Louisiana deep oil drilling disaster

[Peter Lemkin]

JUAN GONZALEZ: Well, to BP. Lawmakers accused BP CEO Tony Hayward of stonewalling on Thursday after hours of tough questioning about the oil spill his company caused that has spiraled into the worst environmental disaster in US history.

Hayward was testifying before the House Energy and Commerce Committee. In seven hours of hearings, he faced a barrage of questions about BP’s cost-cutting measures and how early he was informed about problems with the well that blew sixty days ago, on April 20th. Hayward repeatedly denied any personal responsibility for the decisions that led to the explosion of the well, the sinking of BP’s Deepwater Horizon rig, the deaths of eleven workers, and the ongoing environmental catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico. His appearance before Congress was his first since the explosion.

Several lawmakers said they were frustrated by his answers and accused him of being evasive. Under harsh questioning, Hayward urged them to await the outcome of an investigation into the spill. Georgia Republican Phil Gingrey grilled him on the issue.

TONY HAYWARD: There are clearly some issues that our investigation has identified. And when the investigation is complete, we will draw the right conclusions. If there is at any point—

REP. PHIL GINGREY: Well, with all due respect, you’ve had fifty-nine days, and you’re not exactly moving with fever pitch here. Do you believe BP was drilling the well following the best safety practices you were focused on reinvigorating when you were promoted to the position of CEO a couple years ago?

TONY HAYWARD: I have no reason to conclude that wasn’t the case. If I found at any point that anyone in BP put cost ahead of safety, I would take action.


JUAN GONZALEZ: While Tony Hayward faced tough questions from Republicans and Democrats alike, one lawmaker actually issued an apology to BP. Texas Republican Joe Barton said President Obama’s demand for a $20 billion compensation fund amounted to a "shakedown" of the oil giant.

REP. JOE BARTON: I’m speaking now totally for myself. I’m not speaking for the Republican Party. I’m not speaking for anybody in the House of Representatives but myself. But I’m ashamed of what happened in the White House yesterday. I think it is a tragedy of the first proportion that a private corporation can be subjected to what I would characterize as a shakedown. In this case, a $20 billion shakedown.


JUAN GONZALEZ: Barton came under swift denunciation from the White House and was forced to retract his remarks hours later under pressure from fellow Republicans. At the hearing, Iowa Democrat Bruce Braley challenged Barton and asked Tony Hayward if he considered the $20 billion compensation fund a slush fund.

REP. BRUCE BRALEY: Did you consider this compensation fund for people who had lost their lives, lost their businesses, lost their environment, lost their ability to earn—did you consider that to be a slush fund?

TONY HAYWARD: As we said yesterday, the fund is a signal of our commitment to do right, to ensure that individuals, fishermen, charter boat captains, small hotel owners, everyone who’s been impacted by this, is kept whole. That is what I have said from the very beginning of this, and that is what we intend to do. And as I said in my testimony, I hope people will now take—see that we are good for our word.

REP. BRUCE BRALEY: And can we take that as a "no" in response to my question, sir, that you did not consider this to be a slush fund?

TONY HAYWARD: I certainly didn’t think it was a slush fund.


AMY GOODMAN: Even when grilled by Florida Republican Cliff Stearns, BP CEO Tony Hayward denied the spill was a result of reckless behavior, but acknowledged no one at BP has been fired following the explosion.

REP. CLIFF STEARNS: The people of Florida, when I talk to them and they say there’s oil spilling on the coast, would it be appropriate to say that it’s because of BP’s reckless behavior? Yes or no?

TONY HAYWARD: It is a consequence of a big accident.

REP. CLIFF STEARNS: No, yes or no? Reckless behavior or not?

TONY HAYWARD: There is no evidence of reckless behavior.

REP. CLIFF STEARNS: So, you’re standing here, you’re saying here today that BP had no reckless behavior? That’s your position. Yes?

TONY HAYWARD: There is no evidence of reckless behavior.

REP. CLIFF STEARNS: No, yes or no? You’re saying BP has had no reckless behavior, is what you’re saying to us.

TONY HAYWARD: I have seen no evidence of reckless behavior.

