<\/p>\n
Yes, the oil spewing up from the floor of the Gulf of <\/p>\n It may never be possible to pin down the precise cause of the massive <\/p>\n The new oil rush and its dangers<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n The United States entered the hydrocarbon era with one of the world’s <\/p>\n The hunt for oil and gas has always entailed a certain amount of <\/p>\n Now, in the rush to develop hard-to-reach reserves in Alaska, the <\/p>\n The Deepwater Horizon operation was characteristic of this trend. BP, the company which leased the rig and was overseeing the drilling <\/p>\n Drilling in Alaska and the Arctic poses, if anything, even more <\/p>\n The major energy firms insist that they have adopted ironclad <\/p>\n If it’s oil, it’s okay<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Despite obvious hazards and dangers, as well as inadequate safety <\/p>\n On the government’s side, this outlook was first fully articulated in <\/p>\n As the <\/p>\n First and foremost among the NEP’s recommendations was the <\/p>\n While drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge was, in the <\/p>\n In addition to accelerating the development of the Gulf of Mexico, <\/p>\n A BP hall of shame<\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n The major energy firms have their own compelling reasons for a <\/p>\n This leaves the private firms, widely known as international oil <\/p>\n Take BP. Originally known as the Anglo-Persian Oil Company (later <\/p>\n “Operating at the Energy Frontiers” is the title<\/a> of BP’s Annual Review for 2009, which proudly began: “BP <\/p>\n Within this mandate, moreover, the Gulf of Mexico held center stage. “BP is the leading operator in the Gulf of Mexico,” the review <\/p>\n Clearly, BP’s top executives believed that a rapid ramp-up in <\/p>\n While BP may prove to be the principal villain in this case, other <\/p>\n The Deepwater Horizon explosion, we assuredly will be told, was an <\/p>\n Don’t believe it. While poor oversight and faulty equipment may have <\/p>\n So long as this compulsion prevails, more such disasters will Related Links:<\/strong><\/p>\n U.S. bans more Gulf fishing as oil fears grow for Florida<\/a><\/p>\n Obama’s ocean chief dismisses loop current threat: ‘Very little tarballs!’<\/a><\/p>\n
\nMexico in staggering
\nquantities<\/a> could prove one of the great ecological disasters of
\nhuman history. Think of it, though, as just the prelude to the Age of <\/strong>Tough
\n Oil<\/a>, a time of ever increasing reliance on problematic,
\nhard-to-reach energy sources. Make no mistake: we’re entering the
\ndanger zone. And brace yourself, the fate of the planet could be at
\nstake. <\/p>\n
\n explosion that destroyed the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig on April
\n20, killing 11 of its 126 workers. Possible culprits include a faulty
\n cement plug in the undersea oil bore and a disabled cutoff device known
\n as a blow-out
\n preventer<\/a>. Inadequate governmental oversight of safety procedures
\nundoubtedly also contributed to the disaster, which may have been set
\noff by <\/strong>a combination of defective equipment and human
\n error<\/a>. But whether or not the immediate trigger of the explosion
\nis ever fully determined, there can be no mistaking the underlying
\ncause: a government-backed corporate drive to exploit oil and natural
\ngas reserves in extreme environments under increasingly hazardous
\noperating conditions.<\/strong><\/p>\n
\n largest pools of oil and natural gas. The exploitation of these
\nvaluable and versatile commodities has long contributed to the nation’s
\nwealth and power, as well as to the profitability of giant energy firms
\nlike BP and Exxon. In the process, however, most of our easily
\naccessible onshore oil and gas reservoirs have been depleted, leaving
\nonly less accessible reserves in offshore areas, Alaska, and the melting
\n Arctic. To ensure a continued supply of hydrocarbons—and the
\ncontinued prosperity of the giant energy companies—successive
\nadministrations have promoted the exploitation of these extreme energy
\noptions with a striking disregard for the resulting dangers. By their
\nvery nature, such efforts involve an ever increasing risk of human and
\nenvironmental catastrophe—something that has been far too little
\nacknowledged.<\/p>\n
\nrisk. After all, most energy reserves are trapped deep below the
\nEarth’s surface by overlying rock formations. When punctured by oil
\ndrills, these are likely to erupt in an explosive release of
\nhydrocarbons, the well-known “gusher” effect. In the swashbuckling
\nearly days of the oil industry, this phenomenon—familiar to us from
\nmovies like There Will Be Blood—often caused human and
\nenvironmental injury. Over the years, however, the oil companies became
\n far more adept at anticipating such events and preventing harm to
\nworkers or the surrounding countryside. <\/p>\n
\nArctic, and deep-offshore waters, we’re returning to a particularly
\ndangerous version of those swashbuckling days. As energy companies
\nencounter fresh and unexpected hazards, their existing technologies—
\nlargely developed in more benign environments—often prove incapable
\nof responding adequately to the new challenges. And when disasters
\noccur, as is increasingly likely, the resulting environmental damage is
\nsure to prove exponentially more devastating than anything experienced
