Tag: BP

Opportunity this election year is shrinking for the governor and legislative leaders to reach an agreement on a bill that could head off a series of ballot measures aimed at granting local authorities greater regulatory control over the oil-and-gas industry.

They often want to do better, but somehow can't seem to pull it off. Christine Bader lists six reasons why they fail.

How does the "war on terror" end? It could end with the crisis in Ukraine. To quote Secretary of State John Kerry, "what comes after the war on terror is the '19th century.'”

The Obama administration has approved BP’s first plan to drill for oil in the gulf since last year’s Deepwater Horizon disaster, which left 11 dead and damaged the gulf ecosystem and the economies of the states that border it. Representatives for the Gulf Restoration Network say the decision is “problematic,” considering the fact that comprehensive safety legislation has yet to be passed through Congress.

Colorado Fourth-District Republican US Rep Cory Gardner is filling his campaign coffers for 2012 as he did in 2010 by leaning heavily on oil-and-gas industry donors. He raked in $370,000 in the quarter that just ended. That's the most of any candidate for federal office from Colorado and topped his take in previous quarters by roughly $100,000. One of every ten dollars Gardner brought in last quarter came from oil and gas, and this quarter the percentage is higher, coming in at roughly 12 percent. That notable campaign finance record paired with the high-profile pro-drilling and environmental-regulation-rollback positions he has taken mark out the freshman congressman as an aspiring top-level advocate for oil and gas on the Hill.

A recent report by OpenSecrets shows that several high-profile lawmakers (including GOP Reps. Vern Buchanan and Connie Mack of Florida) dumped their stock in BP and Transocean following last year’s massive Gulf of Mexico oil spill. Both Republicans and Democrats gave up significant portions of their holdings in the companies, according to the analysis by the Center for Responsive Politics.

Opponents of ending tax breaks for big oil companies argue that closing tax loopholes will result in higher prices at the pump, but a report from the non-partisan Congressional Research Service finds that ending the tax breaks is unlikely to cause a rise in prices.

The Deepwater Horizon Joint Investigation Team (JIT), comprised of representatives from the Coast Guard and the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement, Friday released Volume I (PDF) of its exhaustively titled “Report of Investigation into the Circumstances Surrounding the Explosion, Fire, Sinking and Loss of Eleven Crew Members Aboard the Mobile Offshore Drilling Unit Deepwater Horizon in the Gulf of Mexico, April 20 – 22, 2010.”

In the absence of meaningful legislation to curb greenhouse gas emissions in Washington, the fight surrounding California’s ballot measure, Proposition 23, is rapidly becoming...

In the September issue of Esquire, Tom Junod has delivered a profile of the 11 men killed in the Transocean oil rig explosion and...