REP. CLIFF STEARNS: OK. So you’re on record saying there’s been no reckless behavior. Has anyone in BP been fired because of this incident? Anybody?

TONY HAYWARD: Not—

REP. CLIFF STEARNS: Yes or no?

TONY HAYWARD: No, so far.

REP. CLIFF STEARNS: No people have been fired. So, your captain of the ship runs into New Orleans, spews all this oil, causes all this damage, from Alabama, Mississippi, Florida, Louisiana, and no one’s been fired?

TONY HAYWARD: Our investigation is ongoing.

REP. CLIFF STEARNS: So, let’s say the investigation goes for three years. Does that mean you wouldn’t fire anybody?

TONY HAYWARD: As the investigation draws conclusions, we will take the necessary action.


AMY GOODMAN: And New York Democrat Eliot Engel asked Hayward about BP’s other wells in the Gulf of Mexico.

REP. ELIOT ENGEL: How many other wells has BP in the Gulf?

TONY HAYWARD: I don’t know the precise number, but it’s a large number.

REP. ELIOT ENGEL: Well, give me a ballpark figure.

TONY HAYWARD: In the order of hundreds.

REP. ELIOT ENGEL: OK. How can we be assured that the same thing won’t happen with one of the other wells? How can you give us assurances that what happened with this well won’t happen again to several hundred wells?

TONY HAYWARD: The other wells that I’m referring to have all been drilled and completed and are secure.

REP. ELIOT ENGEL: So you are saying that in all the other wells that BP has, something that happened to this well could never happen again in any of those other wells?

TONY HAYWARD: All of the other wells that I’m referring to are wells that have been completed and are secure.

REP. ELIOT ENGEL: So, is that the same assurance that you had said that you were going to, with a laser, make safety a priority? Is this the same kind of assurance that you’re giving us now?

TONY HAYWARD: I have, throughout my tenure, been very explicit about the priority of safety in BP. It is the first word I utter every time I talk to any group of people in BP, the fact that safe and reliable operations is our number one priority. And we have made very significant changes to our processes, to our people, and invested very significantly into the integrity of our plant and equipment over the last three or four years.

REP. ELIOT ENGEL: Mr. Hayward, let me just say, with all due respect, I, like everyone else here and everyone else in America, is thoroughly disgusted. I think you’re stalling. I think you’re insulting our intelligence. And I really resent it.

[Jan Klimkowski]

More excellent posts in this thread - thank you all.

There's also the Joker ready to put in an appearance. The flapping of a butterfly's wings and the chaotic force of a phantasmagoric hurricane tearing through the Gulf.

The crushed, broken, body language of the insiders - crucially Obama, Hayward and Cameron - is suggestive of Dead Men Walking. They know this thing is uncontainable, and their pathetic efforts have not even delayed the day of reckoning.

I suggest deporting them all to Utah. I gather the state has a fully trained firing squad itching for more target practice...

[Magda Hassan]

http://s3.amazonaws.com/wmnf/news_story_...erview.mp3

[Magda Hassan]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3b6J7LRUTFY


The clip is crisp and professionally shot, a surprise hit on YouTube
and Facebook. But this is no music video, nor is it a new comedy hit.
Rather, this is BP's chief executive, Tony Hayward, fresh-faced and
relaxed in blue jacket and open-necked shirt, addressing students of
Stanford's elite business graduate school.
It was 2007 and Hayward, newly ensconced at the helm of
BP, planned the speech to signal the course of his stewardship of the
British oil giant. BP, said the upbeat Englishman, had just finished a
"difficult, critical but necessary self assessment".
The diagnosis?
"We had too many people that were working to save the
world." A studied pause and Hayward returned to his theme: "We'd lost
track of the fact that our primary purpose is to create value for our
shareholders. How you do that is you need to take care of the world ?
but our primary purpose in life was not to save the world."

http://www.smh.com.au/business/lost-at-s...-ymrt.html

[Jan Klimkowski]

As Hayward says in his oh-so-folksy-CEO-way, BP's "primary purpose in life was not to save the world."

