It's About Time Congress Takes on BP

One year ago, the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico, killing eleven workers and injuring sixteen more. The devastating environmental damage that resulted from months of uncapped oil leaking from the site was accompanied by the economic catastrophe mandated by an off-shore oil drilling moratorium.

Freshman Rep. Jeff Landry (LA-03) has proposed two measures to try and address the consequences and lessons of the disaster. For one, BP has been dragging its feet on paying for damages through the Natural Resource Damage Assessment (NRDA) process – via legal procedures, BP and other responsible parties could put off paying damages for decades.

Landry – whose district includes some of the most impacted regions of Louisiana’s Gulf Coast – teamed up with Senator David Vitter (R-LA) to propose the Natural Resources Restoration Act.

The Act mandates that the National Academies of Science put together a panel of appropriately qualified scientists, who would then assess the amount that BP should pay to repair the damage caused by the spill. BP could then pay 30% of the assessed damages upfront, or negotiate a schedule for payment over some other time period.

“I am tired of BP using every trick and turn of the court process to prolong their obligation to pay for the damages they have caused to Louisiana’s natural resources. Our bill forces BP to make a choice: pay 30 percent of what they owe right now or negotiate in good faith; delaying the payment is no longer an option,” said Landry in a statement provided to FrumForum.

Landry also proposed another piece of regulation, the Offshore Installation Emergency Evacuation Act, which would require a private standby vessel to be stationed within 12 miles of offshore drilling installations. After the Deepwater Horizon explosion, survivors were in the water for over an hour before a chopper arrived on the scene – a length of time this bill aims to dramatically lessen the next time an emergency occurs. The bill would require the vessel to have the capacity to carry 100% of the most populated deepwater facility in the area – for shallow-water operations, the bill would only require standby vessels during the most dangerous periods of operation.

This proposed bill will almost certainly be met with pushback from oil companies, who strongly opposed a similar piece of legislation in the 1980s. Other Republicans would also likely protest that the bill adds another layer of regulation on the private sector.

Rep. Landry addresses this by saying in a press statement today that “the most valuable resource in the Gulf of Mexico is not the oil and gas underneath the Gulf [but rather] the men and women who are willing to risk their lives to extract America’s energy… every man who commits his life to extracting our nation’s energy [should be] met by an equal commitment that, no matter what might happen on the rig, a vessel will be waiting to safely take him home.”

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