actions, considerations, plans and steps that will be used in the case of an oil spill, and it is this plan that has been in action in response.”

Every well that a company drills has to be covered by a response plan that includes a worst-case scenario, said Kendra Barkoff, a spokeswoman with the Minerals Management Service.

‘Fundamental Questions’

“The BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill, however, raises several fundamental questions about safety and about industry’s ability to respond to spills,” she said in an e-mailed statement. ” We have launched a full investigation of the oil spill and are in the process of implementing new safety requirements to ensure this doesn’t happen again.”

BP fell 26 pence to 494.8 pence in London trading this morning and has lost 29 percent of its market value since the blast.

BP’s plan says it has contracts with the Marine Spill Response Corp. of Herndon, Virginia, and the National Response Corp. of Great River, New York, to contain and clean up any spills through the use of dispersant chemicals sprayed from airplanes and skimming vessels that would suck up oil-filled water.

The company would also use containment booms to control the spread of oil in the Gulf and work with local environmental groups to clean affected wildlife, according to the plan.

Documents Sought

The House Energy and Commerce Committee, investigating the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, is seeking documents from the clean-up consultants. Chairman Henry Waxman, a California Democrat, and oversight subcommittee Chairman Bart Stupak, a Michigan Democrat, sent letters on May 28 to National Response, a unit of Seacor Holdings Inc., Marine Spill Response, and O’Brien’s Response Management Inc. of Spring, Texas.

Waxman’s committee has reviewed 105,000 documents provided by companies connected with the rig.

BP’s plan says that those companies have enough oil- skimming vessels to remove about 492,000 barrels of oil a day from the water. The companies have the capacity to store 299,000 barrels a day, according to the plan.

BP spokesman John Curry said yesterday that so far, the company, through its contractors, has deployed 91 skimming vessels that have picked up a total of 312,952 barrels of oily water mixture from the spill that has gushed for almost six weeks. “That’s not all oil, it’s oily water,” he said.

A Prolonged Spill

He said the company had spread more than 3 million feet of containment boom, a floating plastic barrier designed to contain the spread of oil and direct it to skimming vessels. The boom was enough to cover about 350 miles of coastline, he said.

BP’s plan foresaw the possibility of a prolonged spill.

“If the spill went unabated, shoreline impact would depend upon existing environmental conditions,” according to the plan.

The chance of oil reaching the shoreline within 30 days was estimated at 3 percent or less for most coastal areas, except Louisiana’s Plaquemines Parish, which the company said had a 21 percent chance of seeing oil onshore within 30 days.

Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal said on May 19 that oil was washing ashore in the Plaquemines wetlands.

BP said yesterday that a plan to stop the leak through a strategy of pumping in heavy mud and debris, known as “top kill,” failed. The company now plans to place a cap over the well.

The spill has cost BP a total of $760 million, or about $22 million a day, the company said May 24. BP’s average daily profit last year was $45 million a day, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.

 
–With assistance from Joe Carroll in Chicago and Lorraine Woellert in Washington. Editors: Jeffrey Taylor, Larry Liebert

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/may/31/bp-oil-spill-death-impact 

It could take months or years for the true impact of the spill on surrounding ecosystems to emerge

by David Adam and agencies
guardian.co.uk, Monday 31 May 2010 23.14 BST

The White House says the BP oil spill is probably the greatest environmental disaster the US has faced, but the true impact on surrounding ecosystems could take months or even years to emerge. Experts say the unprecedented depth of the spill, combined with the use of chemicals that broke the oil down before it reached the surface, pose an unknown threat.

Oil floats around a rig at the site of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Photograph: Jae C. Hong/AP

“It’s difficult to marshal resources to do a thorough job of charting what the impacts are,” Jeffrey Short, an environmental chemist who worked on the effects of the Exxon Valdez spill, told Nature magazine. “It’s especially difficult when weird things happen to catch the scientific community bysurprise. That’s clearly the case here.”

Louisiana, the nearest state to the leaking well, some 42 miles offshore, has been the most impacted. The state’s governor, Bobby Jindal, said more than 100 miles of its 400-mile coast had so far been polluted.

State officials have reported sheets of oil soiling wetlands and seeping into marine and bird nurseries, leaving a stain of sticky crude on cane that binds the marshes together. Billy Nungesser, president of Plaquemines parish, said he had seen dying cane and “no life” in parts of Pass-a-Loutre wildlife refuge.

Oil debris, in the form of tar balls and surface sheen, has also been reported ashore in outlying parts of coastal Mississippi and Alabama. Tar balls found on Florida beaches a fortnight ago did not come from the BP spill, tests showed.

A quarter of US waters in the Gulf of Mexico are closed to fishing, hitting the livelihoods of shrimpers, oyster-catchers and charter boat operators. “Every fish and invertebrate contacting the oil is probably dying. I have no doubt about that,” said Prosanta Chakrabarty, a Louisiana State University fish biologist.

In the six weeks since the explosion that killed 11 workers and started the leak, wildlife officials say at least 491 birds, 227 turtles and 27 mammals, including dolphins, have been found dead along the US Gulf coast. Many of these were not related to the spill; only 28 of the dead birds were covered in oil. More marine creatures, including birds and mammals will be affected by surface oil, and scientists are also concerned about possible underwater clouds of dispersed oil.

Researchers say they have found at least two sprawling underwater plumes of what appear to be oil or oil derivatives, each hundreds of metres deep and stretching for miles. A plume reported last week by a team from the University of South Florida was headed toward the continental shelf off the Alabama coastline, waters thick with fish and other marine life.

No major fish kills have yet been reported, but federal officials said the impacts could take years to unfold. “This is just a giant experiment going on and we’re trying to understand scientifically what this means,” said Roger Helm, a senior official with the US Fish and Wildlife Service.

David Hollander, an oceanographer at the University of South Florida who helped discover one of the plumes, said: “It may be due to the application of the dispersants that a portion of the petroleum has extracted itself from the crude and is now incorporated into the waters with solvents and detergents.”

He said there could be knock-on impacts on organisms further up the food chain. “We think there could be both short-term and long-term implications.”

Special thanks to Richard Charter