http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5h-3O699qQ-Lz_D4XuXiI_JWy3VZQD9FVGSK80

 1 hour ago May 28, 2010

 Highlights of President Barack Obama’s new orders on offshore oil drilling safety. Obama and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar discussed the measures Thursday and Salazar’s office released a 44-page report that night.
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SAFER DRILLING?

Obama ordered a number of changes designed to ensure offshore drilling is safer going forward, based on a 30-day review by Salazar, including:

_Extending a moratorium on new deep water drilling leases for six months, until the presidential commission on the spill completes its work.

_Suspending Shell Oil’s plans to begin exploratory drilling this summer on Arctic leases as far as 140 miles off the Alaska coast. Now those wells will not be considered until 2011.

_Canceling pending lease sales off the coast of Virginia and in the western Gulf of Mexico.

_Suspending action on 33 deep water exploratory wells currently being drilled in the Gulf.

_Salazar announced additional safety measures, including requiring more thorough inspections of the “blowout preventers” designed to prevent oil spills. The blowout preventer on BP’s Deepwater Horizon rig failed.
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Online:
Interior Department report:
http://www.doi.gov/deepwaterhorizon/loader.cfm?csModulesecurity/getfile&PageID33598

special thanks to Richard Charter

http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/senate-races/100361-bp-oil-leak-spills-into-florida-senate-race

By Sean J. Miller – 05/27/10 06:55 PM ET

The deep-water oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico may emerge as a controversial pocketbook issue in the Florida Senate race.
Floridians are watching nervously as the oil slick in the Gulf drifts toward the state’s pristine beaches and rich fishing waters. The spill has made “Floridians more aware than ever how dependent we are on coastal industries,” said Susan MacManus, a professor at the University of South Florida.

Florida Gov. Charlie Crist wants to call state lawmakers into a special session in order to pass a constitutional amendment permanently banning drilling off Florida’s coast – a position supported by two of his Senate rivals but not Republican candidate Marco Rubio.

“He’s holding discussions with our legislative leadership to propose a constitutional ban on offshore drilling,” said Sterling Ivey, a spokesman for the governor’s office. “He would like to have the voters of Florida decide whether they want drilling off the coasts of Florida.”

Rubio said government’s focus should be on stopping the leak in the Gulf, not on passing a ban.

“Calling for an emergency special session to constitutionally ban something that is already prohibited by state law is nothing more than an election-year stunt,” he said in a statement.

Meanwhile, Rep. Kendrick Meek (D-Fla.) signed on to a letter from Florida’s congressional Democrats pushing Crist to call a special session.

“For Florida, it may yet mean full or partial destruction of the world’s third largest coral reef in the Florida Keys and a devastating hit to Florida’s beaches and tourism-driven economy,” the lawmakers wrote. “Governor, you have the authority to call the Legislature back to Tallahassee. We urge you to do so.”

A spokesman for real estate mogul Jeff Greene, who’s challenging Meek for the Democratic Senate nod, said he “100 percent supports calling a special session to ban” offshore drilling.

Florida already has a ban on offshore drilling in place, but observers say anything less than a state constitutional amendment could one day be overturned by state lawmakers.
The proposed amendment can move through the Legislature with a majority. It would then be placed on the state’s November ballot, where it would require a 60 percent vote to pass.

Ivey said the Republican leadership in the state Senate has expressed willingness to return to Tallahassee for a special session but those on the House side are reluctant. The GOP controls both chambers.

Ivey said Crist is working to convince the state House leadership to support the constitutional ban and return for a special session to pass it.

“The leadership in the Florida House is not interested in coming back to Tallahassee to support the issue,” Ivey said. The governor could summon them back, but Ivey said he’s reluctant to do that without the guarantee they’d work to pass the ban. “If they’re not going to pass the amendment, it may not be best to bring them back not to do any work,” Ivey said.

It could also be a political liability for Crist, who already has alienated Republicans by dropping out of the GOP Senate primary and launching an Independent bid.

Sources told The Hill that state House lawmakers’ patience with Crist is running short. They were already frustrated by Crist’s veto of an education bill last month and would be enraged by a summons to the capitol. Part of their frustration is that under Florida statute, lawmakers seeking state-level office can’t raise campaign money while the Legislature is in session. But that provision doesn’t apply to candidates for federal office, so Crist could still raise money while the lawmakers worked through what’s expected to be a special session that could last between four days and two weeks.

If the ban amendment does end up on the ballot, it could become a central issue of the campaign, forcing the candidates to stake out firm positions on the question. Moreover, if the oil reaches Florida’s beaches, “it would be one more huge pocketbook issue,” said MacManus.

Already, she added, “people are canceling hotel reservations, fishermen are freaking out.”
State tourism officials told The Associated Press that Panhandle-area businesses – those closest to the spill – have suffered a roughly 30 percent drop and that hotels in the Florida Keys have started to see a decrease in new bookings.

