Re: [Biofuel] The Other Oil Giants? Just as Unready as BP

[Chris Burck]

there's something that seems to have gone completely under the radar
of the media (or they're willfully avoiding the question) in their
coverage of the gulf catastrofe.  they report from time to time that
bp has brought, or is bringing, this or that asset to the gulf to add
a certain capability in the response effort.  basically repeating the
Bloodsucking Parasite's press releases and little more.  anyway, from
where are these vessels being diverted?  canada, the north sea,
norway.  i'm gonna say it's safe to assume that they had these ships
and platforms stationed in those places because their governments
require more than empty claims and winks and nods, where disaster
response and preparednes are concerned

On 6/24/10, Keith Addison <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> http://www.prwatch.org/node/9171
>
> The Other Oil Giants? Just as Unready as BP
>
> Submitted by Ross Wolfarth on June 18, 2010
>
> The Gulf of Mexico response plans of four of the five major oil
> companies discuss protecting walruses. No walruses live in the Gulf.
>
> On June 15, the CEOs of ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips, Shell, Chevron
> and BP were grilled by the House Subcommittee on Energy and Natural
> Resources. Unsurprisingly, much of what they said was spin. They
> paraded industry investments in alternative energy and safety that
> make up a vanishingly small percentage of their balance sheets. BP's
> competitors claimed again and again that they would never have made
> the catastrophic mistakes that led to the collapse of the Deepwater
> Horizon. But the hearing's scariest moment came when Exxon CEO Rex
> Tillerson told the truth. Tillerson stated that when oil spills occur
> "there will be impacts." According to ExxonMobil, the cleanup effort
> launched by BP represents the best efforts of the oil companies. For
> the oil companies, this travesty is the cutting edge of safety and
> environmental protection.
>
> Same Plan, Different Covers
>
> The major oil companies have essentially identical regional response
> plans for a disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. These 500+ page plans
> have been approved by the Department of the Interior and outline how
> each company would try to stop a leak and would clean up the oil.
> According to Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), in the June 15 hearing the
> plans are ninety percent identical. All five plans were prepared by
> "The Response Group." All five refer to the same contractors for
> clean-up and the same sources of equipment. The covers even feature
> the same photographs of oil wells, although The Response Group did
> tint the covers a different color for each company.
>
> Protecting Walruses, But Not the Gulf
>
> There is nothing fundamentally wrong with oil companies planning a
> similar response to similar disasters. If Chevron knows how to stop
> environmental and economic disaster, by all means it should let Shell
> know. The problem is that all the 'cookie-cutter plans' for the Gulf
> feature laughable errors and have been proven ineffective by the
> Deepwater Horizon spill. Four of the five regional response plans
> discuss the protection of walruses, mammals that have not lived in
> the Gulf for three million years. Three of the plans refer readers to
> the phone number of an expert who died in 2005.
>
> Even worse, the plans claim that the companies have the capacity to
> deal with a "worst case scenario," a disaster dumping substantially
> more oil into the Gulf than the Deepwater Horizon spill. The
> residents of the Gulf Coast know all too well that BP's plan has
> failed utterly to protect their environment and their livelihoods
> from Horizon. It seems that the oil companies have very low standards
> for what constitutes adequate disaster response.
>
> What Are the Oil Giants Ready For?
>
> As ExxonMobil's Tillerson admitted, "we are not well-equipped" to
> deal with offshore disasters. One might question whether the oil
> companies are well-equipped for drilling in general if they cannot
> stop the failure of an exploratory well from spiraling into a
> national catastrophe.
>
> There is one task for which ExxonMobil is very well-equipped. Unlike
> their competitors, ExxonMobil's regional response plan includes
> forty-pages on media response. Exxon may not be prepared to deal with
> a disaster. They may not be able to drill for oil without endangering
> the health and safety of millions. But they are ready to spin.
>
>
> ___
> Biofuel mailing list
> Biofuel@sustainablelists.org
> http://sustainablelists.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainablelorgbiofuel
>
> Biofuel at Journey to Forever:
> http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html
>
> Search the combined Biofuel and Biofuels-biz list archives (70,000
> messages):
> http://www.mail-archive.com/biofuel@sustainablelists.org/
>

___
Biofuel mailing list
Biofuel@sustainablelists.org
http://sustainablelists.org/mailman/listinfo/sustainablelorgbiofuel

Biofuel at J

Re: [Biofuel] The Other Oil Giants? Just as Unready as BP

[Keith Addison]

