The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said it took the action “due to BP’s lack of business integrity,” and that the ban would remain in place until BP proves it can meet federal business standards. That’s good news.
Wilderness Society expert, J.P. Leous, educates us about the BP oil spill in the Gulf, new energy sources, global warming and the importance of political action on a grass roots level. Since 1935, The Wilderness Society has led the conservation movement in wilderness protection, writing and passing the landmark Wilderness Act and winning lasting protection for 109 million acres of Wilderness.
BRETON ISLAND, La. — As the oil spill from the Deepwater Horizon spreads across the Gulf of Mexico, environmentalists and government officials have been working frantically to protect shoreline habitat like this island in the Breton National Wildlife Refuge, eight miles off the coast of Louisiana.
Breton Island, with its hundreds of nesting birds, has been protected by orange booms, as have many other areas of delicate estuaries and wetlands.
John M. Broder, Campbell Robertson and Clifford Krauss, The New York Times
May 5, 2010
Excerpt:
WASHINGTON — In a closed-door briefing for members of Congress, a senior BP executive conceded Tuesday that the ruptured oil well in the Gulf of Mexico could conceivably spill as much as 60,000 barrels a day of oil, more than 10 times the estimate of the current flow.
Even after the Gulf oil spill and as the evidence that BP sidestepped safety precautions mounts, it’s alarming that decision makers continue to give the oil and gas industry unbridled liberties to drill without precaution in the public’s lands and waters.
