environment: acoustic switch Bush Administration Dick Cheney idiots Murdoch
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Month 5, Day 8: You Can’t Use Murdoch Papers for Fishwrap, Now That All The Fish Are Dead
This one went off to the Boston Herald, which ran a McClatchy piece about (mostly Republican) attempts to politicize the Deepwater Horizon disaster.
The attempt by Republican political operatives and their media to blame the Obama administration for a slow response to the Deepwater Horizon spill is absurd. The oil rig explosion and all that followed it is a direct consequence of a culture of corruption in the Minerals Management Service (the government agency charged with overseeing the oil industry) — corruption fostered by the Bush Administration. Members of the Executive Branch (including Vice President Cheney) encouraged MMS staff to weaken safeguards and regulations, directly contributing to the gulf catastrophe.
After secret talks with oil corporations, the Bush/Cheney administration dropped a requirement that offshore platforms be equipped with an acoustic switch, a remotely triggered mechanism that could have closed off the gushing pipe at the wellhead if the manual switch failed. Why? The switches, at $500,000 each, were “too expensive.” It’s safe to say that the damage done by the Deepwater Horizon spill is going to cost a lot more than a half-million dollars — a costly lesson for British Petroleum, and for us all.
Warren Senders
environment: Lisa Margonelli New York Times Oil Addiction
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Month 5, Day 7: Back on Board the Times!
My 60-day exclusion period at the New York Times is now over, so I can start sending them letters again. Lisa Margonelli, the director of the New America Foundation’s energy initiative, had an excellent op-ed on May 1 that seemed to call for a little reinforcement. This letter is a little late for something that was printed last Saturday, but I’m thinking of it as a test run for the oil/cigarette analogy.
Lisa Margonelli is absolutely correct in her analysis of America’s entanglement with oil. Most Americans are unaware of the extent to which the petroleum industry benefits from government largesse in the form of subsidies, tax breaks, and regulatory loopholes — and most Americans likewise have internalized the notion that fossil fuels are “cheap.” It’s time to drop that idea, which requires that we ignore the costs of cleaning up the inevitable spills and disasters, of public health effects, environmental destruction, and global warming, not to mention the odd war or two waged over oil sources. Calling oil “cheap energy,” is akin to calling cigarettes “food.”
America needs to kick the habit; fossil fuels are bad for us, bad for the planet, and bad for the economy our children and grandchildren are going to inherit.
Warren Senders
environment Politics: Deepwater Horizon Ed Markey Henry Waxman offshore drilling
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Month 5, Day 6: Variations on a Theme
Haven’t written to Ed Markey in a while; didn’t feel as much of a need, since ACES passed the House. But in the wake of this awful event, I thought I should tell him to raise a little hell.
Dear Representative Markey — I write as one of your constituents, and as an American citizen who is hopeful that in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon disaster, the Earth-destroying systems that comprise the fossil fuel industries may finally be brought to bay. The recent tragedy in a West Virginia coal mine showed us again the ugly face of the coal industry (personified exactly by the avatar of greed, Mr. Don Blankenship); the catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico shows us again the utter unconcern of British Petroleum (and the rest of Big Oil) for the environmental effects of their activity.
The objection raised to renewable energy is invariably that it is “too expensive.” As we can see in the last two months’ news, it is actually oil and coal that are too expensive: too expensive in lives, in environmental destruction, in cleanup bills, in the costs of war, in health effects, in contributions to global warming.
I write this letter to ask you and Representative Waxman, as the “point people” for energy and climate issues in the House, to stand up and tell the American people that we need to confront our deadly addiction to fossil energy head on; we must educate ourselves about the true costs of oil and coal.
We have to start learning, and stop burning.
There is no time to lose, and none to waste.
Yours Sincerely,
Warren Senders
cc: Rep. Henry Waxman
environment Politics: Deepwater Horizon Joe Lieberman John Kerry Lindsey Graham offshore drilling
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Month 5, Day 5: Pleading With The Powers That Be
Continuing on this theme — this time writing to the Climate/Energy bill trio. Please write some letters yourself!
Dear Senators Kerry, Lieberman and Graham —
It should be obvious to you that offshore drilling is no longer a viable option for America’s energy policy. We have delayed long enough — it is time for America to confront, and end, its addiction to fossil fuels. The disaster of the Deepwater Horizon is just the latest in a steady stream of catastrophes which illuminate the unfortunate fact that oil and coal are not cheap sources of energy. Fossil energy is only cheap when we don’t include the costs of cleanup, of health effects, of long-term ecological damage, and the expensive wars we wage to protect our sources. Renewable energy sources are only expensive when we don’t consider the benefits of positive environmental effects, more locally-based energy sources, greater reliance on conservation and efficiency, and avoiding some of the worst effects of CO2-induced atmospheric warming.
