Blowout Prevention Act of 2010

Too bad it takes a disaster the size of the Deepwater Horizon blowout to get Congress to act on real regulation of private companies operating on the OCS instead of rubber stamping profit motivated dissembling. Nevertheless, the House Committee on Energy and Commerce has marked up a bill (H.R. 5626) intended to put teeth in safety requirements for the OCS and other high risk wells that could cause extensive harm to the environment. The bill was reported out unanimously. For the first time oil company CEOs will have to certify the wells their company intend to drill are designed in a safe manner, have necessary safety equipment including blowout preventers (BOPs) with redundant systems, and that the company has the ability to control and promptly stop a blowout if the BOP fails. Minimum standards for BOPs are established for the first time. It must have two sets of blind shear rams with backup control systems that can be activated remotely. ln addition to these internal certifications well design, cementing procedures, and BOPs must be independently certified by an independent inspector selected by the government. These requirements all reflect failure modes leading to catastrophy on the Deepwater Horizon platform. The bill provides for criminal fines of up to $10million a day for knowing and willful violations. It remains to be seen how many of these tough provisions survive after the oil lobby gets its hands on the bill.

Up until the disaster in the Gulf, oil companies had their way with federal regulators.  The Minerals Management Service (whose name has been changed by Forty-four's folks to protect the complacent) signed off on BP's exploration plan and environmental impact statement for Mississippi Canyon Block 252. This plan infamously claimed that an accidental spill would be "unlikely" to occur from the proposed activities. MMS even certified that the company had "the capacity to respond...to a worst-case discharge". Unhappily, America now knows that wasn't true. BP's playboy CEO Tony Hayward said the disaster was due to the "unprecedented" failure of the BOP, but that isn't true either. MMS knew for years the documented, substantial problems with blowout preventers. When MMS proposed the mandatory installation of acoustic switches on BOPs,-- required by Norway and Brazil--the oil industry pushed back hard and the agency capitulated, deciding their use could be voluntary. Unsurprisingly, the Deepwater Horizon platform did not have the switch.

What is wrong with the agency is summed up in the Interior Department IG's report on the Lake Charles, Louisiana district office with jurisdiction over the Gulf. The IG reported misconduct occurring before 2007. The report portrays a chummy, club-like atmosphere at the district office in which fraternizing and gift exchange was the norm: "we discovered that the individuals involved...have often known one another since childhood." A confidential source told investigators that some MMS inspectors had allowed roughnecks to fill out MMS inspection sheets and then sign the forms and turn them in as their own work product. In January, 2007 an inspector of offshore installations was fired for taking gifts from an oil company. But as Mother Jones concludes, it is hard to imagine that the good 'ole boy system has substantially changed since then despite all the campaign rhetoric.

[photo: Seattleweekly.com]