But there are also some risks with pushing for a permanent ban – the public’s mood could be different by November.
“Suppose gas prices by then are really, really high,” MacManus said. That would make a drilling ban unpopular. “There’s that uncertainty,” she noted.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/27/AR2010052704153.html?nav=hcmoduletmv
By Eugene Robinson
Friday, May 28, 2010

In June 1969, the stretch of the Cuyahoga River that runs through Cleveland was so polluted that it caught fire. Time magazine described the Cuyahoga this way: “Chocolate-brown, oily, bubbling with subsurface gases, it oozes rather than flows.”
The spectacle of a river in flames helped galvanize the environmental movement, and the following year, with Richard Nixon as president, the Environmental Protection Agency was established. In 1972, Congress passed the landmark Clean Water Act. Today, the Cuyahoga is clean enough to support more than 40 species of fish.

We still don’t know the full extent of the environmental disaster unfolding in the Gulf of Mexico — the impact on avian and aquatic life, on fisheries, on tourism, on the delicate ecology of coastal marshes and barrier islands. We do know, though, that it is the worst oil spill in our nation’s history, far surpassing the Exxon Valdez incident. And maybe the shocking images from the gulf of dead fish, oiled pelicans and shores lapped by viscous “brown mousse” will refocus attention on the need to preserve the environment, not just exploit it.

An oil-soaked bird struggles against the side of a ship near the oil-spill site. (Gerald Herbert/associated Press)

“Drill, baby, drill” isn’t just the bizarrely inappropriate chant that we remember from the Republican National Convention two years ago. It’s a pretty good indication of where the national ethos has drifted. Environmental regulation is seen as a bureaucratic imposition — not as an insurance policy against potential catastrophe, and certainly not as a moral imperative.
Yes, many Americans feel good about going through the motions of environmentalism. We’ve made a religion of recycling, which is an important change. We turn off the lights when we leave the room — and we’re even beginning to use fluorescent bulbs. Some of us, though not enough, understand the long-term threat posed by climate change; a subset of those who see the danger are even willing to make lifestyle changes to try to avert a worst-case outcome.

But where the rubber hits the road — in public policy — we’ve reverted to our pre-enlightenment ways. When there’s a perceived conflict between environmental stewardship and economic growth, the bottom line wins.

Barack Obama is, in many admirable ways, our most progressive president in decades. But as an environmentalist, let’s face it, he’s no Richard Nixon. Before the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded — allowing, by some estimates, as many as a million gallons of crude oil to gush into the Gulf of Mexico each day for more than a month — Obama had announced plans to permit new offshore drilling. “I don’t agree with the notion that we shouldn’t do anything,” Obama said at the time. “It turns out, by the way, that oil rigs today generally don’t cause spills. They are technologically very advanced.”

Obama has wisely backed away from that decision. The technology involved in deep-sea oil drilling turned out to be far more advanced than the technology needed to halt a spill if something goes wrong — essentially, like engineering a car to double its top speed without thinking to upgrade the brakes. This oversight apparently wasn’t noticed by anyone who had the power to correct it.
Calls for Obama to somehow “take over” the emergency response ring hollow.
Take it over with what? Hands-on intervention has never been government’s role in this kind of situation. BP and the other oil companies had the undersea robots and the deep-water experience. Other private companies owned and operated the skimmers that remove the oil from the surface. There is no huge government reserve of the booms that are needed to protect Louisiana’s beaches and marshlands; those are made by private firms and are being deployed by unemployed fishermen.
Obama has rethought his enthusiasm for offshore drilling. Now he, and the rest of us, should rethink the larger issue — the trade-off between economic development and environmental protection. In the long run, our natural resources are all we’ve got. Defending them must be a higher priority than our recent presidents, including Obama, have made it.

Energy policy is one of Obama’s priorities. He talks about “clean coal,” which I believe to be an oxymoron, and favors technologies — such as carbon capture and sequestration — that are new and untested. The environmental risks must be a central and paramount concern, not a mere afterthought. Let’s preclude the next Deepwater Horizon right now.

 eugenerobinson@washpost.com

special thanks to Richard Charter

<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/05/27/gulf-oil-spill-new-plumes_n_591994.html>
MATTHEW BROWN AND JASON DEAREN 05/27/10 04:42 PM |

NEW ORLEANS – Marine scientists have discovered a massive new plume of what they believe to be oil deep beneath the Gulf of Mexico, stretching 22 miles (35 kilometers) from the leaking wellhead northeast toward Mobile Bay, Alabama.

The discovery by researchers on the University of South Florida College of Marine Science’s Weatherbird II vessel is the second significant undersea plume recorded since the Deepwater Horizon exploded on April 20.

The thick plume was detected just beneath the surface down to about 3,300 feet (1,000 meters), and is more than 6 miles (9.6 kilometers) wide, said David Hollander, associate professor of chemical oceanography at the school.

Hollander said the team detected the thickest amount of hydrocarbons, likely from the oil spewing from the blown out well, at about 1,300 feet (nearly 400 meters) in the same spot on two separate days this week.

