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deepwater horizon
As Biden Revives Offshore Safety Rules, Advocates Say Drilling Must End to Prevent Disaster
Even with oil spill prevention measures, said one advocate, "offshore drilling simply will never be safe."
Aug 23, 2023
Environmental advocates on Tuesday said the Biden administration's decision to reinstate offshore drilling safety rules would help undo damage caused by former Republican President Donald Trump's repeal of the regulations, but were clear that the rules would not change the fact that fossil fuel extraction is imperiling ecosystems and the planet.
U.S. Interior Secretary Deb Haaland announced that the rules have once again been finalized and will go into effect in October, governing the use of safety equipment on offshore oil rigs.
The rules were originally put in place by the Obama administration after BP's 2010 Deepwater Horizon disaster, which sent four million barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico and killed 11 people, an estimated one million seabirds, and up to five million fish.
The oil and gas industry strongly supported Trump's repeal of the rules, which Kristen Monsell, a senior attorney at the Center for Biological Diversity, said at the time would "make dirty offshore drilling even more dangerous" by making oil spills more likely.
But Jackie Savitz, chief policy officer for the ocean conservation group Oceana, said new safety regulations for drilling operations are no replacement for halting offshore drilling altogether.
"Offshore drilling simply will never be safe," she said. "When there is a spill like Deepwater Horizon, it's too late, our options are severely limited, so prevention is the only solution and this is a good step in that direction."
The reinstated rules are "a big step in getting us back on track" to ensuring there's no repeat of disasters like Deepwater Horizon, Savitz said, but "there is no way we can do enough to prevent an oil spill."
"It is an inherently risky business and it's not a matter of if, but when we will have another one," she added. "So a big part of prevention has to be to stop selling new leases."
The newly reinstated rules will require:
- Real-time monitoring of drilling operations;
- The third-party certification of emergency devices;
- Increased strength requirements for blowout prevention devices, which stop the uncontrolled flow of oil or gas in the event of an accident;
- The reporting of failure data on blowout preventers to the government; and
- Investigations into failures that start within 90 days of an accident.
Ahead of the announcement, Zero Hour founder and executive director Zanagee Artis and Taproot Earth national policy director Kendall Dix wrote an op-ed in the Miami Herald, calling on U.S. President Joe Biden to "move the country off of its addiction to fossil fuels by barring new leasing on public lands and waters," as he promised to when he campaigned for the presidency in 2020.
With the Interior Department considering a five-year oil and gas leasing program that would allow the fossil fuel industry to conduct extraction operations in even more areas of the nation's oceans—a proposal expected to be finalized this fall as the revived safety regulations go into effect—"the risk of environmental disaster from offshore drilling is not a question of if disaster will strike, but when," wrote Artis and Dix.
They pointed out that in addition to the International Energy Agency's call for an immediate end to fossil fuel extraction in order to achieve net zero carbon emissions by 2050 and the United Nations' warning that oil and gas drilling are "incompatible with human survival," offshore operations are simply not necessary "to meet the nation's energy needs."
"An analysis by industry experts found that, even without a single new lease offering, oil production in the United States will remain steady into 2035, at which point the nation's transition to renewable energy will be approaching maturity," Artis and Dix wrote.
"We don't need to sell off more of our ocean to Big Oil," they added. "Every oil spill began with an offshore lease sale."
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13 Years After BP Disaster, Oceana Urges Biden to Block New Offshore Drilling
A report from the ocean conservation organization details how the president can still keep a key campaign promise.
Apr 18, 2023
Thursday will mark the 13th anniversary of the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, in which a BP drilling rig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico, killing 11 workers and hundreds of thousands of animals. The disaster, one of the worst environmental catastrophes in U.S. history, was an object lesson in the dangers of fossil fuels.
Despite this, President Joe Biden has so far violated his campaign promise to stop further offshore oil and gas drilling, and the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA)—regardless of its status as the most important U.S. climate legislation to date—actually mandates its expansion.
"It's as if we learned nothing from the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster," Oceana campaign director Diane Hoskins said in a statement. "We know that when oil companies drill, they spill. It's not a matter of if there will be another spill, but when. And those spills bring immediate economic and environmental devastation to our coastal communities."
