The foreign oil giant BP has come under withering fire for questioning the existence of vast undersea oil plumes from the Deepwater Horizon disaster. BP’s skepticism is nearly matched by the federal government’s top ocean official, Dr. Jane Lubchenco, the ocean scientist in charge of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), raising more questions about the wisdom of the unnecessary federal collaboration with this environmental criminal.

In a teleconference with reporters, Lubchenco said that numerous teams of ocean scientists have found only “anomalies” that might or might not be oil which might or might not be from the BP disaster. She said that only chemical analysis to fingerprint water samples as being contaminated with the Deepwater Horizon’s oil should be considered confirmation of the plumes. Questioned by the Wonk Room, Lubchenco dismissed the findings of the University of Georgia research vessel Walton Smith team — who took physical samples of water contaminated with oil — as “circumstantial evidence.” After further questioning by Huffington Post’s Dan Froomkin, she then conceded:

It is quite possible there is oil under the surface. I think there is reason to believe that may be the case.

Although it is certainly true that chemical analysis of water samples will be definitive, the evidence for these “possible” oil plumes is far stronger than “circumstantial,” as today’s ABC News report about the Walton Smith mission shows:

Lubchenco’s expressed doubt of the existence of oil plumes is consistent with NOAA’s approach to other scientific questions about this environmental calamity. Like BP, she has dismissed the oil entrained in the loop current as a “very small amount of light sheen” which is “likely to be very, very diluted.” Like BP, Lubchenco claimed the 210,000-gallon-a-day guess for flow rate — which was questioned by independent scientists the day it came out on April 28 — was the “best estimate” for an entire month. Eventually NOAA admitted the actual flow rate was at least 240 to 500 percent greater.

Below is a timeline of the scientific research about these undersea plumes: Read more

“The time has come, once and for all, for this nation to fully embrace a clean energy future…. And the only way to do that is by finally putting a price on carbon pollution.”

The votes may not be there right now, but I intend to find them in the coming months. I will make the case for a clean energy future wherever I can, and I will work with anyone from either party to get this done.  But we will get this done.  The next generation will not be held hostage to energy sources from the last century.

Insiders had said the President would begin the pivot from the BP oil disaster to the need for comprehensive climate and clean energy jobs legislation this month (see “write Obama’s ‘pivot’ speech to the climate and clean energy jobs bill“).

Obama’s speech at Carnegie Mellon University today has garnered a lot of press attention for doing just that.  Here are the key excerpts:

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BP’s destruction of Gulf Coast “proves” to her we must let Big Oil exploit the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, too!

Blame-the-victim conservatives are on the warpath again.  First, Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer blamed the extreme deep-water drilling that led to the BP oil disaster in part on those who care about the environment, “Environmental chic has driven us out there.”

Actually, it is “drill, baby, drill” demagoguing by anti-environment, right wingers like him that has driven us to drill out there.

Now Sarah “I just can quit you, Alaska” Palin, has ratcheted up this Orwellian logic on her Facebook page:

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This morning, Rep. Charlie Melancon (D-LA) called for BP CEO Tony Hayward to be fired as the Deepwater Horizon blowout spews millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. In an interview with George Stephanopoulos on ABC’s Good Morning America, Melancon criticized “the way this company’s performed” and expressed his anger at Hayward for complaining earlier this week, “I’d like my life back.” Melancon suggested that BP grant Hayward’s wishes by firing him:

I was watching this week as the CEO of BP was talking about he wants his life back. I’m to the point where I wish the board would call him back, and give us somebody that really wants to make sure that the people of this state, the people of this Gulf Coast region have what they need, when they want, to try and fight this oil spill.

Watch it:

Melancon said BP should get rid of Hayward because “the buck stops there.” However, earlier in the interview, Melancon made it clear that he still supports offshore drilling.

Bush Administration actions created unsafe circumstance, fostered oil addiction

BP’s oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico is former Vice President Dick Cheney’s Katrina — and not because BP has hired Dick Cheney’s press secretary to do damage control.

