Marathon Pundit: Guest post: BP? Government Caused Their Own Disaster in the Gulf

Below you will find my first guest posting, courtesy of Thomas Clements, co-owner of Oilfield CNC Machining LLC in Broussard, Louisiana.

BP? Government Caused Their Own Disaster in the Gulf

This week, President Obama's oil spill commission will meet in Washington D.C. to hear further testimony regarding the cause of BP’s catastrophe in the Gulf. I am traveling to the nation's capital as well to alert federal officials that while BP’s oil spill may be gone, the repercussions of the administration's moratorium and ongoing drilling permit freeze continue to plague my state, Louisiana, and the country as a whole.

Take, for example, my business: Oilfield CNC Machining LLC of Lafayette Parish. Thought the April 20th explosion put a damper on business as companies considered potential repercussions, the Interior's imposition of its 6 month deepwater drilling ban caused every order to be cancelled. With the recent lifting of the moratorium, I was hopeful that we could recover those losses. But those hopes have since been dashed by the so-called 'permitorium' that continues to effectively halt offshore operations. For a point of reference for the extent of Washington's stranglehold on the Gulf of economy, consider that I am now experiencing a 50% decrease in business from this same time last year.

While D.C. regulators continue to drag their heels on exploration of our coast, local official are coming together in New Orleans for the "Gulf Coast Credit and Challenges" conference to figure out how to move forward. Participants will discuss the disaster, and how to prevent or mitigate this from occurring again in the future. For those of us in the Gulf, the answer is pretty clear.

The problem which led to this summer's Gulf spill was isolated not systemic. The solution should be targeted accordingly.

BP's safety record is rife with disaster, each incident followed by claims it will start seriously addressing safety, and each time proceeded by failure to change. Since 2007, BP accounted for 97% of the egregious, willful safety violations in the energy industry, totaling over 800 violations. In 2005, safety oversights in Texas led to the deaths of 17, with 170 additional injuries. A year later, after promising change, this company was fined $20 million for allowing 267,000 gallons of oil to spill into Prudhoe Bay, Alaska from a corroded pipe. This rogue safety outlier is the exception, not the rule in the energy industry. In the Gulf alone, over 50,000 successful wells have been drilled since 1947 without incident.

The broad moratorium demonstrates D.C.'s disconnect with traditional energy. While the White House claims to desire energy independence, its regulators have effectively shut down 31% of our domestic production indefinitely. These policies hurt our region, and place unneeded additional economic pressure on families and businesses, while doing little to punish the true perpetrator in this case, BP. In fact, the foreign-owned oil firm just reported $1.79 billion in net income for the July-September period -- a significant jump that encouraged traders to pick up shares in the company, further increasing its value.

Legislators in Washington, focused on the oil spill in light of the BP commission hearing, should consider the true consequences of their actions. Massive overhauls and continued bans on access to offshore resources will disrupt our local and national economy -- eliminating thousands of the 150,000 jobs directly dependent on Gulf drilling and many more of the 9 million workers across the nation supported by our oil industry.

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