That's why Oceana released a new report Tuesday outlining how Biden can make good on his promise after 2024 without contradicting the terms of the IRA. The report, A Simple Solution: How President Biden Can Meet Offshore Clean Energy Goals and Prevent New Offshore Drilling, comes weeks after the latest update from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change warned that emissions from already existing fossil fuel infrastructure could blow through the carbon budget for limiting global warming to 1.5°C above preindustrial levels, while planned expansion added on top could push the Earth above 2°C.
"President Biden has the responsibility to ensure his administration advances the policies needed to meet the ambitious and necessary climate goals of the United States," the Oceana report authors wrote.
\u201cREAD: Ahead of the 13th memorial of the BP #DeepwaterHorizonSpill, a new @Oceana report outlines how @POTUS can still deliver on his commitment and prevent new leases for offshore drilling #ProtectOurCoast #NoNewLeases https://t.co/F5T0rcCk36\u201d— Oceana (@Oceana) 1681836723
How can he do this? The IRA put up three major stumbling blocks. First, it required the federal government to lease at least 60 million acres of public waters for oil and gas drilling the year before any new offshore wind lease sales. Second, it mandated that 1.7 million acres in the Gulf be leased for oil and gas despite a court ruling that the sale was backed by an insufficient environmental impact statement. Third, it set deadlines for additional lease sales in Alaska and the Gulf for 2022 and 2023.
However, Biden can still honor his campaign promise for 2024 and beyond through his administration's proposed five-year plan for oil and gas drilling , the final draft of which is expected this coming September. The initial proposed program, released last July, floated various options for lease sales for 2023-28, from zero to 10 in the Gulf of Mexico and potentially one in Cook Inlet, Alaska. Oceana hopes the final proposal will stick with zero.
"President Biden has a window now—where he can both abide by the Inflation Reduction Act and honor his campaign commitment—by issuing a five-year plan that includes no new offshore oil and gas leases," Hoskins said.
In addition, Oceana said that the Biden administration could exceed its goal of developing 30 gigawatts of offshore wind power by 2030 without additional oil and gas lease sales, since the sales already planned for 2022 and 2023 would allow offshore wind leasing to proceed through much of 2024. The group further called on Congress to pass legislation reversing the IRA stipulation tying offshore wind development to oil and gas and on Biden to permanently protect more vulnerable coastal areas from offshore drilling by using his powers under Section 12(a) of the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act.
There are many arguments in favor of banning offshore oil and gas drilling from 2024. As the Deepwater Horizon spill proved, it's incredibly dangerous, killing an average of three workers a year. It contributes to the climate crisis: A recent study found that methane emissions from Gulf drilling were double previous estimates and that stopping its spread and boosting the renewable energy transition would cut global greenhouse gas emissions by 6.9 billion tons a year by 2050. In the U.S. alone, preventing new drilling in federal waters could keep more than 19 billion tons of greenhouse gas emissions from entering the atmosphere, which is almost three times more than what the nation emits each year.
"Every new offshore well drilled is another BP Deepwater Horizon disaster waiting to happen."
Then there are the local impacts. The Deepwater Horizon spill spewed 200 millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf and polluted 1,300 miles of shoreline from Texas to Florida. This devastated ecosystems and human communities, triggering the Gulf's largest-known die-off of marine mammals and costing the seafood industry nearly $1 billion. As is common for environmental disasters, the impacts disproportionately harmed marginalized communities. Around 50 million pounds of oil waste from the cleanup—approximately half of the total—were dumped into communities of color.
The spill's legacy persists today in destroyed wetlands and 60 million lingering gallons of oil. And it's only one incident. Between 2010 and 2020, the oil industry averaged nearly two spills per day.
"Every new offshore well drilled is another BP Deepwater Horizon disaster waiting to happen," the Oceana report authors wrote. "Continuing to expand oil and gas development is reckless and irresponsible."
It's also unpopular. A poll released today by coalition Protect Our Coast found that 50% of voters support a ban on new offshore drilling and two-thirds prefer the government prioritize wind and solar developments over oil and gas drilling.
"The data makes clear that American voters prefer expanding clean energy over expanding offshore oil and gas drilling," Lake Research Partners President Celinda Lake said in a statement. "From the Gulf Coast to the eastern seaboard, most voters want to prevent more offshore drilling and protect our coasts from the impacts it has on coastal communities, marine life, and seafood fishing. The Administration can strongly appeal to young people and Democrats by taking action to prevent new offshore oil and gas drilling."
