From the morning papers: The big inverted funnel didn’t work. Ice crystals plugged it up. Now it’s sitting there on the bottom while BP considers its next move. The oil company says the idea isn’t a failure. Even though it didn’t work.
“I wouldn’t say it’s failed yet…what I would say is what we attempted to do … didn’t work.”-Doug Suttles, BP
The other day I was talking to a friend from Finland. I asked if he felt the Scandinavian countries would be handling the oil spill differently. He said the Scandinavians have equipment on standby, just waiting to deal with a problem like the spill in the Gulf. I thought that perhaps he was being overly enthusiastic about his homeland, possibly underestimating our ability to respond to an oil spill.
Apparently, he was spot on.
This morning I read in the NY Times, that the European Union, the United Nations and 14 individual countries, like Sweden, are offering to help the big bad U.S. clean up the mess in the Gulf of Mexico. Little Sweden, the land of my ancestors, is offering to send three ships with the ability to skim 50 tons of oil per hour from the water’s surface with a capacity of 1000 tons. It could take several weeks for the ships to get here. Swedish officials say the offer has been made and they’re just waiting for a request from Washington.
If Sweden can afford to have ships like this on standby, why can’t we? Why haven’t the oil companies, with their monster profits, been ordered to keep a fleet of such ships on standby in the Gulf?
Oops, sorry. There I go again. Letting reality slip away. The reality of course, is that the Minerals Management Service (MMS) didn’t require a $500,000 backup blowout valve or proper safety reports to be filed by BP. That being the case, why in the world would this oil company cozy government agency ever dream of demanding a fleet of ships? It would, after all, be such a terrible imposition on the oil companies.
“The rules on what plans must be filed by exploration companies before drilling a well were relaxed in early 2008 by the Bush administration. Thereafter there was reportedly some confusion over whether the BP well qualified to be exempted, but that appears to be precisely what happened.
If so, lawmakers in Washington are likely to target the Interior Department for falling down on its responsibilities and becoming too cozy with the oil giants. “I’m of the opinion that boosterism breeds complacency and complacency breeds disaster,” said Congressman Edward Markey. “That, in my opinion, is what happened.”‘ -The Independent
A report in the Washington Post in April of 2009, pointed to the MMS giving BP a “categorical exclusion” from filing reports on what exactly it would do in the event of a blowout at the Deepwater Horizon. According to the Post, the MMS, in its infinite wisdom, concluded any blowout that might occur wouldn’t be bad enough to threaten coastal ecosystems. So why worry?
There’s also all that wonderful money the oil and gas industry spreads around Washington. By one account they dumped $169 million on the Dist. last year.
The finger pointing on why the federal government has fallen behind on regulating the industry and foreseeing the possibility of a need to have a more effective response is just getting started. First they’ll clean up the mess. Then they’ll accuse one another of being short-sighted, cheap, and once again, putting profits way out in front of the environment.
But you should be getting used to this by now. It’s the same thing our federal lawmakers have done with healthcare, putting profits ahead of lives. It’s called “getting screwed.” You’ve heard of that?
The maps they’re putting up this morning show the slick spreading out over an area of about 150 miles. However, blobs of oil are reportedly washing up on the white sand beaches of Alabama.
Somebody better get the Swedish ambassador on the phone.