Indeed, with corporation bosses - epitomized by Wall Street's darling and GE destroyer Jack Welch - eager to maximize short term profit at any cost, multinationals don't give a flying fuck about the planet, or 99.9% of its fauna and flora.

The green manifestos of multinational corporations have always been facades - pure PR spin to enable "ethical investment" from pension funds, churches and the like.

Global market capitalism, with regulators bought and owned by multinationals, is fundamentally incompatible with the health of our blue planet.

About all that is currently unknown is the scale of the Gulf of Mexico catastrophe. :mad:

[Peter Lemkin]

http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2010/6...er-in-Gulf

Bush/Cheney Exec Order 5/01 = Gusher in Gulf
by Gorette
- Bush/Cheney Exec Order 5/01 = Gusher in Gulf Mon Jun 21, 2010 at 06:26:04 AM PDT
Late last night I read the powerful, incredible New York Times expose on the knowing failure of oil corporations and intentional lack of the right safety equipment that caused the Gusher in the Gulf. I had just written a diary on Bush's Executive Order to give free rein to oil corporations! The link between the two could not be more clear: BP chose to do everything fast and dirty. Had they not ignore safety reports about faulty BOPs and shear rams failures, they could easily have avoided this catastrophe.

BP knew they were operating unsafely. Read the Times article.

The Bush/Cheney administration had empowered them to do so from May 2001. If Republicans are going to blame this disaster and its cleanup on Obama then let the true blame be placed on Bush/Cheney for enabling the oil industry to run roughshod over safety precautions, regulations and oversight.

Gorette's diary :: ::
The 2000s....ushered in an era of aggressive, government-backed offshore oil production. In May 2001, Bush, acting on recommendations from the oil industry, signed an executive order that required federal agencies to expedite permits for energy projects and paved the way for greater domestic oil exploration.

May 18, 2001. That was the day Bush and Cheney decided they could withstand a huge oil spill. But they probably deemed it unlikely because of the Republican belief that corporations will in self-interest avoid serious risks, and take precautions to avoid catastrophes. Only that is not true.

Bush/Cheney were aware of the many risks and gave Big Oil free rein while they restrained the good people at MMS who wanted to control the industry from doing harm.

. MMS commissioned reports. They knew what was unsafe.
. MMS did not require certain important practices.
. MMS made regulations they then did not enforce.

Giving the pretense of safety, they were effectively neutered by Bush/Cheney who got MMS to require a mere 30 days to approve permits.

Various studies and reports alerted the oil industry. Rig safety hinged on Blow Out Preventers which were at serious risk from failure. But this is not the only rig at risk!

One test showed that 45% of BOP's failed. An industry study four that in only six out of 11 cases had activated BOP's prevented a spill when loss of control of well had occurred. Yet they talk as if these BOP's are the "ultimate failsafe device," offering absolute safety.

..oil industry executives had long known (Blow Out Preventers) could be vulnerable and temperamental.

Other tests showed that two "blind" shear rams were necessary for safety --not just one. Today, 11 of 14 Transocean rigs have two, the other three were built prior to DW Horizon.

From the NYT article today & graphic on how shear rams work:

It was the last line of defense, the final barrier between the rushing volcanic fury of oil and gas and one of the worst environmental disasters in United States history.

Its very name — the blind shear ram — suggested its blunt purpose. When all else failed, if the crew of the Deepwater Horizon oil rig lost control of a well, if a dreaded blowout came, the blind shear ram’s two tough blades were poised to slice through the drill pipe, seal the well and save the day. Everything else could go wrong, just so long as "the pinchers" went right. All it took was one mighty stroke.

On the night of April 20, minutes after an enormous blowout ripped through the Deepwater Horizon, the rig’s desperate crew pinned all hope on this last line of defense.

But the line did not hold.

Subsequent test show that only one side of the shears worked. They are extremely vulnerable in that one component not working can cause the whole device to fail.

The problems highlighted by these cases were common knowledge in the drilling industry.

Blind shear rams failed time and time again just as they did on the Deepwater Horizon.

Checks were done. They found seven which "**had never been checked**" for deepwater performance.