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'Revolving-Door Cronyism': Groups Line Up Against Fossil Fuel Lawyer for Interior
One environmental advocate said that industry-friendly attorney Tommy Beaudreau "has failed to stand up to the fossil fuel industry when it mattered most, and he'll likely fail again if confirmed to this critical position."
Apr 29, 2021
A coalition of 30 environmental groups on Thursday urged U.S. senators to oppose attorney Tommy Beaudreau's nomination for deputy secretary of the Interior due to his extensive record of working on behalf of fossil fuel corporations.
"Beaudreau exemplifies the worst type of revolving-door cronyism, jumping back and forth between representing fossil fuel interests and working for the government."
--Brett Hartl, Center for Biological Diversity
"Tommy Beaudreau simply possesses too many conflicts of interests with the fossil fuel industry and a lackluster record within the Department of the Interior during the Obama administration to serve in such a critical role managing our nation's public lands and irreplaceable natural heritage, not to mention tackling the climate crisis that has been caused by the very industry that Mr. Beaudreau has represented for years."
So begins a letter (pdf) addressed to members of the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources and written by organizations including the Center for Biological Diversity, Food & Water Watch, Friends of the Earth, and Revolving Door Project.
According to the coalition, "Beaudreau's financial disclosure report reveals numerous, deeply troubling conflicts of interests with the fossil fuel industry," which "stand in stark contrast to Secretary [Deb] Haaland's disclosure report."
After leaving the Obama administration, where he was the first director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy and Management (BOEM) and later chief of staff to then-Interior Secretary Sally Jewell, Beaudreau became a partner in the law firm Latham & Watkins.
While there, "he represented numerous coal-mining, oil and gas, pipeline development, and mining companies including: Arch Resources, Total, Beacon Offshore Energy, Epic Midstream, Unocal Pipeline, and BHP," the groups wrote.
"Beaudreau also appears to have done work for two Saudi Arabian companies--Red Sea Development and NEOM--the latter of which is connected to Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman," the groups added. "Reports indicate that the NEOM megacity project will result in at least 20,000 members of the Huwaitat tribe being evicted from their land."
\u201cTommy Beaudreau is unfit to be deputy secretary of the @Interior.\n\n"Beaudreau has failed to stand up to the fossil fuel industry when it mattered most, and he'll likely fail again if confirmed to this critical position." \u2014 Brett Hartl, @centerforbiodiv https://t.co/LbXsiKm4vt\u201d— Center for Biological Diversity (@Center for Biological Diversity) 1619715857
According to the coalition, Beaudreau's previous tenure in the Interior Department, which began shortly after the worst offshore oil spill in U.S. history, was also problematic.
"Eleven years ago, the BP Deepwater Horizon disaster killed 11 oil workers and spewed more than 210 million gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico for nearly three months, killing thousands of marine mammals, sea turtles, and birds," the groups wrote. As the BOEM director, Beaudreau was tasked with reforming offshore oil and gas drilling, "including the design and implementation of new regulations establishing standards for blowout preventers."
"Beaudreau is too cozy with the industry that is most responsible for the escalating climate crisis, and would likely undermine the president's stated goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions 50% by 2030."
--Coalition letter
The coalition wrote that "Beaudreau failed to ensure that the strongest possible regulatory safeguards were implemented post-Deepwater Horizon."
"The rules failed to require the use of crucial safety technology such as blind shear rams on all blowout preventers by excluding them on existing floating drilling units and those currently under construction," the groups noted. "The administration even admitted the new rules did not make the blowout preventers completely fail-safe, and it provided the industry up to seven years to comply with many of the requirements."
In addition, the organizations wrote, Beaudreau "failed to adequately address systemic problems that led to the Deepwater Horizon catastrophe." Although the National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling "called for significant revisions" to the environmental review process, "meaningful changes never occurred" at the BOEM under Beaudreau, who instead "continued to rubber-stamp offshore drilling with no real review."
"Beaudreau is too cozy with the industry that is most responsible for the escalating climate crisis, and would likely undermine the president's stated goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions 50% by 2030," the coalition wrote, adding: "his confirmation would greatly hinder the protections of our most cherished natural and cultural resources."
In a statement, Brett Hartl, government affairs director at the Center for Biological Diversity, said that "Beaudreau exemplifies the worst type of revolving-door cronyism, jumping back and forth between representing fossil fuel interests and working for the government."
"Beaudreau has failed to stand up to the fossil fuel industry when it mattered most, and he'll likely fail again if confirmed to this critical position," added Hartl.
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