http://www.truth-out.org/buzzflash/commentary/who-s-to-blame-for-recurring-oil-and-chemical-disasters-why-should-taxpayers-pay-for-toxic-cleanups
[Image and multiple links in on-line article. Energy politics.]
JACQUELINE MARCUS FOR BUZZFLASH AT TRUTHOUT
If an oil or coal firm releases toxic chemicals that poisons every
living thing it touches (Freedom Industries) and sends thousands of
residents to the hospital from lethal exposure, (read Truthout's Editor
William Rivers Pitt's recent pieces Diary of a Dying Country and The
Poisoner's Reckoning), U.S. government officials not only will pat the
oil-coal thugs on the back, they'll hand over a check worth millions of
tax dollars for cleanup fees. And if that isn't insulting enough for
you, the insurance companies will also allegedly pay the dirty energy
oligarchs again for the same amount.
No criminal charges, no one goes to jail, and to add insult to injury,
they're actually paid twice for contaminating our drinking water, for
putting thousands of Americans in the hospital from toxic poisoning, and
for turning communities into real estate nightmares.
The insurance settlements represent a drop in the bucket to oil
companies that receive close to a trillion dollars a year combined in
profits, but those extra millions that the oil firms pocket can make a
significant difference for cash-strapped states. It's like stealing a
tiny piece of candy from a baby when your store is spilling over with
tons of sweets.
Why are we, the taxpayers, paying for the oil oligarchs' hazardous toxic
messes in the first place?
By and large, the fossil fuel industry owns the U.S. government. You
will never see oil-coal executives arrested for the environmental crimes
they've committed even when Americans have died from their toxic
explosions and disasters. That's why when President Obama boasts about
how he increased drilling, fracking, and the construction of oil
pipelines beyond George W. Bush's wildest dreams, which means more
disasters are bound to happen, it makes you question Obama's motives,
especially when we're heading full speed ahead to mass extinction from
carbon emissions produced from oil and coal.
Federal regulations for sale: Why disasters keep happening
When Republicans rage about federal environmental protection
regulations, think about how we're rapidly heading towards mass
extinction. Instead of increasing regulations, Republicans want to gut
the Endangered Species Act, and they're determined to blow up the
Environmental Protection Agency so that big polluters can continue to
rapidly push us beyond our ability to survive.
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As they're shredding the last of the public safety regulations, think of
the perpetual oil, fracking and coal disasters, and you'll get the
picture of what "deregulation" looks like. Americans pay the
consequences for a government that's been paid to look the other way.
Federal oversight of eroding equipment is not taken seriously. The feds
rarely inspect the fossil fuel industry's equipment whether it be fuel
storage tanks, drilling rigs, pipelines, and most importantly, aging
equipment at refineries.
For all the brouhaha the President and elected officials make about
protecting the public, the fact that oil-chemical disasters continue to
happen demonstrate that they could care less about protecting the
general public's welfare. The oil industry is notorious for putting
workers at risk. Should petroleum engineers, manual laborers, or if an
honest federal inspector complains, they're threatened and told by the
industry's supervisors that they'll lose their jobs.
A friend that formerly worked for a major oil company spoke about the
federal inspection process, and if what he says is generally true, it
explains why these disasters continue to happen: "The federal inspectors
are easily bribed, boxes are checked off based on the word of the oil
management team, and then permits are stamped for approval." In short,
U.S. federal inspections of antiquated equipment for the protection of
workers, the public, and the environment are a joke.
You would think that the petroleum executives would want to maintain and
upgrade their equipment to prevent potential disasters. But thanks to
our oil-soaked elected officials, oil execs don't have to worry about
the disasters they create from gross negligence. We, the taxpayers, pick
up the tab—while the petro-thugs get paid twice for the cleanup and make
off with the profits. Oh and speaking of taxes, Big Oil hardly pays any
U.S. taxes, if at all.