\nin the industrial annals of the nineteenth and early twentieth
\ncenturies.<\/p>\n
\neffort, has for some years been in a rush to extract oil from ever
\ngreater depths in the Gulf of Mexico. The well in question, known as
\nMississippi Canyon 252, was located in 5,000 feet of water, some 50
\nmiles south of the Louisiana coastline; the well bore itself extended
\nanother 13,000 feet into the earth. At depths this great, all work on
\nthe ocean floor has to be performed by remotely-controlled robotic
\ndevices overseen by technicians on the rig. There was little margin for
\n error to begin with, and no tolerance for the corner-cutting,
\npenny-pinching, and lax oversight that appears to have characterized the
\n Deepwater Horizon operation. Once predictable problems did arise, it
\nwas, of course, impossible to send human troubleshooters one mile
\nbeneath the ocean’s surface to assess the situation and devise a
\nsolution.<\/p>\n
\nperilous challenges, given the extreme environmental and climatic
\nconditions to be dealt with. Any drilling rigs deployed offshore in,
\nsay, Alaska’s Beaufort or Chukchi Seas must be hardened to withstand
\ncollisions with floating sea ice, a perennial danger, and capable of
\nwithstanding extreme temperatures and powerful storms. In addition, in
\nsuch hard-to-reach locations, BP-style oil spills, whether at sea or on
\nland, will be even more difficult to deal with than in the Gulf. In any
\n such situation, an uncontrolled oil flow is likely to prove lethal to
\nmany species, endangered or otherwise, which have little tolerance for
\nenvironmental hazards. <\/p>\n
\nsafeguards against such perils, but the disaster in the Gulf has already
\n made mockery of such claims, as does history. In 2006, for instance, a
\n poorly-maintained pipeline at a BP facility ruptured<\/a>,
\n spewing 267,000 gallons of crude oil over Alaska’s North Slope in an
\narea frequented by migrating caribou. (Because the spill occurred in
\nwinter, no caribou were present at the time and it was possible to scoop
\n up the oil from surrounding snow banks; had it occurred in summer, the
\nrisk to the Caribou herds would have been substantial.) <\/p>\n
\npractices, a succession of administrations, including Barack Obama’s,
\nhave backed corporate strategies strongly favoring the exploitation of
\noil and gas reservoirs in the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico and
\nother environmentally sensitive areas. <\/p>\n
\n the National Energy Policy (NEP) adopted by President George W. Bush on
\n May 17, 2001. Led by former Halliburton CEO Vice President Dick
\nCheney, the framers of the policy warned that the United States was
\nbecoming ever more dependent on imported energy, thereby endangering
\nnational security. They called for increased reliance on domestic
\nenergy sources, especially oil and natural gas. “A primary goal of the
\nNational Energy Policy is to add supply from diverse sources,” the
\ndocument declared. “This means domestic oil, gas, and coal.”<\/p>\n
\nNEP made clear, however, the United States was running out of
\nconventional, easily tapped reservoirs of oil and natural gas located on
\n land or in shallow coastal waters. “U.S. oil production is expected to
\n decline over the next two decades, [while] demand for natural gas will
\nmost likely continue to outpace domestic production,” the document
\nnoted. The only solution, it claimed, would be to increase exploitation
\n of unconventional energy reserves—oil and gas found in deep offshore
\n areas of the Gulf of Mexico, the Outer Continental Shelf, Alaska, and
\nthe American Arctic, as well as in complex geological formations such as
\n shale oil and gas. “Producing oil and gas from geologically
\nchallenging areas while protecting the environment is important
\n to Americans and to the future of our nation’s energy security,” the
\npolicy affirmed. (The phrase in italics was evidently added by the
\nWhite House to counter charges—painfully accurate, as it turned out —that the administration was unmindful of the environmental
\nconsequences of its energy policies.)<\/p>\n
\ndevelopment of the pristine Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, a proposal
\nthat generated intense media interest and produced widespread opposition
\n from environmentalists. Equally significant, however, was its call for
\n increased exploration and drilling in the deep waters of the Gulf, as
\nwell as the Beaufort and Chukchi Seas off northern Alaska. <\/p>\n
\nend, blocked by Congress, an oil rush to exploit the other areas
\nproceeded with little governmental opposition. In fact, as has now
\nbecome evident, the government’s deeply
\n corrupted<\/a> regulatory arm, the Minerals Management Service (MMS),
\nhas for years facilitated the awarding of leases for exploration and
\ndrilling in the Gulf of Mexico while systematically ignoring<\/a> environmental regulations and concerns. Common practice during the Bush
\n years, this was not altered when Barack Obama took over the
\npresidency. Indeed, he gave his own stamp of approval to a potentially
\nmassive increase in offshore drilling when on March 30—three weeks
\nbefore the Deepwater Horizon disaster—he announced<\/a> that vast areas of the Atlantic, the eastern Gulf of Mexico, and
\nAlaskan waters would be opened to oil and gas drilling for the first
\ntime. <\/p>\n