Hi Chris

>there's something that seems to have gone completely under the radar
>of the media (or they're willfully avoiding the question) in their
>coverage of the gulf catastrofe.  they report from time to time that
>bp has brought, or is bringing, this or that asset to the gulf to add
>a certain capability in the response effort.  basically repeating the
>Bloodsucking Parasite's press releases and little more.  anyway, from
>where are these vessels being diverted?  canada, the north sea,
>norway.  i'm gonna say it's safe to assume that they had these ships
>and platforms stationed in those places because their governments
>require more than empty claims and winks and nods, where disaster
>response and preparednes are concerned

I'd guess you'd be right. Though if you tried actually to prove it 
rather than just safely assuming it you might find yourself facing 
the unfathomable murkiness of just about anything to do with Big Oil. 
It could also be reinforced by Big Oil's perception of greater risk 
(greater financial risk to them, that is), since they don't own 
Ottawa or Oslo in the same way they own Washington and Wall Street.

All best

Keith


>On 6/24/10, Keith Addison <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>>  http://www.prwatch.org/node/9171
>>
>>  The Other Oil Giants? Just as Unready as BP
>>
>>  Submitted by Ross Wolfarth on June 18, 2010
>>
>>  The Gulf of Mexico response plans of four of the five major oil
>>  companies discuss protecting walruses. No walruses live in the Gulf.
>>
>>  On June 15, the CEOs of ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips, Shell, Chevron
>>  and BP were grilled by the House Subcommittee on Energy and Natural
>>  Resources. Unsurprisingly, much of what they said was spin. They
>>  paraded industry investments in alternative energy and safety that
>>  make up a vanishingly small percentage of their balance sheets. BP's
>>  competitors claimed again and again that they would never have made
>>  the catastrophic mistakes that led to the collapse of the Deepwater
>>  Horizon. But the hearing's scariest moment came when Exxon CEO Rex
>>  Tillerson told the truth. Tillerson stated that when oil spills occur
>>  "there will be impacts." According to ExxonMobil, the cleanup effort
>>  launched by BP represents the best efforts of the oil companies. For
>>  the oil companies, this travesty is the cutting edge of safety and
>>  environmental protection.
>>
>>  Same Plan, Different Covers
>>
>>  The major oil companies have essentially identical regional response
>>  plans for a disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. These 500+ page plans
>>  have been approved by the Department of the Interior and outline how
>>  each company would try to stop a leak and would clean up the oil.
>>  According to Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), in the June 15 hearing the
>>  plans are ninety percent identical. All five plans were prepared by
>>  "The Response Group." All five refer to the same contractors for
>>  clean-up and the same sources of equipment. The covers even feature
>>  the same photographs of oil wells, although The Response Group did
>>  tint the covers a different color for each company.
>>
>>  Protecting Walruses, But Not the Gulf
>>
>>  There is nothing fundamentally wrong with oil companies planning a
>>  similar response to similar disasters. If Chevron knows how to stop
>>  environmental and economic disaster, by all means it should let Shell
>>  know. The problem is that all the 'cookie-cutter plans' for the Gulf
>>  feature laughable errors and have been proven ineffective by the
>>  Deepwater Horizon spill. Four of the five regional response plans
>>  discuss the protection of walruses, mammals that have not lived in
>>  the Gulf for three million years. Three of the plans refer readers to
>>  the phone number of an expert who died in 2005.
>>
>>  Even worse, the plans claim that the companies have the capacity to
>>  deal with a "worst case scenario," a disaster dumping substantially
>>  more oil into the Gulf than the Deepwater Horizon spill. The
>>  residents of the Gulf Coast know all too well that BP's plan has
>  > failed utterly to protect their environment and their livelihoods
>>  from Horizon. It seems that the oil companies have very low standards
>>  for what constitutes adequate disaster response.
>>
>>  What Are the Oil Giants Ready For?
>>
>>  As ExxonMobil's Tillerson admitted, "we are not well-equipped" to
>>  deal with offshore disasters. One might question whether the oil
>>  companies are well-equipped for drilling in general if they cannot
>>  stop the failure of an exploratory well from spiraling into a
>>  national catastrophe.
>>
>>  There is one task for which ExxonMobil is very well-equipped. Unlike
>>  their competitors, ExxonMobil's regional response plan includes
>>  forty-pages on media response. Exxon may not be prepared to deal with
>>  a disaster. They may not be able to drill for oil without endangering
>  > the health and safety of millions. But they are ready to spin.