Cheney and President George W. Bush — seen above delivering his 2006 State of the Union address, where he famously stated that “America is addicted to oil” — consistently catered to Big Oil and other special interests to undercut renewable energy and energy efficiency initiatives that would set the United States on a more secure clean energy path.  CAP’s Rebecca Lefton has story, which takes us back to 2001 and Cheney’s secret dirty energy task force and goes through the 2005 regulations that permit the oil and gas industry to regulate itself, to where we are today.

Under Cheney-Bush, oil companies raked in record profits while benefitting from policies they wrote for themselves. These energy policies did nothing for our national security and left consumers to pay the price at the pump and on their energy bills, which rose more than $1,100 during the Bush administration, as this figure illustrates:

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Western states could run on 35% wind and solar without extensive new infrastructure

Wind energy has plenty going for it: it is clean, unlimited in supply and the most economical source of renewable power. Its clearest drawback is unreliability: sometimes the wind just does not blow.

But that intermittency – long considered a major shortcoming – may have little impact on the potential for wind to power much of the electric grid in the western United States, according to a new study by the Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Lab.

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Responding to the epic BP oil disaster killing off the Gulf of Mexico, Rep. John Dingell (D-MI) has called for a suspension of all oil leasing and drilling in the United States. “I’ve been a supporter of offshore oil and drilling,” Dingell said in a May 27 hearing on the BP oil spill, “and I must say the oil companies are making this support increasingly difficult.” His concern that the environmental laws he helped write are not being obeyed by the oil industry or enforced by the government has made the senior-most Democrat on the House energy committee believe that it is necessary to “establish a complete moratorium on all leasing and drilling activity”:

Today I am forced to come to a difficult conclusion. We need to establish a complete moratorium on all leasing and drilling activity until it is established that all of it was done and is being done in full compliance with the environmental laws, and with full attention to safety, and to avoid the kind of disastrous spills were now seeing in the Gulf.

Watch it:

A long-time senior member of the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, Dingell “either authored or was a major force” in enacting “the Endangered Species Act, the National Environmental Policy Act, the original Clean Water Act, the 1990 Clean Air Act, and the National Wildlife Refuge Administration Act.” At the same time, Dingell has also been a major advocate for the automotive and energy industries, opposing regulations for seat belts, catalytic converters, fuel economy, and global warming pollution.

How to reduce oil dependence and move to a clean energy economy

Below is a column from CAP’s John Podesta and Dan Weiss, “America Needs an Oil Reform Agenda.”  It is followed by “Powering an Oil Reform Agenda,” that provides details on each proposed measure.

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Latest effort to capture oil stalls

UPDATE:  Hayward apologizes for “hurtful and thoughtless comment.”

Rep. Charlie Melancon (D-LA) called on the tone-deaf chief of the untrustworthy and reckless oil giant to resign yesterday.  He specifically cited Hayward’s absurd statement “I’d like my life back,” which even UK newspapers are now mocking.

While Hayward, who became CEO in 2007, has tried to pass the buck on the safety issue to his predecessor, in fact, he became “Chief Executive of exploration and production in January 2003.” Hayward created whatever safety culture the explorers and producers have today (see  Is BP the Goldman Sachs of Big Oil? CEO Hayward says to fellow executives: “What the hell did we do to deserve this?” Let’s see: How about a spotty safety record, insistence on voluntary ‘trust me’ self-regulation, a drilling plan that ignored key risks, and failure to use best shut-off technology to save a few bucks?)

Hayward’s “ruthless” cost-cutting, as the UK media labeled it, was obviously a key driver of the reckless corner-cutting (see “The three causes of BP’s Titanic oil disaster: Recklessness, Arrogance, and Hubris“).  The UK’s Times Online ran a November 2009 story, with this amazing headline:

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Here is the latest cartoon from the terrific Tom Toles — along with his thoughts on the disaster, climate change, and that “preposterous fraud” Sarah Palin:
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