rssMarkey Blasts Oil Companies for ‘Carbon Copy’ Safety Plans
Tuesday, June 15, 2010 at 1:27 pm
- 9 Comments
At a hearing this morning with executives from five leading oil companies, House Energy and Environment Subcommittee Chairman Ed Markey (D-Mass.) lambasted the executives for their companies’ lack of preparation for an oil spill like the one that has been spewing crude into the Gulf of Mexico for 57 days.
After taking BP to task for allowing the spill to occur, Markey said, “Now the other companies here today will contend that this was an isolated incident. They will say a similar disaster could never happen to them.”
And so they did. “This incident represents a dramatic departure from the industry norm in deepwater drilling,” said ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson. And Chevron chairman John Watson said his company’s “drilling and control practices for deepwater wells are safe and environmentally sound.”
But Markey would have none of it. “What we found was that these five companies have response plans that are virtually identical,” he said.
“The covers of the five response plans are different colors, but the content is ninety percent identical,” Markey continued. “Like BP, three other companies include references to protecting walruses, which have not called the Gulf of Mexico home for 3 million years. Two other plans are such dead ringers for BP’s that they list a phone number for the same long-dead expert.”
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9 Comments
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Comment posted June 15, 2010 @ 11:12 pm
“Like BP, three other companies include references to protecting walruses, which have not called the Gulf of Mexico home for 3 million years. Two other plans are such dead ringers for BP’s that they list a phone number for the same long-dead expert.”
One is a fluke. Two is coincidence. Three is a trend.
Comment posted June 16, 2010 @ 6:30 am
And we STILL have defenders of big oil, from both sides. Seems their influence wasn't just with MMS.
I sincerely hope BP execs are prosecuted, but I try to be realist about it. At this point, I hope they fold (of course, AFTER they fully pay up for their criminal malfeasance). Serve as a warning loud and clear that the world's oceans are NOT dumping grounds for that aforementioned malfeasance.
At this point, anything coming out of the mouth of a corporate lackey is a lie, and should be dealt with as such. The circus today proved that beyond a doubt.
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[...] Energy and Environment Subcommittee Chairman Ed Markey: What we found was that these five companies have response plans that are virtually identical. [...]
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