__

Re: [Biofuel] The Other Oil Giants? Just as Unready as BP

[Fritz]

Keith Addison wrote:
> Hi Chris
>
>   
>> there's something that seems to have gone completely under the radar
>> of the media (or they're willfully avoiding the question) in their
>> coverage of the gulf catastrofe.  they report from time to time that
>> bp has brought, or is bringing, this or that asset to the gulf to add
>> a certain capability in the response effort.  basically repeating the
>> Bloodsucking Parasite's press releases and little more.  anyway, from
>> where are these vessels being diverted?  canada, the north sea,
>> norway.  i'm gonna say it's safe to assume that they had these ships
>> and platforms stationed in those places because their governments
>> require more than empty claims and winks and nods, where disaster
>> response and preparednes are concerned
>> 
>
> I'd guess you'd be right. Though if you tried actually to prove it 
> rather than just safely assuming it you might find yourself facing 
> the unfathomable murkiness of just about anything to do with Big Oil. 
> It could also be reinforced by Big Oil's perception of greater risk 
> (greater financial risk to them, that is), since they don't own 
> Ottawa or Oslo in the same way they own Washington and Wall Street.
>
> All best
>
> Keith
>
>
>   
>> On 6/24/10, Keith Addison <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>> 
>>>  http://www.prwatch.org/node/9171
>>>
>>>  The Other Oil Giants? Just as Unready as BP
>>>
>>>  Submitted by Ross Wolfarth on June 18, 2010
>>>
>>>  The Gulf of Mexico response plans of four of the five major oil
>>>  companies discuss protecting walruses. No walruses live in the Gulf.
>>>
>>>  On June 15, the CEOs of ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips, Shell, Chevron
>>>  and BP were grilled by the House Subcommittee on Energy and Natural
>>>  Resources. Unsurprisingly, much of what they said was spin. They
>>>  paraded industry investments in alternative energy and safety that
>>>  make up a vanishingly small percentage of their balance sheets. BP's
>>>  competitors claimed again and again that they would never have made
>>>  the catastrophic mistakes that led to the collapse of the Deepwater
>>>  Horizon. But the hearing's scariest moment came when Exxon CEO Rex
>>>  Tillerson told the truth. Tillerson stated that when oil spills occur
>>>  "there will be impacts." According to ExxonMobil, the cleanup effort
>>>  launched by BP represents the best efforts of the oil companies. For
>>>  the oil companies, this travesty is the cutting edge of safety and
>>>  environmental protection.
>>>
>>>  Same Plan, Different Covers
>>>
>>>  The major oil companies have essentially identical regional response
>>>  plans for a disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. These 500+ page plans
>>>  have been approved by the Department of the Interior and outline how
>>>  each company would try to stop a leak and would clean up the oil.
>>>  According to Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), in the June 15 hearing the
>>>  plans are ninety percent identical. All five plans were prepared by
>>>  "The Response Group." All five refer to the same contractors for
>>>  clean-up and the same sources of equipment. The covers even feature
>>>  the same photographs of oil wells, although The Response Group did
>>>  tint the covers a different color for each company.
>>>
>>>  Protecting Walruses, But Not the Gulf
>>>
>>>  There is nothing fundamentally wrong with oil companies planning a
>>>  similar response to similar disasters. If Chevron knows how to stop
>>>  environmental and economic disaster, by all means it should let Shell
>>>  know. The problem is that all the 'cookie-cutter plans' for the Gulf
>>>  feature laughable errors and have been proven ineffective by the
>>>  Deepwater Horizon spill. Four of the five regional response plans
>>>  discuss the protection of walruses, mammals that have not lived in
>>>  the Gulf for three million years. Three of the plans refer readers to
>>>  the phone number of an expert who died in 2005.
>>>
>>>  Even worse, the plans claim that the companies have the capacity to
>>>  deal with a "worst case scenario," a disaster dumping substantially
>>>  more oil into the Gulf than the Deepwater Horizon spill. The
>>>  residents of the Gulf Coast know all too well that BP's plan has
>>>   
>>  > failed utterly to protect their environment and their livelihoods
>> 
>>>  from Horizon. It seems that the oil companies have very low standards
>>>  for what constitutes adequate disaster response.
>>>
>>>  What Are the Oil Giants Ready For?
>>>
>>>  As ExxonMobil's Tillerson admitted, "we are not well-equipped" to
>>>  deal with offshore disasters. One might question whether the oil
>>>  companies are well-equipped for drilling in general if they cannot
>>>  stop the failure of an exploratory well from spiraling into a
>>>  national catastrophe.
>>>
>>>  There is one task for which ExxonMobil is very well-equipped. Unlike
>>>  their competitors, ExxonMobil's regional response plan includes
>>>  forty-pages on media response. Exxo

Re: [Biofuel] "Gasland" Movie Explosive for Drilling Industry

[Keith Addison]

A New Generation of Natural Gas Drilling Is Endangering Communities 
 From the Rockies to New York

Filmmaker Josh Fox talks about 'Gasland' and his quest to understand 
the risks posed by today's natural gas industry.

