Archive for the ‘oil’ Category
Romney energy policy: oil and gas
And renewables? Fuhgetaboudit! A clean energy economy is the sort of idea that’s impossible to find in Mitt Romney’s approach to energy policy, contained in his 87-page platform document, “Believe in America: Mitt Romney’s Plan for Jobs and Economic Growth.”
Romney’s energy program is so bereft of new ideas and so cynically beholding to Big Oil and King Coal that it’s almost breathtaking: basically, whatever the fossil fuel industry wants, Romney is there.
One of the bills he says he’ll introduce on “day one” of his presidency will direct the Department of Interior “to undertake a comprehensive survey of American energy reserves in partnership with exploration companies and initiate leasing in all areas currently approved for exploration.”
There it is—Romney the handmaiden and toady for Big Oil and King Coal on energy policy. Exactly what the economy and the environment needs. Read the rest of this entry »
BP, Halliburton Ready to Rumble
A pox on both their houses. Legal battles surrounding the Deepwater Horizon 2010 drilling disaster will be just as messy—and way lengthier—than the spill incident itself.
The latest shots in what bids to be a never-ending exercise in passing the buck and liability were fired last month when oil giant BP went to court in New Orleans claiming that the U.S. contractor Halliburton (you know – Iran, Dick Cheney? That Halliburton) botched the cement work on the doomed oil rig. Read the rest of this entry »
Chevron, Ecuador and the forever lawsuit
Back in May I wrote about Chevron’s stubborn refusal to settle an $18 billion lawsuit over oil pollution in Ecuador.
Chevron is on trial in Ecuador for widespread contamination of Amazonian land and water resources in the 1970s by Texaco, which Chevron purchased in 2001. Plaintiffs suing Chevron are challenging the adequacy of a $40 million remediation effort that Texaco completed in 1998. A court-appointed expert in the Ecuadorian litigation has recommended that Chevron be held liable for up to $27.3 billion in damages. In February, an Ecuadoran judge fined the San Ramon oil major $9.5 billion over oil-field contamination in a portion of the Amazon rain forest where Texaco used to drill, working as a partner with the government-run Petroecuador. The fine could increase to $18 billion. Read the rest of this entry »
No Concessions from Chevron on Ecuador or Anywhere Else
Among the developments at Chevron’s recent raucous annual shareholder meeting was the oil company’s stubborn refusal to settle an $18 billion lawsuit over oil pollution in Ecuador.
Chevron is on trial in Ecuador for widespread contamination of Amazonian land and water resources in the 1970s by Texaco, which Chevron purchased in 2001. Plaintiffs suing Chevron are challenging the adequacy of a remediation effort that Texaco completed in 1998. A court-appointed expert in the Ecuadorian litigation has recommended that Chevron be held liable for up to $27.3 billion in damages. In February, an Ecuadoran judge fined the San Ramon oil major $9.5 billion over oil-field contamination in a portion of the Amazon rain forest where Texaco used to drill, working as a partner with the government-run Petroecuador. The fine could increase to $18 billion. Read the rest of this entry »
Chevron, the socially responsible oil company?
When you’re a member of the Big Oil club, bragging about your CSR accomplishments and good citizenship rings more than hollow, it is tone deaf and lame from an environmental and climate change perspective and considering the commodity involved.
Chevron forged ahead anyway with its 2010 Corporate Responsibility Report, released this month. It makes these points: The company achieved the safest year in its history; it has reduced total energy consumption by 33 percent since 1992; spent $2 billion with small U.S. businesses and “increased social investment” in communities around the world to $197 million. Yippee-skippee. Read the rest of this entry »
Deepwater dreaming
When the Exxon Valdez crashed into Bligh Reef in Alaska’s Prince William Sound in 1989 it caused the worst environmental disaster in U.S. history. Out of that terrible event there was some good: New standards for tanker construction such as double hulls; new laws covering oil spill liability and compensation and a comprehensive regime for oil spill response, cleanup, training and equipment.
For the most part these changes were enacted in a bipartisan fashion – we were shocked, briefly, out of our complacency and ignorance about the danger of supertankers feeding our oil addiction.
We did something then and for the most part it has worked.
Now we’re faced with the Deepwater Horizon disaster and what is the new worst environmental disaster in U.S. history by far. People have died. The “experts” don’t seem to have a solid clue about what to do.
The challenge is enormous – we’re dealing with a well spewing oil more than one mile below the surface of the Gulf. Stopping that flow and dealing with the catastrophic environmental effects is and will be a harder task than going to the moon.
Is there an opportunity here? Will there finally be a realization that breaking the hold of the oil companies on our economic, environmental and security future is a necessity that must begin now? Is it conceivable that oil companies could change their spots and become energy companies or even (dare it be whispered?) renewable energy companies?
If you dare to dream you might as well dream big.
But this nightmare occurs in a time of partisan and political extremism, with corporations and their legislative minions calling the shots. Is it possible that the level of discourse, influence and the ability to act quickly and collaboratively in this country can be turned on its head?
Of course anything is possible. As Thomas Friedman said on Sunday, “A disaster is a terrible thing to waste.”
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