The oil spill can frustrate in many ways. The mix of regulatory failures and oil industry cost cutting that appeared to directly lead to the Deepwater Horizon accident—that’s pretty galling. The inability of BP and the government brain trust to successfully shut off the leak, more than a month and a half after it began—that’s …
Energy
Sweden Goes Nuclear (maybe)
The Riksdag, Sweden’s parliament, voted on June 17 to overturn a three-decades old ban on new nuclear reactors in what many see as a test-case for the long-predicted “nuclear renaissance ” in Europe.
The legislation annuls a a referendum in 1980 in which Sweden’s population voted against renewing or replacing the country’s fleet of 12 …
BP’s Tony Hayward Stonewalls Congress
Republican Congressman Joe Barton of Texas has received $27,350 in campaign donations from BP—and today during the Congressional inquisition of BP CEO Tony Hayward, Barton was worth just about every penny. Barton’s odd apology in his opening statement to Hayward—Barton said he was “ashamed of what happened in the White House” …
Does Energy Security Really Matter?
Energy security—it’s the policy everyone loves. Republicans love it. Democrats love it. Environmentalists love it. President Barack Obama loves it. Even BP CEO Tony Hayward loves it. While we fight over the need to fight climate change and battle over subsidies for oil, there’s a strong consensus that the U.S. needs to break its …
BP’s Tony Hayward Doesn’t Know…Much at All
The grand Congressional inquisition of BP CEO Tony Hayward has been adjourned until 2 PM—annoyingly, members of Congress are occasionally expected to vote for things—but so far the biggest revelation has come from Republican Representative Joe Barton. As Jay Newton-Small observed over in Swampland, Barton began his opening …
5 Questions BP’s Tony Hayward Will Face in Congress
The explosion and fire aboard the Deepwater Horizon and the resulting oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico never should have happened—and I am deeply sorry that they did.
That’s how BP CEO Tony Hayward will begin his testimony to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce on Thursday morning, according to several media reports. Hayward’s …
BP Agrees Puts Up $20 Billion for a Spill Compensation Fund
During his Oval Office speech last night, President Barack Obama told the American people that he would be meeting with the chairman of BP on Wednesday and that Obama would “inform him that he is to set aside whatever resources are required to compensate the workers and business owners who have been harmed as a result of his company’s …
Obama Calls for Energy Reform—But Doesn’t Mention a Carbon Cap
It may be time to bury cap-and-trade.
Speaking in his first prime-time televised address from the Oval Office, President Barack Obama hit a range of topics. He promised the people of the Gulf Coast, and the rest of the country, that his Administration would do whatever it took to fight the BP oil spill—while warning us that it would …
New Gov’t Estimate: Even More Oil Spilling
A new report from the government’s Flow Rate Technical Group, charged with clocking the speed of the Gulf oil leak, has just been released and it’s not good: the new estimate is 35,000 to 60,000 barrels a day. That’s a significant increase from the most recent count, nearly a week ago, which put the leak at between 20,000 and 40,000 …
Big Oil Battles Congress—America Loses
Around 10:30 AM Eastern this morning, just as the five executives of the major global oil companies were settling in for what was set to be a brutal hearing from the House Energy and Commerce Committee, a fire broke out on BP’s Enterprise drilling ship, which is processing thousands of barrels a day of oil diverted from the Gulf of …