Not One Dime for BP

Last week, scientists revealed that BP's oil spill is much worse than we thought. The oil is gushing into the Gulf of Mexico at a rate somewhere between 25,000 and 80,000 barrels per day -- with underwater oil plumes stretching on as far as 10 miles. Oil-soaked pelicans, fishermen idled, coastal economies disrupted -- some have put the bill as high as $14 billion.[1] Who will pay for all this?

Click here to help make sure that BP is held accountable for every dime of this disaster.

Last week, BP America's president Lamar McKay appeared before Congress and pledged that the company would pay all "legitimate claims," notwithstanding a $75 million cap on oil companies' liability for such damage. The question is, do we take him at his word?

Here are three reasons I'm not buying it:

First of all, BP is refusing to admit that it made any mistakes leading to the explosion and sinking of its Deepwater Horizon rig. At the hearing, Mr. McKay said: "I believe our operating system in the Gulf of Mexico is as good as anyone. I can't point to any deficiencies." He also asserted that the company operating the drill rig -- Transocean -- was responsible for safety.[2]

Second, let's remember what happened with the Exxon Valdez. There, the court case dragged on for nearly 20 years, and Exxon's lawyers ultimately got the Supreme Court to drastically reduce damages against the company. It is not too hard to imagine that BP -- and Transocean and Halliburton -- will use every legal trick in the book, including the caps on oil companies' liability for spills. In fact, Transocean is already asking a federal court in Houston to limit its liability to $26.7 million, under a 150 year-old provision in maritime law.[3]

Third, while BP might sound contrite now, actions speak louder than words. In fact, the environmental track record of the company that calls itself "Beyond Petroleum" is frankly appalling. In 2005, BP's refinery in Texas City exploded, killing 15 workers, and then in 2006, BP was responsible for "the largest oil spill on Alaska's North Slope." [4] And more recently, the company has leaked more oil on the Alaskan tundra, and it even proposed dumping toxic-laden wastewater into Lake Michigan in 2007. Will BP ever learn that it doesn't pay to pollute?
So join us in telling Congress that "Not One Dime" of taxpayer money should bail out BP's disaster.

In light of all this, it is rather astonishing to me that there is a law that can limit oil companies' liability for damage from spills to $75 million. Every dime of liability that BP -- and Halliburton and Transocean, collectively -- avoids is a dime of damage that is picked up by us, the taxpaying public.

So let's tell Congress to remove the cap on liability for Big Oil and its spills. Not One Dime. Not one dime of taxpayer money to cover BP's horrendous mess:

Click here to take action now!

And thanks, as always, for making it all possible.

Sincerely,

Luke Metzger
Environment Texas Director
http://www.environmenttexas.org