"This grim snapshot....illustrates the lack of preparedness in the industry to shear and seal a well with the last line of defense against a blowout."

But they moved into deeper water. The industry argued for fewer safety checks.

This is the kind of redundancy in safety mechanisms that the president is talking about, that his Commission will investigate.

The Times also states that the MMS had not acted on it's own expert's advice on how to minimize this shear ram failure and that the Obama administration needs to stop this. Even when MMS enacted a rule about it, they failed to enforce it.

So it is on all sides that the failures occured, due to the wink, the nod, the Executive Order by Bush/Cheney. A report (May 2000) from our own regulators concluded that a big spill from a deepwater oil well could be disastrous, having major, disastrous effects on wildlife and wetlands. Incoming Bush/Cheney ignored this report.

If Republicans are going to blame this disaster and its cleanup on Obama then let the true blame be placed on Bush/Cheney for enabling the oil industry to run roughshod over safety precautions, regulations and oversight.

Fortunately we now have a president who knows how to make things right and I have every confidence he will wipe out the Bush Executive Order on Expediting Permits to the oil industry:

Obama does the right thing.
One tool that the Bush Team used to approve MTR projects was an expedited permit process: Obama suspended this expedited process last week.

Government regulators told Bush/Cheney that a deepwater oil spill would be disastrous because:

McClatchy:
...there were few good ways to capture oil underwater.

They said in effect, SO WHAT? They cared only, only, for the oil corporations.

They did everything they could to squelch all oversight. Hearings by Congress to do their job and oversee the MMS? Forget about that. They put out the word. No hearings that would reveal their treachery of this administration and its directives to push forward on deepwater drilling and the lack of environmental impact studies.

As clear as anything: They put out the word: Restrain the regulators at MMS. MMS knew better. They had commissioned reports, they put out advice but stopped at requiring certain practices that were of great importance. They made regulations and did not enforce them. They were neutered, made ineffective by Bush/Cheney while giving the pretense of safety.

McClatchy:

The Minerals Management Service had never required any of these backup systems to be tested despite a report it commissioned in 2003 that said these systems "should probably receive the same attention to verify functionality" as the rest of the blowout preventer. The agency had also declined to take the modest step of requiring rigs to have these backup systems in place at all, though it had sent out a safety alert encouraging their use.

Yes, they did restrain MMS. How can we get MMS, they pondered, to approve drilling applications quickly? Let's simply make it impossible for them to do the job. We'll make it a requirement for MMS to make 30-day decisions on matters concerning the environmental impact of deep water oil wells. Thirty days. Not 60. Not 90. Not 120. But 30 days.

How many days does your local Wetlands Protection Act provide for consideration as to whether or not your building a dog house on your property will adversely impact wetlands? (Wetlands regulations are critical.)

Bush and Cheney, they both had oil interests or ties to companies working in that field. From the moment Cheney had his secret meetings with oil executives we suspected he had nefarious plans. He and George decided probably before they took over the White House that their administration was going to be oil friendly, above all else, at the expense of all else.

Environment? Oceans? Who cares? Sea life? Who cares? Jobs for the people? Who cares? Money for oil corporations? We care. That is their mentality, those are their values. Cronyism, corruption. That's GOP values. Forget that family values thing, unless it's our family.

The result of those GOP values? A spill the size of the Exxon Valdez every few days! Eleven lives lost! A huge oil gusher for months in our precious Gulf of Mexico and all the tragedy it entails.

They knew from the deepwater Shell Plan:

"Regaining well control in deep water may be a problem since it could require the operator to cap and control well flow at the seabed in greater water depths . . . and could require simultaneous firefighting efforts at the surface."

Now all of us have to bear the burden of having had that president and vice president who cared more about the interests of rich oil corporations/friends/family, than about the broader interests of the American people.

They care more about the interests of oil corporations than they do about jobs, about the economy, about people losing hope and a way of life. And many of their GOP friends and colleagues are exactly the same!

The GOP cannot--even now in the disaster's ongoing tragic effects--stop saying DRILL BABY DRILL. They shout it from the rooftops. They preach it on tv and in Congress. They have no common sense, no values, no care for anything else. Just give them their oil and fast. The earth to them is an expendable commodity, just as are rain forests, whales, the land, the marsh, the beach, the sea, the people.

