Whilst the media have been focussing on the untested nature of the 4 story dome or “cofferdam” that is going to be lowered over BP’s spill at the sea bed, its use of dispersant is also coming under scrutiny. Alarmingly, according to the dispersant manufacturer, no toxicity tests have been conducted on this product. The … Read More
impact on wildlife
“What the hell did we do to deserve this?”
“What the hell did we do to deserve this?” is the question, baby-faced BP CEO Tony Hayward apparently asked his stunned fellow BP executives as they saw billions wiped off the company’s share price due to the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. The reason for the shareholder panic is that much more oil is escaping … Read More
Groups Fight “Irresponsible Shell” in the Arctic
The Chukchi Sea stand-off between environmental and Alaska Native groups and Shell has taken another twist, with a new legal action to stop the oil company’s plans to drill in the region next summer. Yesterday’s challenge was filed in the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals a group of Native Americans and environmental organisations including the … Read More
21 years later oil still pollutes Prince William Sound
For those of you who have not seen the film the Age of Stupid, Pete Postlethwaite, puts in a great performance as a despairing archivist wondering how we allowed the world to be ravaged by climate change. You could imagine Pete putting in a similar performance as an archivist looking back at how the oil … Read More
“We’ve got an environmental disaster unfolding”
And so it goes on. We may be able to send people to the moon but we are not able to stop a simple leak on an oil rig. Over two months after Thailand’s PTTEP’s well sprung a leak in the Timor Sea, the oil continues to pour into the sea at a rate of … Read More
Drilling in the Arctic? Yes We Can…
The joke going round Europe is that the only reason that President Obama won the Nobel Peace prize is that he is not President Bush. It’s not who he is but who he is not, that matters. He might not be President Bush but Obama is continuing the mistakes of the Bush era. In fact … Read More
Expect Catastrophic Warming in Your Life-Time …
A 4 C rise and counting. By 2060. That is the message from the UK Met Office in a study prepared for the British Government. Unless there is a radical action on carbon emissions, a catastrophic four degree rise in centigrade (7.2 F) could happen in many people’s live-times. That is five decades before most … Read More
The New Arctic Oil Rush Begins
Anyone who regularly reads this blog – or any other oil-related one – will know that the oil majors are running out of places to find oil. That’s why countries with huge reserves such as Iraq and Libya are seen as so important. The vast majority of known reserves are locked up in the Middle … Read More
Obama Backs Bush on Bears
Obama may have won over the press at the weekend at the annual White House correspondents’ dinner, including poking fun at the Bush Administration, but he has angered his critics by keeping one of the Bush Administration’s policies, which he could have overturned. At the end of last week, Obama’s Interior Department announced it was … Read More
Shell to Continue Arctic Drilling Despite Legal Ruling
At the end of last week, environmental campaigners and Native Alaskans were celebrating a huge victory. A US Federal Appeals court ruled that the Bush administration did not properly study the environmental impact of expanding oil and gas drilling off the Alaska coast.