Recently in Energy Category

Earmarks were not the only government spending plans that died when Harry Reid pulled the Senate omnibus spending bill this week.  So, too, did fees and rule improvements that would have helped the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, the revamped agency overseeing offshore drilling safety, fund increased inspections and reviews.  The omnibus bill contained $51 million of increased budget to fund inspections of offshore platforms and rigs, as well as increasing the statutory time limit...

I was on live on C-Span's Washington Journal yesterday morning talking about BP's Macondo well blowout and my book Disaster on the Horizon.  Have a look:...

You'll recall that all during the summer I talked about BP's number one goal with its blowout well: getting it shut in without measuring the flow.  They accomplished just that on July 13 when, as the Washington Post reported in August, Energy Secretary Steve Chu ordered the "well integrity test" and the well was shut in, before the elaborate containment system, that could have measured the flow, was completed.  BP successfully shut in the well...

Today, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced that the Obama administration had reversed its decision to open the eastern Gulf of Mexico and the eastern seaboard to new offshore drilling, delaying any decision until at least 2017.   New offshore drilling outside of the Western Gulf and (oddly) the Alaskan coast is officially dead.  I believe that permanent bans, similar to the one enacted by the State of California 30 years ago, will be enacted by...

The Times Picayune is reporting that this morrning, three workers were burned, one seriously, in a fire on a workover rig on a gas well location in shallow water in lower Jefferson Parish, Louisiana.  Details are still sketchy, but apparently the fire was started while the crew was welding on the rig.  Workover rigs are used to make repairs and conduct recompletions to existing wells.  They are generally smaller (and more dangerous) than larger rigs...

I was interviewed by WCAX in Burlington, Vermont about Disaster on the Horizon and my book signing today at the Woodstock Historical Society.  Have a look:...

Today, from 5:00 - 7:00 pm EST, I will be on Firedoglake chatting about my new book, Disaster on the Horizon.  My friend, marine biologist Riki Ott, will host the discussion.  She has been on the Gulf Coast since the blowout, and has committed to staying there for a year documenting the ecological damage and risks to human health.Please join us for what I hope to be a lively discussion about the BP well blowout, the long lasting...

Yesterday, National Academy of Engineering committee chair Donald Winter submitted preliminary findings about BP's Macondo well blowout to Interior Secretary Ken Salazar.  Among other criticisms of BP's and Transocean's management (or lack thereof) that led up to the April 20 catastrophe, Winter characterized as a key finding the companies' "lack of a suitable approach for anticipating and managing the inherent risks, uncertainties, and dangers associated with deepwater drilling operations and a failure to learn from previous...

Huffington Post just published an excerpt from my new book, Disaster on the Horizon.  Have a look....

From my pals over at Daily Kos Gulfwatchers, who have continued their 24/7 vigil over BP's Macondo well since it was killed in the middle of September, below is a video of the cap put in place over the collet connector early yesterday morning.   The cap memorializes the eleven men who were killed by this well on the night of April 20, 2010.  It seems unjust that, like an eternal flame, gas continues to...