I watched the entire Energy Committee hearings yesterday when the heads of BP, Transocean, and Haliburton testified before the Senate on the gigantic oil spill in the gulf.  If you've read anything at all about the results of the first testimony from these companies and their role in the ongoing disaster, you'll already know that they blamed each other for the accident and subsequent scrambling to stop the flow of oil.

What you may not have heard are the questions surrounding the explosion itself, as well as the safety measures deployed.  It turns out that Haliburton employees were present because they were in the process of sealing the well with a special cement that hardens underwater.  Normally this cement is poured right on top of mud unearthed by the drilling and because it is heavier than the mud it sinks to the bottom and caps the well.  However, on this occasion the decision was made to remove the mud and then pour the cement, which is being investigated as a contributing factor to the suspected gas bubble thought to have led to the explosion.

While that may be part of the explanation as to what caused the deaths of 11 people and contaminated a huge portion of the local environment, I found the testimony surrounding safety procedures and equipment far more interesting.

Not surprisingly there were questions as to why, not only why primary safety measures failed to shut off the flow from the well, but the failsafe devices as well.  When asked about the testing history of their blowout preventers and the mechanism to seal the well should something catastrophic occur, it was revealed that there was a question as to the reliability of the testing done on the blow out preventers.   

I want to point out that I don't think offshore drilling is going anywhere, nor do I think it should.  The usual argument you might hear is between those who are completely against drilling and those who are full balls to the wall capitalist about it.  My perspective is that drilling is here to stay for at least my lifetime, but what we can insist upon at the very least are tested and redundant safety technologies.  There was much made of the giant "box" which ended up failing to contain the leak so that they could pump the oil to a tanker above, but it was never tested.  It wasn't even built prior to this incident.  Why the hell wasn't it built and tested prior to this?

In any event, the BP executive insisted that they were only required to have small robot submersibles on hand to operate the failsafe devises installed, however it was noted that countries like Norway and Brazil insist that rigs drilling off their coast have additional safety measures like an acoustic remote switch in case the robots fail.  It should be no surprise that it turned out that the oil industry itself wrote many of the regulations for the government who's job it is to ensure the safety of the safety industry.  I will even be so bold as to compare the lack of regulation and oversight in this case, to the Wall Street collapse of 2008, and the mining disaster in West Virginia. 

Is it really a coincidence that Wall Street, the mining industry, and now the oil industry all suffered disasters because profit overtook the need for safety? 

The answer is no.  It's not a coincidence.

UPDATE: The Huffington Post published an article about a whistle blower talking about the companies falsifying testing data on blow out preventers.  Read the article here.