The new safety regulations proposed the Obama administration has made the House of Saud very happy indeed. It will cost American producers of oil billions of dollars, at a time when they could least afford it. This is the final checkmate in a game played very patiently by President Obama. The complete and utter destruction of energy independence is underway.
“What we’re worried about is how do we make the industry do what they’re putting on paper,” said Cheryl MacKenzie, a CSB investigator.
She said safety gaps could be filled by giving the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement — the offshore regulator — more power to “challenge companies and verify that they are doing what they said they would do.”
CSB also recommended getting workers more involved in safety decisions, for instance by letting workers elect worker representatives to be part of discussions over safety.
“These are the people who have their hands on the equipment,” MacKenzie said. “They need to be involved … This is not a CSB tenet, this is a well-known concept.”
The CSB report said there were lessons to learn from places like Norway and the United Kingdom.
In a statement, Vanessa Allen Sutherland, the CSB chairwoman, called on the industry and the federal government to take “a tripartite” approach where workers, companies and regulators are entwined in improving safety.
“Ultimately, this will require a culture shift for everyone,” Sutherland said.
Ken Arnold, an expert on offshore drilling and member of the National Academy of Engineering, said the industry, through an American Petroleum Institute committee, is looking at revising the industry’s safety standards. He said more oversight of contractors is being considered.
However, he questioned the practicality of some of the CSB’s recommendations.
For instance, he said U.S. offshore workers are not unionized and are “culturally anti-union.” He said it would be difficult to duplicate the safety regimes of Norway and the U.K.
“In the U.S. we have a system that is a blame culture,” he said. “Norway and the U.K. have a culture of working with industry to make things better rather than focus on who to blame. We have to work within the culture of the United States.”
Yes, indeed. We need to be like Europe and have all competitive advantages stripped from the playing field. God forbid the United States become energy independent, how would the House of Saud fund terrorist groups that force us into brainless wars?
Safety in industry is a management issue. It has sweet fuck all to do with unions. If industry is proactive they can keep government regulators at bay, but failures bring the regulators and all the hassle accordingly.
Your “man in havana” is becoming extremely boring and we outsiders would be happy if he fucked off sooner than later.
Socialist on TV. LOL- looking like a slob and trying to avoid the horrible history of said ideology.
Fortunately, hyperbole continues to flow freely.
Sounds like the CSB just wants their own “enforcement team” aka offshore police. 🙁 Typical asshole bullshit government agency fuckery.
To be fair to the House of Saud, which certainly does have significant flaws, it is unclear whether or to what extent the Saudi government funds terrorist groups. They may not.
It is clear that private individuals in Saudi Arabia funds terrorist groups. E.g. some private individuals in Saudi think that their government is not religious enough. Their idea of what is religious enough is ISIS, so they fund ISIS.
I will have to read up on these new regulations and see whether I agree with them or not. There have been horrible oil spills in the past, and if these regs will prevent those from happening again, it may well be worth whatever it costs to implement them.
I am from Louisiana originally and I still don’t understand how anyone could eat seafood from the Gulf of Mexico. The oil looked awful on everything, so the company put a dispersant into the water. Now it looks okay. The only problem is that dispersant is more toxic to your food than oil is.
I agree that over-regulation is bad and hampers industry. But am so far unclear as to whether this constitutes over-regulation, or if it is necessary for safety.
Yep, it is awful…Your list has a few companies that already bit the dust…
MHR – Magnum Hunter went bankrupt – last time I looked stock was .005,
Sandridge Energy (I think) also filed for bankruptcy & Halcon did as well – there are probably others on that list…a lot more. Those compannies are still listed- as their last day on the market. Lots of investors wish those figures on your list were correct – me included. MHR went straight to a penny even before bankruptcy was filed.
I had some MHR preferreds and SD preferreds and was not amused when they went to zero. MHR in particular had a lying shitweasel for a CEO. They’re still on the pinks, so they show up on my books – and I’m often amused to see them go up a few hundred percent (or even a few thousand percent) which suggests that some moron is throwing money down the toilet. I’d booked years of 10% dividends, but the losses still sucked.
This leads me to reinforce my believe that President Obama is brilliant and will go down in history as one of our greatest presidents. His anima is Kali. Glorious and sublime destruction.
My other favorite President was John Adams and Abigail Adams was extraordinary as is FLOTUS Michelle Obama.