By Nora Eisenberg, The Nation

Posted on June 22, 2010

http://www.alternet.org/story/147298/

Theater and film director Josh Fox's documentary Gasland explores the 
new generation of natural gas drilling, which for a decade has been 
blasting its way east across the country, tapping shale formations 
from the Rockies to Pennsylvania, and is now expanding in New York. 
Fox is only 37, but he is a veteran explorer of complex themes from 
militarism to war to globalization and torture who skillfully blends 
artistry and social message. Gasland is more straightforward than 
Fox's earlier experimental mixes of theater, dance, music and film, 
but no less striking. Winner of the Special Jury Prize for 
Documentary at Sundance, where it premiered in January, Gasland has 
been causing a stir wherever it has gone since. 

In 2008, a gas company offered Fox $100,000 to lease his family's 
nineteen acres in Milanville, Pennsylvania, for the purpose of 
"hydraulic fracturing" to extract natural gas. He was baffled-what 
was hydraulic fracturing and what would leasing his land for fracking 
mean? To find out, he set out on a cross-country journey from his 
home in the pristine Upper Delaware River Basin to places where 
hydrofracking had already begun: Dimock, Pennsylvania; Pavillion, 
Wyoming; Weld County, Colorado; and Fort Worth, Texas.

"Fracking," (sometimes "fracing") as the combination of hydraulic 
fracturing and horizontal drilling is widely called, bears little 
resemblance to conventional gas drilling in shallow reserves used to 
extract natural gas during the twentieth century. As Gasland deftly 
explains, fracking, which is now the dominant technology in US gas 
production, is elaborate and risky. Fracking involves extracting 
billions of gallons of water from lakes and rivers (2-4 million of 
gallons per well) and pressure-drilling a mix of the water, sand and 
chemicals more than a mile down into the earth and then miles 
horizontally. The sand and chemicals break up the dense rock to 
release methane, the compound comprising natural gas, which is pumped 
back up along with the fracking liquid, now infused not only with the 
chemical additives but heavy metals and radioactive material.

The film's stunning footage shows the consequences of fracking on the 
communities where it takes place: the huge pits and pools of used 
toxic fracking fluid, left to spill on the ground and evaporate into 
the atmosphere; darkened and foul-smelling air and water; sick 
vegetation, animals and people; and dramatic gas explosions and 
fires, including tap water that bursts into flames.

Gasland tells a gripping tale of intrigue and deception. It all 
begins with the Energy Policy Act of 2005, developed behind closed 
doors by Dick Cheney and undisclosed energy industry leaders and 
lobbyists, which exempted fracking from federal regulation. 
Halliburton is a prime actor in the fracking drama. Due to what the 
New York Times has referred to as the "Halliburton loophole," it and 
other energy companies have used the new and untested technology to 
extract gas once thought inaccessible. The 2005 law allows energy 
companies to conceal as trade secrets the chemicals they use to help 
the drilling liquid to reach and fracture the shale but blowouts, 
whistle-blowers, and industry documents have revealed dangerous 
compounds including 2-butoxyethanol, formaldehyde, ethylene glycol, 
glycol ethers, hydrocholoric acid, and sodium hydroxide, benzene, and 
other known toxins and carcinogens.

Fracking may not yet be a household phrase, but after Gasland airs, 
viewers will know the basics of what fracking is and what it does. 
According to Josh Fox, we're facing nothing less than the mutation of 
America as we know it into a new state called Gasland.

In early June, I got Josh Fox to sit still for an hour, no easy feat, 
to talk about Gasland, the film, and Gasland, the state.

Nora Eisenberg: The film is done, the festivals have slowed down, but 
you're still running around. What are you doing?

Josh Fox: I'm touring with the film as much as I can, going from one 
affected area to another. It's been very amazing and also 
overwhelming at the same time. There are so many people who are so 
concerned about the way natural gas has completely taken over their 
lives, their towns. The outcry is remarkable.