All they can do now, the GOP is try to re-focus the people's interest onto the current administration, onto jobs lost temporarily from a time-out on drilling in deepwater of 24 oil rigs so they can be checked for safe operation and plans to deal with spills.


The GOP and some Democratic politicians gain from drilling because some get huge amounts from oil corporations. You can tell which ones get the most by listening to their speeches in favor of drilling. From Open Secrets, amounts from BP and Oil Industry totals: John McCain (R-AZ) $36,649 & $2,428,287, Mary Landrieu (D-LA) $16,200 & $329,100, Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) $8,500 & $223,326, Mitch McConnell (R-KY) $8,500 & $408,400.

This McClatchy article is a must read, especially the paragraph down a ways that begins: "The 2000 Shell plan also cautioned that an oil gusher wouldn't behave the same way in deepwater..." And the next paragraph: "Among its other warnings ..." This will make the hair on the back of your neck stand up. I promise.

The Shell drill plan written in 2000 by MMS, describes what we are now experiencing. Catastrophic. It:

indicates that some federal regulators were well aware of the potential hazards of deepwater oil production in its early years...

[Ed Jewett]

Jamie Gorelick, famed in yesteryear for her role on the 9/11 Commission [see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jamie_Gorelick and elsewhere] and who also had a minor supporting role in Catherine Austin Fitts' "Dunwalke tales" [http://www.dunwalke.com/], is now making an appearance in the tale of the Deepwater spectacle.


Gorelick's challenge: Backing BP
By: Abby Phillip
June 17, 2010 04:44 AM EDT
When BP executives filed into the West Wing on Wednesday morning to meet with President Barack Obama, they were joined by at least one familiar Washington hand: former Clinton administration Deputy Attorney General Jamie Gorelick, who signed on earlier this month to represent BP in congressional inquiries linked to the massive oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico.
As one of the top lawyers in Washington and a former Justice Department official, it is no surprise that BP tapped Gorelick and her prominent law firm, WilmerHale, to do the nearly impossible: defend it against a deluge of legislative inquiries into the oil disaster.

And her role is not very different from the one played by another prominent Democrat, former White House counsel Greg Craig, who is now representing Goldman Sachs — which until the oil spill was Washington’s favorite corporate pariah.

“Speaking generally, the reliance on high-powered insiders results in corporations escaping penalties that are not as severe as they would otherwise face. The familiarity of the former prosecutor with the system enables them to think creatively about tricks to end up with resolutions that seem much more significant than they actually are,” said Robert Weissman, president of Public Citizen.

Still, Gorelick could easily have been on the other side of the table as one of the Obama administration’s key players. Her role in the Clinton administration and her later service as a member of the 9/11 Commission made her a logical choice for attorney general.

But Gorelick has had her own share of controversies, which are widely believed to be why she is representing high-profile clients rather than working for Obama.

After leaving the Justice Department, Gorelick served for six years as vice chairwoman of Fannie Mae and got caught up in the mortgage agency’s accounting controversy. In 2005, two years after Gorelick left Fannie Mae, a federal investigation into the public-private mortgage company found that accountants had falsified signatures to erase $9 billion in losses from the books. Eliminating those losses resulted in Gorelick and four other Fannie Mae executives taking away six- and seven-figure bonuses in 1998.

The federal investigation found that Gorelick was paid more than $25 million during her time at Fannie, and the huge compensation received by Fannie Mae executives later became a major issue in Congress.

