The Oily Mess In The Gulf Is Becoming A Political Mess
I had a conversation with a neighbor that until recently had been working offshore in the Gulf. He had just come back from shutting his rig down and the rig was headed to somewhere off the coast of Africa. He will now have to head overseas or hope to find a position onshore. He said the Gulf is a ghost town and it will be 18 - 24 months until his rig could return.
A federal judge struck down the Obama administration’s six-month ban on deepwater oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico today, saying the government rashly concluded that because one rig failed, the others are in immediate danger, too. The White House promised an immediate appeal.
The Interior Department had halted approval of any new permits for deepwater drilling and suspended drilling of 33 exploratory wells in the gulf. Press Secretary Robert Gibbs says President Barack Obama believes strongly that drilling at such depths does not make sense and puts the safety of workers “at a danger that the president does not believe we can afford.” Several companies that ferry people and supplies, among other services, to and from offshore drilling rigs asked U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman in New Orleans to overturn the moratorium. They argued it was arbitrarily imposed after the April 20 explosion on the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig that killed 11 workers and blew out the well 5,000 feet underwater. Feldman sided with the companies, saying in his ruling the Interior Department assumed that because one rig failed, all companies and rigs doing deepwater drilling pose an imminent danger.
“The Deepwater Horizon oil spill is an unprecedented, sad, ugly and inhuman disaster,” he wrote. “What seems clear is that the federal government has been pressed by what happened on the Deepwater Horizon into an otherwise sweeping confirmation that all Gulf deepwater drilling activities put us all in a universal threat of irreparable harm.” His ruling prohibits federal officials from enforcing the moratorium until a trial is held. He did not set a trial date.
If we follow through with the “moratorium logic” then all air travel will have to be shut down every time there is a crash until we are 100% sure there will not be another crash and every plane is inspected top to bottom. We will also have to halt all car sales(not just Toyota) until Toyota can prove there are no problems with any of their vehicles and all unsold vehicles are inspected (not just Toyota). All fast food restaurants will need to be shut down anytime there is an illness at any fast food restaurant and remain that way until all restaurants are inspected and cleared (not opened as they are cleared).
All deepwater drilling was halted - not just BP or Transocean drilling. A call for inspections and corrective measures to avoid what we learned from this BP mess would be a good idea. Shut individual wells down if they fail or are deemed unsafe. Don’t shut an entire industry down because of one accident. Lets do remember this is the first major oil spill in the Gulf since the late 70’s.
I hate what this spill is going to the coast of LA. I also hate what the moratorium is doing to the economy of South Louisiana. There needs to be a rational way to protect the coast ecology without destroying the coast economy.
1 year ago