NE: So you've had sold-out screenings in small towns and big cities, 
and now a national audience on HBO. Did you anticipate this response 
when you first set out to make the film?

JF: So many people were quick to respond to our requests to be 
interviewed about fracking that I could tell instantly that this was 
a national problem-and nobody had really talked enough about it.

NE: The film does not just feature ta

Re: [Biofuel] Scum of the earth

[Keith Addison]

BP Skirts Offshore Drilling Moratorium by Building an Island 3 Miles 
Off Alaska Coast
Posted By Byard Duncan On June 24, 2010 @ 7:50 am In Environment


'Reasonably high' chance BP files for bankruptcy
BY Derek Thompson
23 JUN 2010


Venezuela to Nationalize US-Owned Oil Rigs
Published on Thursday, June 24, 2010 by Al-Jazeera-English


Hands Across The Sand: In Opposition to Offshore Drilling, This 
Saturday Activists Nationwide Join Hands
Published on Thursday, June 24, 2010 by Audubon Magazine


--0--



Published on Thursday, June 24, 2010 by CommonDreams.org

Beyond Petroleum

by Robert C. Koehler

You couldn't call it a dialogue. It was more like a momentary rip in 
the global power continuum, a spill of outrage on the stage of a 
major oil conference in London.

On Tuesday, two Greenpeace activists interrupted a speech by British 
Petroleum chief of staff Steve Westwell - sandwiched him at his 
podium, trespassed on time and space that didn't belong to them, and 
spoke to an audience that hadn't come to hear them. They had about 20 
seconds, not much time to talk about the complexity of ecosystems or 
draw attention, say, to the plight of the Gulf of Mexico's Sargassum 
algae. They did the best they could.

One unfurled a banner that read "Go Beyond Petroleum." The other, as 
she was being ushered off the stage and out of the hotel, shouted, 
"We need to speed up progress and make a push to end the oil age."

That was it. Time's up. That's how protest is - shouted and 
emotional, sometimes illegal. Even when it's videotaped and the world 
gets to witness those 20 seconds of public theater, all we hear are 
slogans, all we see are disruption and scuffle: disorder, quickly 
dealt with. Money gets its hair mussed a little, then returns to its 
agenda. Nothing seems to change. The disorder implicit in that agenda 
returns to "let our children worry about it" status, and we remain on 
the track described by Ronald Wright in A Short History of Progress, 
his investigation into why civilizations collapse:

"The concentration of power at the top of large-scale societies gives 
the elite a vested interest in the status quo; they continue to 
prosper in darkening times long after the environment and general 
populace begin to suffer."

As though still on the podium with the BP exec, I claim a little more 
time to open up that Greenpeace slogan, to address its implications 
not in the abstract but in the presence of those who profit from our 
stagnation within the oil age, whatever that might mean. After all, 
it's their future too.

For it to matter whether or not we move "beyond petroleum," there has 
to be a spiritual, not just a technical, dimension to the concept. It 
implies, I think, a fundamental break with the domination impulse by 
which we have "tamed" nature over the millennia of recorded history 
and built our unstable civilizations, propped up by war and conquest. 
Moving beyond petroleum means moving beyond our uncritical acceptance 
of a fragmented world and fragmented sense of responsibility.

Indeed, it means moving beyond the gospel that competing fragments, 
each looking out for its own "self-interest" (a.k.a., capitalism), is 
the highest form of order we can hope for. Rep. Joe Barton of Texas, 
the highest-ranking Republican on the House energy committee, 
demonstrated the sham nature of this system last week, when he 
apologized to BP for the $20 billion escrow account President Obama 
ordered the company to establish, calling it a "shakedown."

Turns out, A) "Of the five Gulf Coast states, Mr. Barton's Texas is 
the only one whose beaches, fisheries and tourist haunts are not 
threatened by oil spewing from BP's ruined well," the New York Times 
reported; and B) ". . . the oil and gas industry have been Mr. 
Barton's biggest source of campaign money . . . contributing $1.4 
million since the 1990 election cycle," the Times added.

At the very least, capitalism in its unregulated, most virulent form 
- fragmentation capitalism, you might say - which was set loose in 
the Reagan era, has to be contained. No small task. U.S. District 
Judge Martin Feldman, a Reagan appointee (with stockholder interest 
in the drilling industry), recently overturned Obama's six-month 
moratorium on new deepwater drilling in the Gulf (which would affect 
operations at 33 of 3,600 sites), siding with the argument that one 
blown deepwater well is "no proof" the others constitute a threat - 
no matter that the consequences of another accident would be 
cataclysmic.

