Defenders of Wildlife Blog

Angry or depressed about the Gulf oil disaster? You’re not alone. Deborah Du Nann Winter, PhD, Professor of Psychology at Whitman College, says the emotional impacts of this massive environmental disaster are widespread.

Dr. Du Nann Winter witnessed a wide variety of emotional reactions to the Deepwater Horizon crisis, the most striking  in her opinion being anger - toward BP’s failure to adhere to regulations and cutting corners on safety precautions, and toward President Obama for his apparent lack of anger.

“But I think all that anger projected toward the oil companies and toward the President is a way of masking the really unfathomable and profound despair that is just under the surface as we watch this catastrophe unfold,” she said. 

Also, “It really isn’t appropriate to blame BP or the President for the fact that we are rapidly approaching the end of cheap oil, and these kinds of disasters are accumulating all over the world. Blaming individuals by demonizing them is simply not a very good problem-solving mechanism for coping with feelings. Some more effective reactions would be to rethink our relationship with oil.”

Click here to read the full article.

On Friday, the U.S. House of Representatives voted to pass H.R. 3534, the CLEAR Act, in response to the ongoing oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico.  The CLEAR Act reforms the structure of the offshore drilling oversight agency to avoid clear conflicts of interest; enhances the role of science, independent review, and other oversight agencies; and calls for the establishment of mandatory safety and environmental management standards. The CLEAR Act also fully funds the Land and Water Conservation Fund, helping to offset the inherent risk offshore drilling poses to our wildlife and important lands and waters, and allows national wildlife refuges to collect and retain funds for damages from oil spills for the first time ever.

Jamie Rappaport Clark, executive vice president of Defenders of Wildlife said that with the passage, “The House of Representatives voted to start reforming the offshore drilling industry and to protect and restore coastal communities, wetlands and wildlife and help prevent the next offshore oil disaster.

“The CLEAR Act overhauls the system that failed to prevent the BP disaster. And in securing critically needed funding for the Land and Water Conservation Fund, the bill reinvests in our nation’s public lands and waters.

“When we authorize drilling off of America’s coasts, we allow the oil industry to hold the ecosystems and economies of entire regions in the palm of its hand. The CLEAR Act will help put the American people back in control. We now look to the Senate to pass their spill response bill next week to make these crucial reforms a reality.”

The legislation rides on the tail of a rocky week for the oil and gas drilling industry – with additional oil spills in Michigan, New Mexico and beleaguered Louisiana. Click here to read the full statement and learn more about the “Summer of Oil Spills.”

A federal judge blocked a six-month moratorium on deepwater drilling, but the Obama administration has decided to appeal the judge’s decision, reports Voice of America News.

Read the full story

The Minerals Management Service (MMS) continues to approve new leases after the Deepwater Horizon explosion that give British Petroleum and other companies the right to drill even more deepwater wells in the Gulf of Mexico under the same inadequate oversight that led to the current oil spill, according to a new legal challenge filed by the Southern Environmental Law Center and Defenders of Wildlife. The groups say current policies create an incentive to allow drilling even in the face of evident risks because once a lease is issued by MMS, the U.S. government is obligated to pay the lessee either the fair market value of the lease or the amount spent to obtain the bid plus costs and interest if the government cancels the lease or refuses to allow drilling.

Mike Senatore, vice president for Conservation Law at Defenders of Wildlife, said, “Clueless and inept is really the only way to describe the ongoing situation at MMS. This agency is at the epicenter of the worst environmental disaster in our nation’s history and yet it’s still going about business as usual. How else do you explain MMS’s approval of the right to drill hundreds of new wells in the Gulf, including 13 for BP, based on the same fundamentally flawed and patently illegal environmental documents used to green-light the Deepwater Horizon operation?”

MMS approved new leases for deepwater tracts as recently as June 10 under the same lax oversight complicit in the current Gulf spill.

Read the full release.

Earlier today, the Washington Post reported that an email written by the head of the MMS’ supervisor of field operations for the Gulf of Mexico stated that “until further notice we have been informed not to approve or allow any drilling no matter the water depth.”

However, the Interior Department now denies that it has extended a drilling freeze to shallow waters of the Gulf of Mexico, telling the Washington Post that “shallow water drilling may continue as long as oil and gas operations satisfy the environmental and safety requirements Secretary Salazar outlined in his report to the President and have exploration plans that meet those requirements. There is no moratorium on shallow water drilling.”

But Richard Charter, senior policy advisor at Defenders, said the risks involved with offshore oil and gas drilling have very little to do with the depth of the water. In a interview with WBAI Evening News, he recalls the recent drilling disaster in Australia’s Timor Sea, in which a rig blowout led to an oil spill that gushed unchecked for 10 weeks last fall. That drilling rig was operating “in very shallow water, only a few hundred feet.”

Listen to the full show from June 2, 2010 (segment begins at 6:00; hear Richard at 7:20).

The Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ) is seeking public input regarding its review of Minerals Management Service (MMS) environmental review procedures and practices under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA). CEQ is reviewing and seeking public input regarding the adequacy of MMS compliance with NEPA at all phases of its offshore oil and gas program, specifically focusing on the use of NEPA categorical exclusions.

Jamie Rappaport Clark, executive vice president of Defenders of Wildlife said, “MMS has clearly been unable to perform its duty of environmental review. This welcome analysis by CEQ is the crucial first step towards fixing their broken process.”

Read full statement.