Good question..... two parts... Do nothing?... Yes.... Should D.O.E. have more "enforcement power"?... maybe...
http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/11/02/a-collaborative-effort-to-prevent-the-next-spill/?partner=rss&emc=rss A Collaborative Effort to Prevent the Next Spill By MATTHEW L. WALD Soon after the Deepwater Horizon explosion and oil spill, the two chairmen of the presidential commission appointed to look into the catastrophe and some other officials raised the idea of the offshore oil industry’s doing what the nuclear industry did after the Three Mile Island meltdown of 1979: create an industrywide organization that would conduct peer-to-peer audits and identify “best practices” that could be cloned from place to place to improve safety. Associated Press The Deepwater Horizon oil rig burning in the Gulf of Mexico on April 21.On Tuesday, the Interior Department floated a slightly different idea. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar proposed an Ocean Energy Safety Institute that would arrange research, development and training in areas like drilling safety, blowout containment and a broad oil spill response. The nuclear group, the Institute of Nuclear Power Operations, concerns itself with an industry that has not done much construction in the last few years, so it focuses on continuing operations; by contrast, the Deepwater Horizon was essentially an industrial construction site. And INPO, as it is known, is not the industry’s consortium for research. Its link to government is limited; it allows the Nuclear Regulatory Commission access to its audits of reactors, but it is by design a nongovernmental agency that is not subject to Freedom of Information Act rules. Mr. Salazar’s proposal would draw in the Energy Department and the Coast Guard as well as academic experts and scientists and would be housed at the Interior Department. But one of its goals echoes the role of INPO: it would master “full-system risk and reliability for the offshore environment.’’ Mr. Salazar asked for comments from the industry by the end of November. The American Petroleum Institute, the industry’s main trade association, said in a statement that it favored coordination in research and development of new technologies for safe operation and cleanup. “We look forward to continuing to work with the Interior Department to find ways forward to expeditiously develop our oil and natural gas resources, which would create jobs, generate revenues and increase our nation’s energy security,’’ it said. Cathy Landry, a spokeswoman for the institute, said that the idea of an oil version of INPO was still alive, but that Mr. Salazar’s proposal really did not fall into that category. What he is proposing is a research and development group, she said, and would not preclude an industry organization that focused on auditing drilling operations for safety. The two could be separate or form different wings of a new organization, she suggested. Bets are IMO that the Oil Industry would like to see the Energy Dept (DOE) ..... whither away..... On Nov 8, 11:05 am, THE ANNOINTED ONE <[email protected]> wrote: > The US Department of Energy has not fulfilled a single goal (or even > close) stated in its mission statement and has failed at everything it > has tried. What is the bet that it will survive the present storm that > is ascending on Washington after the mid-terms unscathed ??? > > It is a do nothing branch that siphons off 33 + Billion dollars a > year. They are asking for a 5% increase this year. -- Thanks for being part of "PoliticalForum" at Google Groups. For options & help see http://groups.google.com/group/PoliticalForum * Visit our other community at http://www.PoliticalForum.com/ * It's active and moderated. Register and vote in our polls. * Read the latest breaking news, and more.