These recurring disasters are far from being "leaks" and "spills": those
are Big Oil euphemisms that are used by the media and politicians in the
attempt to deceive the public. Think of BP's Gulf catastrophe. There is
no clear evidence of a recovery. On the contrary, it's been over three
years after the explosion and enormous dead zones are spreading
throughout the Gulf. As Truthout reporter Dahr Jamail noted, thousands
of Gulf residents have been suffering from the toxic exposure.
Nevertheless, President Obama still refers to BP's worst oil disaster in
history as a "leak".
Who's to blame?
Every other week you read about another oil catastrophe: trains
exploding from the fuel they're transporting, toxic water contamination,
offshore rig explosions, pipeline ruptures and refinery explosions, on
and on it goes, there's no end to it—many of which could have been
prevented if federal inspectors were doing their jobs and if the oil
firms were diligent about maintaining safety equipment.
These disasters are systemic cases of gross negligence that threaten the
public's health. While our elected officials are being wined and dined
by Big Oil criminals, they see the American people as merely "collateral
damage" when disasters happen, and then proceed with business as usual.
Who's to blame? The oily legislators have passed laws with the fossil
fuel lobbyists that benefit the oil industry at the expense of our
environment: our drinking water, our oceans, our forests, our farms and
ranches—all sacrificed in exchange for campaign funding and
happy-go-lucky party money. I've asked this before and I'll ask it
again: Can we eat and drink oil?
Executive decisions lead to ongoing disasters
If President Obama is sincere about preventing another BP Gulf disaster,
as he often claims, then why did he give Shell approval to drill in
Alaska's dangerously turbulent Chukchi Sea—home to more than half the
nation's polar bears? Moreover: Shell is working with Transocean: BP's
collaborator that contributed to the unprecedented 2010 Gulf of Mexico
catastrophe due to Transocean's faulty equipment which was never
properly inspected by the federal government.
President Obama is fully aware of Shell's critical malfunctions of
transporting their rig at sea, which was shoved to the shore like a
bobbing toy from Alaska's turbulent winds. To allow Shell to proceed is
unconscionable when this near disaster signaled an alarming siren of
warning to the White House. There's a perfect example of why disasters
keep happening.
New Laws: the American public v the U.S. federal government
Our legislators are perpetually occupied at passing new laws that
benefit the fossil fuel industry at our expense.
Well maybe it's time for us to pass a few laws against our legislators:
New Laws: The fossil fuel industry from now on must pay for cleaning up
their deadly toxic disasters that they create, not the taxpayers and not
the insurance companies. If the federal government fails to inspect
faulty and aging equipment, then the President, and members of the
legislature that receive dirty energy money, must pay for the cleanup
expenses when disasters occur as a result, and they must establish a
multibillion dollar fund for families and animals that are harmed,
injured, killed or poisoned from the toxic chemical disasters from their
dirty energy campaign money. If they (fossil fuel firms and legislators)
do not pay for the cleanup expenses, and for all those who have been
affected and harmed immediately after it happens, they will be held to a
mandatory prison sentence of ten years in federal prison without bail or
parole.
If this were to happen, oil and chemical disasters would be reduced to
rare exceptions if at all.
-
Footnotes:
1. Freedom Industries, a coal-industry surrogate in West Virginia,
dumped poison into the water supply known as the Elk River, waited 24
hours to tell anyone about it, waited even longer to mention that they
had also dumped a second poison into the water supply, and then declared
bankruptcy so as to make themselves judgment-proof in civil court
against the hundreds of thousands of people who couldn't eat or work or
bathe or cook for weeks...and this was all before the stuff they dumped
into the river evaporated into formaldehyde, which it does, so everyone
who couldn't eat or bathe or cook for weeks was suddenly eating and
cooking and bathing in a whole different poison, this one being a known
carcinogen...but they're bankrupt now, so screw you and your tumors.
(William Rivers Pitt: "The Poisoner's Reckoning")
2. National Resources Defense Council (NRDC.org)
Recommended Reading:
Mark Karlin, editor of Buzzflash: Plundering the Earth
Profiting from Global Warming
--
Darryl McMahon
It's your planet. If you won't look after it, who will?
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