The Deepwater Horizon is a signal event in the history of our energy policy. It must be recognized as a clarion call to our nation’s citizenry, an “Environmental 9-11” that alerts us to the terrifying consequences of continued reliance on fossil energy.
America needs to wake up and face reality. Are you going to continue to offer sops to the oil and coal lobbies…or are you going to take the necessary steps to transform our energy equation once and for all? Our descendants’ lives hang in the balance.
For once, Senators…do the right thing.
Yours Sincerely,
Warren Senders
environment: Barack Obama Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling
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Month 5, Day 4: Schwarzenegger is Now Opposed To Offshore Drilling. Mr. President?
Okay, I’ll send another letter to the President. Why not?
Dear President Obama — It is becoming clearer by the day that offshore drilling for oil is too high-risk an activity. The idea that fossil fuels are inherently cheaper than renewable energy sources is now as obsolete as the phlogiston theory of combustion. Oil and coal are only cheap if we don’t count the enormous costs of cleanup, public health effects, and environmental/climatic impacts (not to mention all those expensive wars we wage to protect our oil sources). Renewables are only expensive if we don’t count the value inherent in an unspoiled environment, in benign climatic effects, and no longer spending billions of dollars every year propping up the big oil companies.
As the Deepwater Horizon disaster shows us, we can no longer afford the potential negative impacts of offshore drilling. This catastrophe makes it crystal clear what was obvious to some of us quite some time ago: there is no room at the negotiating table for Big Oil, for they have abdicated their responsibilities to the citizens of the USA, and of the world.
Please reinstate the ban on offshore drilling immediately.
Yours Sincerely,
Warren Senders
environment: Deepwater Horizon offshore drilling Time Magazine
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Month 5, Day 3: Sometimes I Hate Writing These Letters
Time Magazine also has a piece on the oil disaster, so they get another version of the letter I sent to Newsweek.
One good thing about a disaster — everybody covers it, so I have no problem finding a hook for a letter.
Frankly, I’d just as soon have to look for hours to find something worth writing about. The latest projections suggest that the Deepwater Horizon spill is going to dwarf the Valdez in another couple of days. Horrible.
The list of recent disasters attendant on fossil fuels is profoundly depressing: a Chinese coal ship fouling the Great Barrier Reef; a mine explosion in West Virginia; the Deepwater Horizon, pouring oil into the Gulf of Mexico at accelerating rates, with some projections describing flow equivalent to an Exxon Valdez every two days. And where is that oil coming from? Almost a mile underwater — too deep for divers. The results of this monumental corporate irresponsibility are beyond catastrophic; the Gulf of Mexico will be a petro-Chernobyl for decades to come. Communities and ecosystems are devastated; oyster beds that provided steadily for over a century are already lost. Towns and businesses that depend on fishing are facing death sentences. What will we learn from our latest catastrophe? If we are lucky, we will finally understand that fossil energy is anything but cheap, and that our collective survival depends on getting off our destructive addiction to oil and coal as soon as possible. BP, alas, must now stand for “Broken Planet.”
Warren Senders
atheism Education environment Personal: philosophy timescale
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Eight Thoughts About Timescale
I’m not sanguine about our ability to solve the climate crisis — and it’s not because the monolithic forces of global capitalism won’t let us (although they’re not helping). It’s not because we’re too greedy and acquisitive (although we are). It’s not because things have progressed too far already for us to stop them (although they have).
It’s because we humans aren’t very good at thinking in different timescales. We’re basically monkeys, and we have monkey minds. Our species-wide ADD started out as a feature, but in our present situation, it’s a bug.
1. Timescale and Our Fate
The words are frightening: fix atmospheric CO2, or in a century rising seas will wipe out coastal cities all over the world. Deal with methane release, or in a couple of hundred years the planet will be Venusized. If we completely stop adding carbon to the atmosphere, it will take the planet several thousand years to recover.
Big time spans, no?
environment: Deepwater Horizon hubris offshore drilling
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Month 5, Day 2: We Don’t Need No Education
More on the Deepwater Horizon. This one goes to Newsweek, which has an article on how the spill is going to affect the future of offshore drilling.
The fate of hundreds of communities and multiple ecosystems now hangs in the balance as a toxic oil slick begins to wash up on the coastlines of Louisiana and Florida. The Deepwater Horizon spill is both a crisis of terrifying proportions and a testament to human folly and hubris.
The crucial question is, “What will we learn from this disaster?” Will we learn that we need to wean ourselves from oil as rapidly as possible — or will we learn that communities and ecosystems are expendable? Will we learn that there is more energy to be saved through eliminating waste than there is to be found under the seabed — or will we learn that conservation (in the words of Dick Cheney) can “never be the basis of a sound energy policy”? Will we learn that when we include the costs of cleaning up spills and mitigating the worst effects of climate change, oil is not cheap, but horribly expensive?