When it comes to defending BP, Weissman said that Gorelick should feel some responsibility to defend the ideals that led her into government, especially given the importance of her former position as the Justice Department’s second-ranking official.
“She’s made a lot of money in her life,” Weissman said. “Does she wake up and say, ‘I want to defend BP?’ She’s a free agent, but it’s a reasonable ethical question to ask yourself in that position. Presumably, you felt some public service instinct when you went into government. On one hand, you’re trading in on that; on the other hand, you’re betraying the ideals you believed in when you went into government in the first place.”
Since leaving Fannie Mae, Gorelick has been a partner at WilmerHale and head of its Defense, National Security and Government Contracts Practice Group. Even with a Democrat in power, she has not shied away from representing clients with interests at odds with the Obama administration.
Earlier this year, student loan giant Sallie Mae made it a point to hire prominent Democrats, including Gorelick, and Democratic lobbyists from the Podesta Group to stop congressional legislation that would severely alter its role in the student loan industry. Their efforts were defeated, and the Obama administration succeeded in attaching a reform bill to the health care legislation that made the federal government the only lender to students — effectively cutting out private companies like Sallie.

Gorelick has also represented Steve Rattner, a prominent Democratic fundraiser, against accusations by the Securities and Exchange Commission that he arranged a pay-to-play deal that secured a $100 million investment from the New York public pension fund for his private investment management firm.

Despite the potential for ill will in Washington, Gorelick is only reprising a role for BP that she played in 2007, when the company was scrambling to deal with yet another oil spill, off the coast of Alaska. Then, the company was fined $50 million.

This time, the price tag is bound to be much higher. And BP will face intense scrutiny from Congress in the coming months.

Gorelick will have plenty of work — and detractors.

“They took her into this meeting, and they still got nailed for $20 billion. I would say that she’s not yet earning her money,” said Kenneth Green, a resident scholar on energy and the environment at the American Enterprise Institute. “I think their concern now is to avoid criminal prosecution, so they’re trying to figure out how best to navigate the justice system to minimize their criminal risk.”
Even if Gorelick has friends in the White House, Melanie Sloan, executive director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, said her connections are unlikely to save BP from paying the greatest possible price for the spill.

“Of course, it helps if she has a good relationship with someone in the White House, but it doesn’t mean they’re going to go soft on BP,” she said. “They’re the villain of the world. Even a good lawyer can only help you so much.”
© 2010 Capitol News Company, LLC
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0610/38645.html

[Peter Lemkin]

....the Oil Industry lawyers said it "was killing an entire 'ecosystem of oil companies'".....I feel sick...not only are they ruled by law as 'persons', but they seem to have destroyed the concept of ecosystem, as well!:eviltongue::eviltongue::eviltongue:

[Ed Jewett]

I understand what you are saying, Peter. (The Derrick Jensen themes are still valid....) But of course the sense of an inter-related string of business and economy built around the oil industry is also valid; there are many on he Gulf Coast clambering for more drilling, and there was a court ruling on it today giving a green light (or overturning) Obama's temporary ban... What the issue is from my POV is that the nation has failed to address peak oil along with the corporate electioneering and person-hood issues and the larger issues of fascist Wall Street/Chamber of Commerce influence on national policy. We still endorse companies eating mountains for clean coal, so seas, fish, cultures and beaches are not going to stop them from satisfying their voracious appetite. Now, too, we have to have that lithium in Afghanistan.

[Magda Hassan]

Lord Coe says BP is 'trusted partner' of 2012 Olympics

Page last updated at 13:58 GMT, Monday, 21 June 2010 14:58 UK

Lord Coe says BP sponsorship of 2012 Olympics is 'solid'

London Olympics chairman Lord Coe has said the Gulf of Mexico oil spill will not harm BP's sponsorship of the 2012 Games.
He said the oil giant was a "trusted partner", adding the spill "does not make a difference to us at all".
Lord Coe and BP regional vice president Peter Mather were attending an event to promote the London 2012 Cultural Weekend, which takes place in July.
BP is a top tier sponsor of the 2012 Games.
Lord Coe said: "They [BP] were with us during the bid and now they are with us as partners doing the delivery phase.
Share 'vision' "They are an example of a world class company who are working with us, sharing our vision and bringing it forward."
Mr Mather defended BP's actions in the oil spill crisis.
"Our focus as a company is 100% on the Gulf of Mexico, doing the right thing - doing the right thing on the seabed and our focus is also on the shore," he said.
Eleven people died when an explosion destroyed the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig in the Gulf of Mexico on 20 April.
Owned and operated by Transocean, the rig was being leased by BP.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/england/london/10366896.stm