June 15, 2010

• Ahhh BP… Be more careful with your coffee!

  Words cannot describe how upsetting and rage inducing I find the news related to the BP Oil Spill we’ve been hearing over the last couple of months.

  Fortunately there are occasional bright spots that come out of this crisis that can cheer me up. For example, the brilliance of this comedy sketch is simply beyond words:

  I need a word that starts with “P” that stands for incompetence, reckless greed, and monstrous evil.  Because whatever that word is BP is definitely Beyond that.

  While of course I think a comedy sketch should be more than sufficient to prove that point. I have other evidence too:

  For some reason this quote was missing from the videos above (might be unconfirmed):

  “BP representative Hugh Depland said that while the company wasn’t sure exactly when more workers would be hired, the $239 billion company was spending “a lot of money, time and effort to bring this event to a close.” And to those worried restaurateurs facing rising prices for shrimp and oysters? In the words of fellow BP rep Randy Prescott: “Louisiana isn’t the only place that has shrimp.”” source

  Don’t forget also that BP was both deceptive and dishonest when setting up this drill site.

  “In an e-mail on April 16, a BP official involved in the decision explained: “It will take 10 hours to install them. I do not like this.” Later that day, another official recognized the risks of proceeding with insufficient centralizers but commented: “Who cares, it’s done, end of story, will probably be fine.”“  source

  “BP’s 582-page emergency-response never anticipated an oil spill as large as the one now gushing on the floor of the Gulf of Mexico; a closer reading shows the document was not much than a boilerplate, cut-and-paste job used by BP from region to region; in a section titled “Sensitive Biological & Human-Use Resources,” the emergency plan lists “seals, sea otters and walruses” as animals that could be impacted by a Gulf of Mexico spill — even though no such animals live in the Gulf; the plan was approved in July by the federal Minerals Management Service (MMS), a toothless agency accused by lawmakers of being in the pocket of the oil industry” source

  “In its Deepwater Horizon plan, the British oil giant stated: “BP Exploration and Production Inc. has the capability to respond, to the maximum extent practicable, to a worst case discharge, or a substantial threat of such a discharge, resulting from the activities proposed in our Exploration Plan.”

  In the spill scenarios detailed in the documents, fish, marine mammals and birds escape serious harm; beaches remain pristine; water quality is only a temporary problem. And those are the projections for a leak about 10 times worse than what has been calculated for the ongoing disaster.

  There are other wildly false assumptions in the documents. BP’s proposed method to calculate spill volume judging by the darkness of the oil sheen is way off. The internationally accepted formula would produce estimates 100 times higher.

  The Gulf’s loop current, which is projected to help eventually send oil hundreds of miles around Florida’s southern tip and up the Atlantic coast, isn’t mentioned in either plan.

  The website listed for Marine Spill Response Corp. — one of two firms that BP relies on for equipment to clean a spill — links to a defunct Japanese-language page.

  In early May, at least 80 Louisiana state prisoners were trained to clean birds by listening to a presentation and watching a video. It was a work force never envisioned in the plans, which contain no detailed references to how birds would be cleansed of oil.”

  “_ Beaches where oil washed up within weeks of a spill were supposed to be safe from contamination because BP promised it could marshal more than enough boats to scoop up all the oil before any deepwater spill could reach shore — a claim that in retrospect seems absurd.

  “The vessels in question maintain the necessary spill containment and recovery equipment to respond effectively,” one of the documents says.

  BP asserts that the combined response could skim, suck up or otherwise remove 20 million gallons of oil each day from the water. But that is about how much has leaked in the past six weeks — and the slick now covers about 3,300 square miles, according to Hans Graber, director of the University of Miami’s satellite sensing facility. Only a small fraction of the spill has been successfully skimmed.“

  “The plan uses computer modeling to project a 21 percent chance of oil reaching the Louisiana coast within a month of a spill. In reality, an oily sheen reached the Mississippi River delta just nine days after the April 20 explosion.“

  “_ BP’s site plan regarding birds, sea turtles or endangered marine mammals (“no adverse impacts“) also have proved far too optimistic.”

  “There weren’t supposed to be any coastline problems because the site was far offshore. “Due to the distance to shore (48 miles) and the response capabilities that would be implemented, no significant adverse impacts are expected,” the site plan says.“” source

  In case you needed another reminder of how bad things are. Here’s a glimpse of this oil from under the ocean:
  

  And don’t forget all those birds you see covered in oil on the news every day have almost no chance of survival.

  But while we’re mocking BP for sheer stupidity let’s not forget there’s been plenty of THAT to go around:
  

  There’s also this from Republican Alaska representative Don Young:

  “This is not an environmental disaster, and I will say that again and again because it is a national phenomena. Oil has seeped into this ocean for centuries, will continue to do it. During World War II there was over 10 million barrels of oil spilt from ships, and no natural catastrophe. … We will lose some birds, we will lose some fixed sealife, but overall it will recover.” source

  But if you strangely think Democrats and the Obama administration are coming across as angels, think again.  I highly recommend reading this lengthy article:

  The Spill, The Scandal and the President

  Or you can watch these videos that include an interview with the author of that article here.