We can no longer afford disasters of this magnitude. How many more Deepwater Horizons will it take before we learn that we’re better off leaving that oil in the Earth, and moving to a renewable-energy economy?
Warren Senders
environment: acoustic switch Deepwater Horizon Dick Cheney vileness Voldemort
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Month 5, Day 1: Writing to Lord Voldemort
The Deepwater Horizon would never have happened, if there had been an “acoustic switch” installed. Why wasn’t there such a switch? Because federal laws requiring them were nullified early in the Bush/Cheney administration. By guess who?
I have never been more frightened to write a letter than I am at this moment.
UPDATE: There is NO CONTACT INFORMATION AVAILABLE for Dick Cheney. Try googling “Dick Cheney Contact” and see for yourself. So I sent it to his wife, who is a “Senior Fellow” at the American Enterprise Institute (a wingnut welfare center).
Dear Mr. Cheney,
I imagine that as a big fan of environmental destruction, you’re probably relishing the news of the expanding disaster of the Deepwater Horizon platform. I assume also that you are savoring the knowledge that you played an integral part in laying the groundwork for the catastrophe.
Remember the secret meetings you had with the oil industry at the beginning of your first term as Secret President? Of course you do. And you probably remember the deregulation you devised that did away with the requirement for an acoustic switch to cut the flow of oil off at the source. A half-million dollars was surely too expensive, and nothing was going to happen anyway, so why worry?
That switch you decided your buddies didn’t need? It would have prevented this nightmare. Acoustic switches are required in off-shore drilling platforms in most of the world, except, of course, for the United States.
Mr. Cheney, the environmental and economic disaster our nation is now facing is one that can be laid at your feet. If you had a moral bone in your body, you’d be out there on the coastline right now, helping with the cleanup.
I remember way back when you said that “Conservation may be a sign of personal virtue, but it is not a sufficient basis for a sound, comprehensive energy policy.” A genuinely “sound and comprehensive” energy policy would include projected cleanup costs for oil disasters like the Deepwater Horizon — costs that would explode forever the myth that fossil fuels are “cheap.”
The damage you have done, sir, is incalculable. Because you wanted to spare your Big Oil buddies from having to buy a few switches, we are now facing what’s likely to be the worst oil spill in history, with costs estimated in the hundreds of millions.
This must be a very special and proud moment for you. Savor it.
Yours Sincerely,
Warren Senders
environment: Barack Obama Deepwater Horizon Katrina Louisiana oil spill
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Month 4, Day 30: How Much Worse Can Things Get?
The Deepwater Horizon is an overwhelming tragedy, made worse by corporate attempts at a coverup, and with compounded irony from President Obama’s remarks a few days before it happened.
Dear President Obama,
It was surely unfortunate timing when you remarked (at a town hall meeting in South Carolina) on April 2nd that “…oil rigs today generally don’t cause spills. They are technologically very advanced.” Well, maybe, but in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon disaster we can see that the result of all that “technical advancement” is a catastrophe that is now likely to eclipse the Exxon Valdez spill in every respect.
You also said that, “Even during Katrina, the spills didn’t come from the oil rigs; they came from the refineries onshore.” Oh, how I wish this were true. But, alas, the facts are different: hurricanes Katrina and Rita caused 124 offshore spills, totaling almost a million gallons of oil released into the ocean. 554,400 gallons were crude oil and condensate from platforms, rigs and pipelines, and 189,000 gallons were refined products from platforms and rigs. The largest of these was 152,250 gallons, well over the 100,000 gallon threshold considered a “major spill.”
But corrections aside, the Deepwater Horizon qualifies as an environmental crisis of terrifying proportions. Kerry St. Pe, the former head of Louisiana’s oil spill response team, says, “This isn’t a storage tank or a ship with a finite amount of oil that has boundaries. This is much, much worse.” Much worse, indeed. It’s not a “spill,” it’s a river of oil flowing from the bottom of the Gulf at the rate of 210,000 gallons a day. Some officials say it could be running for months. If that prediction holds, the coastline of Louisiana will become a disaster area that hasn’t been seen in the United States since the Exxon Valdez.
If this doesn’t convince you that offshore drilling is a succession of disasters waiting to happen, what will? The Deepwater Horizon offers further proof that the only way to avoid oil spills is to leave it in the earth. We do need renewable energy, and we don’t need to dump millions of gallons of crude oil over some of the most delicate and valuable ecosystems in the country.
Please reconsider your support for this aspect of your energy program.
Yours Sincerely,
Warren Senders