\nwhile overruling government scientists and other officials who warned of
\n the dangers, the MMS also approved offshore drilling in the Chukchi and
\n Beaufort Seas. This happened despite strong opposition from
\nenvironmentalists and native peoples who fear a risk to whales and other
\n endangered species crucial to their way of life. In October, for
\nexample, the MMS gave Shell Oil preliminary
\n approval<\/a> to conduct exploratory drilling on two offshore blocks in
\nthe Beaufort Sea. Opponents of the plan have warned that any oil spills
\n produced by such activities would pose a severe threat to endangered
\nanimals, but these concerns were, as usual<\/a>,
\nignored. (On April 30, 10 days after the Gulf explosion, final
\napproval of the plan was suddenly ordered<\/a> withheld by President Obama, pending a review of offshore drilling
\nactivities.)<\/p>\n
\ngrowing involvement in the exploitation of extreme energy options. Each
\n year, to prevent the value of their shares from falling, these
\ncompanies must replace the oil extracted from their existing reservoirs
\nwith new reserves. Most of the oil and gas basins in their traditional
\nareas of supply have, however, been depleted, while many promising
\nfields in the Middle East, Latin America, and the former Soviet Union
\nare now under the exclusive control of state-owned national oil
\ncompanies like Saudi Aramco, Mexico’s Pemex, and Venezuela’s PdVSA. <\/p>\n
\ncompanies (IOCs), with ever fewer areas in which to replenish their
\nsupplies. They are now deeply involved in an ongoing oil rush in
\nsub-Saharan Africa, where most countries still allow some participation
\nby IOCs, but there they face dauntingly stiff competition from Chinese
\ncompanies and other state-backed companies. The only areas where they
\nstill have a virtually free hand are the Arctic, the Gulf of Mexico, the
\n North Atlantic, and the North Sea. Not surprisingly, this is where
\nthey are concentrating their efforts, whatever the dangers to us or to
\nthe planet.<\/p>\n
\nthe Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, still later British Petroleum), BP got
\nits start in southwestern Iran, where it once enjoyed a monopoly on the
\nproduction of crude petroleum. In 1951, its Iranian holdings were
\nnationalized by the democratic government of Mohammed Mossadeq. The
\ncompany returned to Iran in 1953, following a U.S.-backed coup that put
\nthe Shah in power, and was finally expelled again in 1979 following the
\nIslamic Revolution. The company still retains a significant foothold in
\n oil-rich but unstable Nigeria, a former British colony, and in
\nAzerbaijan. However, since its takeover of Amoco (once the Standard Oil
\n Company of Indiana) in 1998, BP has concentrated its energies on the
\nexploitation of Alaskan reserves and tough-oil locations in the deep
\nwaters of the Gulf of Mexico and off the African coast. <\/p>\n
\noperates at the frontiers of the energy industry. From deep beneath the
\n ocean to complex refining environments, from remote tropical islands to
\n next-generation biofuels—a revitalized BP is driving greater
\nefficiency, sustained momentum, and business growth.” <\/p>\n
\nasserted. “We are the biggest producer, the leading resource holder, and
\n have the largest exploration acreage position … With new discoveries,
\nsuccessful start-ups, efficient operations, and a strong portfolio of
\nnew projects, we are exceptionally well placed to sustain our success in
\n the deepwater Gulf of Mexico over the long run.”<\/p>\n
\nproduction in the Gulf was essential to the company’s long-term
\nfinancial health (and indeed, only days after the Deepwater Horizon
\nexplosion, the company announced that it had made $6.1
\n billion<\/a> in profits in the first quarter of 2010 alone). To what
\ndegree BP’s corporate culture contributed to the Deepwater Horizon
\naccident has yet to be determined. There is, however, some indication<\/a> that the company was in an unseemly rush to complete the cementing of
\nthe Mississippi Canyon 252 well—a procedure that would cap it until
\nthe company was ready to undertake commercial extraction of the oil
\nstored below. It could then have moved the rig, rented from Transocean
\nLtd. at $500,000 per day, to another prospective drill site in search of
\n yet more oil.<\/p>\n
\nlarge energy firms—egged on by the government and state officials—
\nare engaged in similar reckless drives to extract oil and natural gas
\nfrom extreme environmental locations. These companies and their
\ngovernment backers insist that, with proper precautions, it is safe to
\noperate in these conditions, but the Deepwater Horizon incident shows
\nthat the more extreme the environment, the more unlikely such statements
\n will prove accurate.<\/p>\n
\nunfortunate fluke: a confluence of improper management and faulty
\nequipment. With tightened oversight, it will be said, such accidents
\ncan be averted—and so it will be safe to go back into the
\ndeep waters<\/a> again and drill for oil a mile or more beneath the
\nocean’s surface. <\/p>\n
\n played a critical role in BP’s catastrophe in the Gulf, the ultimate
\nsource of the disaster is big oil’s compulsive drive to compensate for
\nthe decline in its conventional oil reserves by seeking supplies in
\ninherently hazardous areas—risks be damned. <\/p>\n
\nfollow. Bet on it.<\/p>\n
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