42,000 Reasons a day not to increase Offshore Drilling

The oil lobby says, oh, oil drilling has come a long way, since the bad old days of Santa Barbara. Funny thing is, it goes just fine, except when it doesn't--when birds drown in oil slicks, fish are sickened and die. God help us if this spill reaches the already-endangered wet lands along the Louisiana coast, etc.

(Via Mother Nature Network)

ALL IS NOT WELL: As response teams struggle to plug an underwater oil well that's leaking 42,000 gallons of crude into the Gulf of Mexico daily, the oil slick on the surface has already tripled in size since Sunday, the Houston Chronicle reports. The sheen now covers 1,800 square miles - up from 600 two days ago - and is steadily drifting toward the U.S. Gulf Coast, threatening disaster for the region's bayous and beaches. The greatest concern is focused on Louisiana's Chandeleur and Breton barrier islands, home to thousands of nesting seabirds, but oyster beds on the eastern side of the Mississippi River are also at risk, as is the commercial oyster fishery that depends on them. "It is an area of great concern, not just for the environment and the fishing but economically, with what it would do to tourism," says an emergency management director in coastal Alabama. "That tax revenue drives the whole state." As winds shift, some experts say the growing oil spill could reach land by this weekend. Meanwhile, officials are still trying to close valves on the leaking well using robot submarines, and say they could install a large dome to cover the leak in as little as two weeks. Family members of oil workers lost in last week's explosion are suing BP and Transocean Ltd., the rig's operator, accusing them of violating safety standards, and the Huffington Post reports today that an offshore-oil advocacy group has been fighting safety regulations for years. In a PowerPoint presentation to federal regulators in 2009, the Offshore Operators Committee asked, "What do HURRICANES and New Rules Have in Common?", followed by a slide answering that "Both are Disruptive to Operations And are costly to Recover From!" (Sources: Houston Chronicle, Dallas Morning News, Huffington Post)