Gulf Coast Oil Spill

BP To Gov't Last Year: We Can Handle A 300,000 Barrels-Per-Day Spill Just Fine

Justin Elliott | May 31, 2010, 1:03PM

A worker cleans up a contaminated beach in Port Fourchon, Louisiana on May 24, 2010

Of all the bad predictions and downright misinformation we've seen surrounding the Gulf oil spill, this one ranks pretty high: BP actually told the government last year that it was prepared to respond to a blowout flowing at 300,000 barrels per day -- as much as 25 times the rate of the current spill.

That assertion came in an Initial Exploration Plan for the well that ultimately blew out, filed with the Minerals Management Service in 2009. BP says in the document that it "has the capability to respond, to the maximum extent practicable, to a worst-case discharge, or a substantial threat of such a discharge, resulting from the activities proposed in our Exploration Plan."

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Gulf Coast Oil Spill

TPM's Tour Of The Oil Spill Flack Universe -- Who's On Damage Control?

Christina Bellantoni | May 5, 2010, 12:25PM

Clockwise, from top left: Workers organize for oil cleanup efforts in Venice, LA, the U.S. Capitol, the Transocean Deepwater Horizon drilling platform sinks, and API President and CEO Jack Gerard

As the oil industry went into full damage control mode following the catastrophic spill in the Gulf of Mexico, their corporate public relations went into overdrive too, with firms across Washington jumping in to help British Petroleum and BP firing up its Facebook page and Twitter feed. The universe of flacks Americans might be seeing on television and quoted in news stories has widened, with BP executives making the rounds, hosting journalists for explainer sessions and corporate PR folks helping craft an image of a company doing everything it can to help.

The industry already had an army of lobbyists and PR hands deployed in Washington to influence the negotiations over climate change legislation (which may be in dire straits thanks to the spill), and BP brought in the international consulting firm the Brunswick Group.

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BP

Paying For The Oil Spill: A Guide To Who's On The Hook

Justin Elliott | May 4, 2010, 2:15PM

The Deepwater Horizon rig burning before it sank

There are two broad categories of costs associated with the catastrophic BP Gulf oil spill: one is cleanup; the other is damage caused by the oil -- to shoreline property, local tax revenues, the fishing and tourism industries, and other businesses and individuals.

Here's a guide to who's on the hook for which costs.

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Tony Hayward

BP Chief Claims Oil Spill 'Wasn't Our Accident' Despite BP Role In Running Rig (VIDEO)

Justin Elliott | May 4, 2010, 9:26AM

BP Group CEO Tony Hayward

The CEO of BP is trying to get out in front of potential lawsuits by casting the blame for the Gulf oil spill squarely on the owner of the rig: Transocean. But in doing so in media interviews Monday, BP's Tony Hayward appears to have also gotten out in front of the known facts.

"It wasn't our accident," he told the Today Show on Monday. Pressed by anchor Meredith Vieira, Hayward claimed: "the drilling rig was a Transocean drilling rig. It was their rig and their equipment that failed, run by their people, their processes."

But oil industry experts tell TPMmuckraker that BP, as the lease operator on the Deepwater Horizon rig, most likely did have a role in decision-making aboard the drilling vessel. And six BP employees were on the rig when it exploded April 20.

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