Companies like BP, ExxonMobil and Chevron are receiving billions in taxpayer subsidies, sitting on thousands of unused drilling leases and raking in enormous profits.
But Big Oil wants more – specifically, a green light for harmful drilling that could wreck the crucial habitat sea turtles, walrus, whales, sea otters and other wildlife need to survive.
Just one year after the tragic BP Deepwater Horizon oil disaster that killed 11 people and thousands of animals, Congressman Doc Hastings has introduced three – that’s right, three – separate bills (H. R. 1229, H.R. 1230 and H.R. 1231) aimed at giving the oil and gas companies exactly what they want.
The Hastings bills would…
- Force harmful new drilling in key wildlife habitat.H.R. 1231 would expose thousands miles miles of vital coastal habitat and communities to dirty and dangerous offshore oil production. It would put at risk the entire Atlantic Coast (a place that is vital for sea turtles, dolphins and other wildlife), the Southern California Coast (home to sea otters) and Alaska’s Bristol Bay (a key area for walrus and North Pacific right whales).
- Sidestep important safety and environmental considerations. H. R. 1229 would give federal officials just 60 days to consider new permits for drilling, affording experts far too little time to adequately evaluate the safety and environmental implications of drilling.
- Ignore the lessons learned from the Deepwater Horizon tragedy. H.R. 1230 reopens lease sales that were cancelled in the Gulf of Mexico and off the coast of Virginia following the disaster. The bill also deems pre-Deepwater Horizon environmental reviews – the product of a process found to be inadequate by both the National Oil Spill Commission and the Council on Environmental Quality – to be adequate and requires the administration to rely on these outdated, inadequate documents.
The Hastings plan might increase stock prices for Big Oil, but it does nothing to address the “systemic” problems in the oil industry identified by the bi-partisan National Oil Spill Commission. And it does nothing to help restore the Gulf of Mexico, or hold oil companies more accountable for the environmental and economic devastation caused by massive oil spills like the Deepwater Horizon.
Instead, the Hastings plan focuses on fast-tracking risky and dirty production, bypassing environmental reviews and expanding areas that will be exposed to the dangers of oil development.
The cost to wildlife could be considerable. The bills would increase seismic testing, an activity that is incredibly disruptive to whales and other marine wildlife. Increased drilling also risks another spill, which could have devastating consequences for sea turtles, whales, sea otters, walrus and other already-imperiled animals.