The decision is proof of the status-quo aversion to long-range 
thinking - or thin

Re: [Biofuel] The Other Oil Giants? Just as Unready as BP

[Keith Addison]

Hi Fritz

>Sorry Keith,
>i tend to disagree with you on this!
>The Oilsands prove the contrary!
>Fritz

Yes, there's certainly that. Same cashflow account as the offshore 
stuff, do you think?

All best

Keith


>Keith Addison wrote:
>>  Hi Chris
>>
>>  
>>>  there's something that seems to have gone completely under the radar
>>>  of the media (or they're willfully avoiding the question) in their
>>>  coverage of the gulf catastrofe.  they report from time to time that
>>>  bp has brought, or is bringing, this or that asset to the gulf to add
>>>  a certain capability in the response effort.  basically repeating the
>>>  Bloodsucking Parasite's press releases and little more.  anyway, from
>>>  where are these vessels being diverted?  canada, the north sea,
>>>  norway.  i'm gonna say it's safe to assume that they had these ships
>>>  and platforms stationed in those places because their governments
>>>  require more than empty claims and winks and nods, where disaster
>>>  response and preparednes are concerned
>>>
>>
>>  I'd guess you'd be right. Though if you tried actually to prove it
>>  rather than just safely assuming it you might find yourself facing
>>  the unfathomable murkiness of just about anything to do with Big Oil.
>>  It could also be reinforced by Big Oil's perception of greater risk
>>  (greater financial risk to them, that is), since they don't own
>>  Ottawa or Oslo in the same way they own Washington and Wall Street.
>>
>>  All best
>>
>>  Keith
>>
>>
>>  
>>>  On 6/24/10, Keith Addison <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>>>
   http://www.prwatch.org/node/9171

   The Other Oil Giants? Just as Unready as BP

   Submitted by Ross Wolfarth on June 18, 2010

   The Gulf of Mexico response plans of four of the five major oil
   companies discuss protecting walruses. No walruses live in the Gulf.

   On June 15, the CEOs of ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips, Shell, Chevron
   and BP were grilled by the House Subcommittee on Energy and Natural
   Resources. Unsurprisingly, much of what they said was spin. They
   paraded industry investments in alternative energy and safety that
   make up a vanishingly small percentage of their balance sheets. BP's
   competitors claimed again and again that they would never have made
   the catastrophic mistakes that led to the collapse of the Deepwater
   Horizon. But the hearing's scariest moment came when Exxon CEO Rex
   Tillerson told the truth. Tillerson stated that when oil spills occur
   "there will be impacts." According to ExxonMobil, the cleanup effort
   launched by BP represents the best efforts of the oil companies. For
   the oil companies, this travesty is the cutting edge of safety and
   environmental protection.

   Same Plan, Different Covers

   The major oil companies have essentially identical regional response
   plans for a disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. These 500+ page plans
   have been approved by the Department of the Interior and outline how
   each company would try to stop a leak and would clean up the oil.
   According to Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.), in the June 15 hearing the
   plans are ninety percent identical. All five plans were prepared by
   "The Response Group." All five refer to the same contractors for
   clean-up and the same sources of equipment. The covers even feature
   the same photographs of oil wells, although The Response Group did
   tint the covers a different color for each company.

   Protecting Walruses, But Not the Gulf

   There is nothing fundamentally wrong with oil companies planning a
   similar response to similar disasters. If Chevron knows how to stop
   environmental and economic disaster, by all means it should let Shell
   know. The problem is that all the 'cookie-cutter plans' for the Gulf
   feature laughable errors and have been proven ineffective by the
   Deepwater Horizon spill. Four of the five regional response plans
>  >>>  discuss the protection of walruses, mammals that have not lived in
   the Gulf for three million years. Three of the plans refer readers to
   the phone number of an expert who died in 2005.

   Even worse, the plans claim that the companies have the capacity to
   deal with a "worst case scenario," a disaster dumping substantially
   more oil into the Gulf than the Deepwater Horizon spill. The
   residents of the Gulf Coast know all too well that BP's plan has
  
>>>   > failed utterly to protect their environment and their livelihoods
>>>
   from Horizon. It seems that the oil companies have very low standards
   for what constitutes adequate disaster response.

   What Are the Oil Giants Ready For?

   As ExxonMobil's Tillerson admitted, "we are not well-equipped" to
   deal with offshore disasters. One might question whe