  Both political parties share significant responsibility for the anti-regulatory culture of Washington that was indirectly responsible for this oil spill.

  But let’s get back to BP.

  Their cover up and attempts to avoid responsibility are even more sickening than their pre-spill mistakes. From setting up a bogus call center to blocking reporters from talking to clean up crews to buying up all the Google Adwords to control the story.

  Then there’s of course the dithering over whether to pay shareholder dividends.  Meanwhile BP is super ambiguous about whether they tend to try and use the $75 million liability cap currently existing in law to avoid paying damages. And instead of voluntarily setting up a large escrow fund to pay liability payments it looks like BP will wait for the Obama administration to legally compel them to do so.

  I don’t even have to tell you about all the shenanigans with regards to misreporting and covering up the amount of oil that spilled.

  Let’s not forget that this is all during a time when BP has been doing quite well profit-wise:

  “Europe’s second-largest oil company, said Tuesday that first-quarter profit more than doubled from a year earlier to $6.1 billion due to higher crude prices and lower production costs and taxes.”  source

  “02 February 2010

  BP today reported a sharp year-on-year increase in fourth quarter profits as it announced that its oil and gas production increased by more than four per cent in 2009 and the company continued its industry-leading 17-year run of increasing reserves.
  …
  The company announced that underlying replacement cost profit for the fourth quarter of 2009, before non-operating items and fair value accounting effects, was $4.4 billion – an increase of 70 per cent on the same period in 2008.
  …
  Group chief executive Tony Hayward said 2009 had been a “very good” year for BP, exceeding many of the expectations he had set out for the company at the beginning of the year, despite the weak external environment. ” source

  “On Monday, BP said it spent $350 million in the first 20 days of the spill response, about $17.5 million a day. It has paid 295 of the 4,700 claims received, for a total of $3.5 million. By contrast, in the first quarter of the year, the London-based oil giant’s profits averaged $93 million a day.” source

  Nor is this kind of immorality and incompetence new for BP. Indeed it’s a marked element of their entire modern history.

  From their role (with our help) in the overthrow of the Iranian Democracy:

  To their role in the brutal conditions and exploitation of Iranians that encouraged the Iranian revolution that created said democracy in the first place:

  “The British government owned a majority share of the company and what little revenue was handed to the Iranian government was paid back to British and other European creditors. In 1947, for example, AIOC reported after-tax profits of £40 million, while giving Iran a mere £7 million.

  The company subjected Iranian workers to deplorable working conditions, paying Iranians considerably less than foreigners. The following passage is how the director of Iran’s Petroleum Institute described those conditions:

  Wages were 50 cents a day. There was no vacation pay, no sick leave, no disability compensation. The workers lived in a shanty town called Kaghazabad, or Paper city, without running water or electricity … In winter the earth flooded and became a flat, perspiring lake. The mud in town was knee-deep, and … when the rains subsided, clouds of nipping, small-winged flies rose from the stagnant water to fill the nostrils. … Summer was worse. … The heat was torrid … sticky and unrelenting—while the wind and sandstorms shipped off the desert hot as a blower. The dwellings of Kaghazabad, cobbled from rusted oil drums hammered flat, turned into sweltering ovens. … In every crevice hung the foul, sulfurous stench of burning oil … in Kaghazad there was nothing—not a tea shop, not a bath, not a single tree. The tiled reflecting pool and shaded central square that were part of every Iranian town … were missing here. The unpaved alleyways were emporiums for rats.”  source

  To the 2005 Texas City Refinery explosion:

  “On March 23, 2005, a fire and explosion occurred at BP‘s Texas City Refinery in Texas City, Texas, killing 15 workers and injuring more than 170 others. BP was charged with violating federal environment crime laws and has been subject to law suits from the victim’s families. Later an $87 million fine was imposed by the US Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which claimed that BP had failed to implement safety improvements following the disaster.”

  To the Alaskan Prudhoe Bay Oil Spill that was caused by corroded pipelines:

  “Alaska’s unified command ratified the volume of crude oil spilled as 212,252 US gallons (5,053.6 bbl) in March 2008.  …  In November 2007, BP Exploration, Alaska (BPXA) pled guilty to negligent discharge of oil, a misdemeanor under the federal Clean Water Act and was fined US$20 million.

  …

  Red flags and warning signs had been raised about corrosion on several occasions both from within and outside the organization but had been ignored.  … A company report in year 2005 said BP based its corrosion-fighting on a limited budget instead of needs.