The discovery was important, he said, because it confirmed that the substance found in the water was not naturally occurring and that the plume was at its highest concentration in deeper waters. The researchers will use further testing to determine whether the hydrocarbons they found are the result of dispersants or the emulsification of oil as it traveled away from the well.

The first such plume detected by scientists stretched from the well southwest toward the open sea, but this new undersea oil cloud is headed miles inland into shallower waters where many fish and other species reproduce.

The researchers say they are worried these undersea plumes may be the result of the unprecedented use of chemical dispersants to break up the oil a mile undersea at the site of the leak.

Hollander said the oil they detected has dissolved into the water, and is no longer visible, leading to fears from researchers that the toxicity from the oil and dispersants could pose a big danger to fish larvae and creatures that filter the waters for food.

“There are two elements to it,” Hollander said. “The plume reaching waters on the continental shelf could have a toxic effect on fish larvae, and we also may see a long term response as it cascades up the food web.”

Dispersants contain surfactants, which are similar to dishwashing soap.

A Louisiana State University researcher who has studied their effects on marine life said that by breaking oil into small particles, surfactants make it easier for fish and other animals to soak up the oil’s toxic chemicals. That can impair the animals’ immune systems and cause reproductive problems.

“The oil’s not at the surface, so it doesn’t look so bad, but you have a situation where it’s more available to fish,” said Kevin Kleinow, a professor in LSU’s school of veterinary medicine.

Special thanks to Richard Charter

http://www.tampabay.com/news/environment/wildlife/biologists-worry-about-oil-spills-effects-on-nesting-sea-turtles/1097536

May 25, 2010
By Sara Gregory, Times Staff Writer
With the oil spill casting a shadow of danger, turtles begin making nests.
Wildlife officials are cautiously waiting to see what impact the Deepwater Horizon oil spill will have on sea turtles as their nesting season gets under way.
Biologists worry about oil spill’s effects on nesting sea turtles
By Sara Gregory, Times Staff Writer
In Print: Wednesday, May 26, 2010

Mike Anderson of the Clearwater Marine Aquarium measures the first loggerhead turtle nest of the year, at Sunset Beach in Treasure Island, on Sunday. A beachgoer saw a turtle digging and alerted authorities. The nest will be monitored until the hatchlings emerge.
 
[JIM DAMASKE | Times]

The number of loggerhead turtle nests along Pinellas beaches has grown moderately the past two years, recovering from an all-time low in 2007. Officials were hoping the growth would have continued or stayed the same, though what will happen now is anyone’s guess.
“Probably strange things,” said David Godfrey, executive director of the Caribbean Conservation Corporation, an organization dedicated to advocating on behalf of sea turtles. “It’s really impossible to guess what this spill may do to the nesting season.”
The oil spill could affect turtles in a number of ways.
Oil in the gulf could leave adult turtles too ill to mate or make it to the beach to lay their eggs. If the oil reaches the shore, it could contaminate nests, cutting off oxygen to the eggs buried in the sand.
Hatchlings that make it back to the water could face even more challenges. They spend the first years of their life swimming in the loop current, which could become contaminated with oil. If that happens, oil could burn their skin and they could mistake tar balls for food.
“You can imagine this little mouth with this marble-sized tar ball in its mouth,” Godfrey said. “It’s not coming out.”
Pinellas County’s first loggerhead turtle nest of the season was discovered Sunday morning on Sunset Beach Treasure Island. That’s on track with when the first nests are usually found, said Mike Anderson, Clearwater Marine Aquarium’s supervisor of sea turtle nesting.
Nesting season began May 1 and continues until Oct. 31, though most of the golf ball-sized eggs will have been laid by the end of September, Anderson said.
Throughout that time, Anderson and his staff will patrol the beaches, looking for the telltale signs of turtle nesting: drag marks in the sand from flippers, a mound of sand near where the eggs are buried and more drag marks as the female turtles make their way back to the water.
Both Godfrey and Anderson stress that the spill’s full effects might not be known for decades, when the hatchlings born this season reach maturity.
“This spill keeps me up at night,” Godfrey said.
There were signs before the spill that the loggerhead population was struggling.
“We’ve really had an unusual last 10 years,” said Anne Meylan, a research administrator with the Fish and Wildlife Research Institute. About 55,000 nests were laid statewide each year in the late 1990s, a number that dropped about 43 percent by 2006.
Unprecedented cold weather in January left thousands of turtles in “cold stuns,” unable to move.
And in March, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the National Marine Fishery Service declared its intent to change the status of loggerhead turtles from “threatened” to “endangered.”
Florida’s other two turtle species, the leatherback and green turtles, already are listed as endangered. If the loggerhead turtle joins their ranks, it could mean extra efforts to identify and preserve crucial loggerhead turtle habitats.
For now, there’s only wait-and-see, Meylan said.
“Everybody’s just heartsick about it,” she said. “Turtles are dead center in this particular mess.”
Sara Gregory can be reached at (727) 893-8785 or sgregory@sptimes.com.
By the numbers
Loggerhead nests found in Pinellas by Clearwater Marine Aquarium
2005 105
2006 115
2007 38
2008 108
2009 138