A young heron sits dying amidst oil splattering underneath mangrove on an island impacted by oil from the Deepwater Horizon oil spill in Barataria Bay, along the the coast of Louisiana on Sunday, May 23, 2010. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert) #
Yesterday, the Department of the Interior‘s (DOI) Inspector General (IG) released its investigation into the Lake Charles District Office of the Minerals Management Service (MMS). Among other insights into the incestuous nature between the oil industry and the regulators it regulates was this little gem:
Another confidential source told investigators that some MMS inspectors had allowed oil and gas production company personnel located located on the platform to fill out inspection forms. The forms would then be completed or signed by the inspector and turned in for review. According to the source, operating company personnel completed the inspection forms using pencils, and MMS inspectors would write on top of the pencil in ink and turn in the completed form.
Add to that the three other investigations the DOI’s IG did at the Denver office of MMS, issued September 2008. As the Denver Post reported it:
Government workers in Denver engaged in secret sex and drug abuse with oil company employees and accepted thousand of dollars in gifts while handling billions of dollars worth of energy contracts, federal investigators said today.
Employees at the Minerals Management Service including the former head of the Denver division repeatedly and “without remorse” violated ethics rules over a four-year period, the Interior Department’s Inspector General said.
BP (Beyond Perdition) is used to getting its way. Last week, a CBS film crew trying to document the first landfall of the oil monster it spawned was threatened with arrest by BP’s “partner”, the US Coast Guard, who, according to the crew, was operating “under BP rules.” Fast forward to this week to this clip from CNN showing BP CEO Tony Hayward ordering the media around like they were barking seals during his highly staged visit to a beach cleanup site.
In the thirty seven days since it ripped a gash in the ocean floor, releasing hundreds of thousands of barrels a day into the fragile Gulf marine ecosystem (at 6800 psi), BP has tried a half a dozen failed Rube Goldberg schemes to close it down.
Today, BP tries its latest brainstorm, “The Top Kill”, which involves filling the well head with drilling mud. A procedure that is being given a 60-70% chance of success, but might just make a bad situation worse if it fails. Which would explain Rep. Ed Markey‘s statement today that he was told by BP that it is going to cut the live seafloor feed during the operation. Wouldn’t want to watch what’s left of the original piping ripped asunder now, would we?
But if BP’s Top Kill procedure fails tomorrow, don’t expect other efforts to succeed, at least until the relief wells are drilled a few months hence. Or until the whole freakin oil reservoir spills its guts, which just might persist longer than we do as a species.
The Gulf’s ecosystem is fucked either way. And as the oil enters the Loop Current, it will impact the coral reefs and beaches from Florida to North Carolina. In the years that follow, as the oil slicks its way into the greater Atlantic current, perhaps BP’s home shores as well.
Karma is a bitch that way.
UPDATE: As I pointed out in another post, it is to BP’s legal and financial advantage to keep the estimates of how much oil is leaking out as low as possible. Now comes this:
SPECIAL REPORT-Civil fine in Gulf spill could be $4,300 barrel
NEW YORK, May 25 (Reuters) – Just how many barrels of oil are gushing into the Gulf of Mexico from the Deepwater Horizon spill is a billion dollar question with implications that go beyond the environment. It could also help determine how much BP (BP.L) and others end up paying for the disaster.
A clause buried deep in the U.S. Clean Water Act may expose BP and others to civil fines that aren’t limited to any finite cap — unlike a $75 million limit on compensation for economic damages. The Act allows the government to seek civil penalties in court for every drop of oil that spills into U.S. navigable waters, including the area of BP’s leaking well.
As a result, the U.S. government could seek to fine BP or others up to $4,300 for every barrel leaked into the U.S. Gulf, according to legal experts and official documents.
[…]