  Employees had raised their concerns before the actual incident, which were ignored by BP management. In an e-mail to a company lawyer in June 2004, Mr. Kovac, an official of the United Steelworkers union representing workers at the BP facility, forwarded a collection of his earlier complaints to management. … Initially BP denied that they took money-saving measures maintaining the pipeline. Robert Malone, the chairman of BP America, cited a report commissioned by BP which concluded that “budget increases alone would not have prevented the leak”. He later admitted that there “was a concerted effort to manage the costs in response to the continuing decline in production at Prudhoe Bay”. One of the reasons for the pipeline failure was an insufficient level of corrosion inhibitor, a liquid which resists corrosion of pipeline by the corroding liquid, which is water. John Dingell read from an internal BP email that said budgetary constraints would force the end of a programme to inject corrosion inhibitor directly into the pipeline system. The process of injecting corrosion inhibitor directly into a pipeline, though costly, is much more effective than injecting in a process plant.

  …
  

  The leak detection system measures the volumes of fluid entering each pipeline segment and the volumes of fluid leaving each segment. The system triggers an alarm if the volume measurements don’t match up. The leak detection alarm sounded four times during the week before the spill was discovered, but BP interpreted the leak detection alarms as false alarms. BP is now investigating the potential for developing a more sensitive leak detection system.“

  To terrifying reports of negligence in safety at BP’s Atlantis Platform:

  “Kenneth Abbott, a project control supervisor BP contracted to work on the Atlantis, and the environmental group Food & Water Watch filed suit against the federal government on May 17 seeking a temporary injunction to force the Minerals Management Service (MMS) to shut down the platform. Abbott claims that his contract was terminated shortly after he alerted management to the rig’s lack of crucial engineering documents in late 2008.

  According to Abbott, the BP Atlantis lacks more than 6,000 documents that are key to operating the rig safely. Abbott has said that the vast majority of the project’s subsea piping and instrument diagrams were not approved by engineers, and the safety systems are out of date. In March 2009, Abbott took his concerns about the rig to MMS, the Department of Interior office responsible for regulating offshore drilling. He says the agency requested some of these documents from BP, but failed to seek specific diagrams of key components necessary for ensuring the rig’s secure operation.

  An internal BP email that came out in the course of Abbott’s dispute refers to the potential for “catastrophic operator errors” on the rig due to these lapses. The suit argues that without these documents, the rig operators “are flying blind, and have no way to assure the safety of offshore drilling operations.” Food & Water Watch began pushing for lawmakers to intervene on the rig back in August 2009.” source
  

  To the generally horrible safety record of BP in general:

  “A Washington-based research group says two BP refineries in the U.S. account for 97 percent of “egregious willful” violations given by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration.

  The study by the Center for Public Integrity says the violations were found in the last three years in BP’s Texas City refinery and another plant in Toledo, Ohio. In 2005, 15 people were killed in an explosion at the Texas City refinery.

  Deputy Assistant Secretary of Labor for OSHA Jordan Barab says BP has a “systemic safety problem.” He told The Associated Press BP has not adequately addressed the issues, despite being fined more than $87 million.

  Assistant Secretary of Labor for OSHA David Michaels says similar problems are pervasive throughout the U.S. petroleum industry.”  source
  

  Meanwhile, BP pretends to be “Beyond Petroleum” and the “Green” oil company. Only that’s nothing but a blatant lie:

  “Greenpeace UK calculated information from company documents and found that the company’s investments do not match their public relations statements. BP invested 93 percent of investments into oil and gas in comparison to 2.79 percent on biofuel and 1.39 percent on solar initiatives. The ratio speaks for itself. It demonstrates (in actual numbers), the misleading nature of BP’s marketing claims of dedication toward alternative energy.
  …

  For example, in 2009 BP further affirmed that it was never truly committed to alternative energy when that division of the company in London was shut down.  Vivienne Cox, the director of solar and wind power for the company resigned at the same time. Shortly before the entire division was cut, BP’s solar projects in both Spain and the United States were ended, cutting hundreds of jobs.

  The same time last year BBC reported that BP had decided to shift its priorities from being “green” to being “responsible,” backing away from their environmentally friendly commitment.  “  source

  But AT LEAST we have BP’s “heartfelt” apology:

  So I guess everything’s just fine then! Right?

  It’s scary sometimes how deep arrogance and incompetence can run within the centers of power in this world.

  I recall seeing an article the other day that said that boycotting BP was “foolish”. Similarly I heard a radio commentator argue that investors were being “silly” by running away from BP stocks. This is absurd. BP shares have fallen over 40% for the same reason consumers are choosing to do everything in their power to shop elsewhere. Namely, BP has shown in nearly every way imaginable that they are one of the most corrupt conniving corporations on the face of the planet and that they haven’t the faintest clue what they are doing. They simply appear to have no interest whatsoever in being a responsible global entity. Nobody trusts BP as far as they can throw them.

  For reasonable people the benefit of the doubt only goes so far. There is a point where people do something so wrong that they should no longer be given any slack. There is a point where all that matters is that they be held accountable and be made to pay for the harm they’ve caused.  This is important not just for them, to ensure that they no longer make similar mistakes, but also for everyone else too. It’s to create an example that convinces people that they cannot act with reckless impunity. So that they know that they have to take into account the possible unintended consequences of their actions when planning for the future.

  No one should shed a single tear if BP goes out of business or is taken over.  The simple fact is we’d be much better off without them.

  • 6:00 pm
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