William Reilly, co-chairman of the presidential panel that investigated BP's massive 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, says the company has made significant progress on safety since the disaster and has learned its lesson, The Hill reports.
LIMA, Peru (AP) — Peruvian authorities are still trying to unravel the mystery of why hundreds of dolphins ended up dead on beaches in the country over the past 2 1/2 months.
Deputy Environment Minister Gabriel Quijandria told The Associated Press in an interview on Friday that studies are incomplete but officials hope to complete their research on the likely causes next week.
Salvage work to remove the capsized Costa Concordia cruise ship from its rocky perch off Tuscany, where 32 people died, will begin early next month and is expected to take a year, the Italian owner announced Saturday.
The U.S.-owned company Titan Salvage won the bid to remove the ship, which struck a reef off the tourist-dependent island of Giglio on Jan. 13, after the captain veered off course and steered the liner carrying 4,200 people close to shore in an apparent stunt. Thirty-two passengers and crew members died in the frantic and delayed evacuation. Two of those remain missing.
The Washington Post reports that two years after the BP disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, more recent leaks, spills and fires at global offshore operations, show that such incidents are inevitable even with tougher regulations in the United States.
James Watson, director of the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement at the U.S. Department of the Interior, writes a column in the Houston Chronicle that his agency still has much work to do as it continues to implement safety advances to avoid another oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico.
BRUSSELS (AP) — The European Commission will delay asking members to approve a measure that would label oil from oil sands as worse for climate change than crude oil — a proposal that had been vigorously opposed by Canada, where such oil is produced.
The Commission will ask the EU's 27 environment ministers to vote on the measure early in 2013 rather than this June, Isaac Valero-Ladron, a spokesman for EU Commissioner for Climate Action Connie Hedegaard, said Friday.
CAT ISLAND, La. (AP) — Before the BP oil spill, this shrubby island along the Louisiana coast was a lush green rookery where noisy brown pelicans and other birds clamored. Two years later, the island is smaller and ragged, full of dead black mangrove stumps and muddy patches.
Cat Island was one of the first places to be hit by thick mats of oil coming from 50 miles away in the Gulf of Mexico. Crews hired by BP raced to try to protect the island with boom, skims and dispersant, but a lot of the effort was futile. Some of the most iconic images from spill — confused, struggling pelicans covered in oil — were seen near these parts.
Safety experts, environmentalists and investigators say that despite oil industry improvements to safety conditions in the aftermath of the BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico two years ago, they still have a long way to go to ensure no similar disaster can happen, the San Antonio Express-News reports.
Following the year-long drilling moratorium that the Obama administration imposed in the wake of the massive 2010 BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico, BP and other oil companies are back intensifying their production activities in the Gulf. Operations are expected soon to surpass the levels from before the disaster, Rigzone reports.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Photos of fish with sores may raise concern about long-term environmental effects of the massive BP oil spill — but federal health officials say the Gulf seafood that's on the market is safe to eat.
After all, diseased fish aren't allowed to be sold, said Dr. Robert W. Dickey, who heads the Food and Drug Administration's Gulf Coast Seafood Laboratory.
House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., said the House Energy Action Team has discussed renewable energy as part of energy legislation that could attract Democratic support, National Journal reports.
Rep. Lois Capps, D-Calif., and other Democrats introduced a bill that would require the federal government to develop a strategy to respond to the health risks of climate change, The Hill reports.
Republican lawmakers sent a letter to Acting EPA Administrator Bob Perciasepe comparing the agency's information request procedures to the IRS's targeting of conservative groups, The Hill reports.
European Union Energy Commissioner Guenther Oettinger said the EU would review the potential risks and benefits of hydraulic fracturing this year, Reuters reports.
Federal plans to rebuild shorelines demolished by Hurricane Sandy have high costs, could threaten the environment and have high upkeep costs, The New York Times reports.
Though water supplies are plentiful, the surge of hydraulic fracturing in North Dakota has prompted a battle between water providers and a government-back cooperative over who should supply water for the process, Reuters reports.
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology's experimental study of nuclear fusion as an energy source will close within a year after a cut in federal funding, The Boston Globe reports.
Environmental activists called on Organizing for Action, the political group built from President Obama's campaign, to press the administration against approving the Keystone XL pipeline, Politico reports.
