Oil Executives Break Ranks in Testimony, page 1

posted on Jun, 15 2010 @ 11:43 PM

link

— The chairmen of four of the world’s largest oil companies broke their nearly two-month silence on the major spill in the Gulf of Mexico on Tuesday and publicly blamed BP for mishandling the well that caused the disaster.

Seeking to insulate their companies from the continuing crisis in the gulf and the political backlash in Washington, the leaders of Exxon Mobil, Chevron, Shell and ConocoPhillips insisted at a Congressional hearing that they would not have made the mistakes that led to the well explosion and the deaths of 11 rig workers on April 20.

“We would not have drilled the well the way they did,” said Rex W. Tillerson, chief executive of Exxon Mobil.

“It certainly appears that not all the standards that we would recommend or that we would employ were in place,” said John S. Watson chairman of Chevron.

“It’s not a well that we would have drilled in that mechanical setup,” said Marvin E. Odum, president of Shell.

Please visit the link provided for the complete story.

It's interesting that even Rex Tillerson of Exxon Mobil admitted that the industry as a whole had no real way to deal with an oil spill of that magnitude (see end of article). They would all be flying blind in those circumstances.

Unless we as a country are willing to destroy our coasts from time to time in the rush to provide 2% of the world's oil reserves, it seems that the only real answer to the BP disaster and those which will almost certainly occur in the future is to put a moratorium on offshore drilling. Until such time as the oil companies can PROVE they have an effective way to clean up spills, not just a document alleging that they can, they should not be allowed to drill.

Profits or no profits, the oil giants cannot be allowed to destroy the lives and livelihoods of countless Americans and decimate countless species of wildlife.

Greed should not be allowed to trump the welfare of the American people as a whole.

[edit on 15-6-2010 by Sestias]

twitchy

posted on Jun, 15 2010 @ 11:52 PM

link

Noticed your location is Asheville! Me too!

Interesting thread, weird to see the other oil executives speaking out, but hardly surprising.

Wyn Hawks

posted on Jun, 15 2010 @ 11:56 PM

link

...abberration - you have to decide for yourself what that really means in this deal... imo, the use of that word is an attempt to obscure the truth, dull the edges, protect the guilty, add doubt, add the fantasy quotient... as for the claims of the other oil mega-corps - "we wouldnt do it that way" - this is just a case of sharks eating sharks...

Sestias

posted on Jun, 16 2010 @ 12:05 AM

link

reply to post by twitchy

Hey, glad to meet you twitchy. It seems our mountains inspire common sense as well as provide a feast for the senses.

ExPostFacto

posted on Jun, 16 2010 @ 12:05 AM

link

Originally posted by twitchy
Noticed your location is Asheville! Me too!

Interesting thread, weird to see the other oil executives speaking out, but hardly surprising.

Cool...I wish I lived in Asheville. I'm two hours up the road from you all in Statesville.

On topic, I would imagine these oil companies would all be saying the same thing if it were Shell instead of BP, or Exxon instead of BP.

[edit on 16-6-2010 by ExPostFacto]

boondock-saint

posted on Jun, 16 2010 @ 12:19 AM

link

Originally posted by twitchy
Noticed your location is Asheville! Me too!

seems NC is well represented here.
I'm a Tarheel too

Would you expect any of them to say
they would have done it the same
way BP did anyway???

lol, I doubt it

mjs022

posted on Jun, 16 2010 @ 12:24 AM

link

All of them would have bypassed the safety with the amount of oil that is speculated to be there. Comparing it to the Ghawar oil field in saudi arabia. BP see's the flipside of this as major dollar signs that outweigh the cost of cleanup.

BTW: Charlotte, NC here haha

Sestias

posted on Jun, 16 2010 @ 12:28 AM

link

Hello there ExPostFacto and boondock-saint. I've seen some of your posts before but didn't know you were fellow tar heels.

Welcome.

Any other North Carolinians, please weigh in.

[edit on 16-6-2010 by Sestias]

soleprobe

posted on Jun, 16 2010 @ 12:29 AM

link

hehehehe... ny times.... it's all about blaming BP... then BP goes belly up and the tax payer takes care of the rest by borrowing more from the bankster cabal.... and the real criminals get away as usual

Sestias

posted on Jun, 16 2010 @ 12:35 AM

link

reply to post by soleprobe

Why wouldn't people blame BP? They're the ones who assured the government and the public that they could handle any disaster that might arise.

BP deserves to go belly-up. THEY should pay for their disaster, not the American people.

I doubt that the American people would tolerate a bail-out of BP. That doesn't mean BP wouldn't try to get one. I just don't think the Democrats would go for it though.

mbkennel

posted on Jun, 16 2010 @ 01:34 AM

link

Originally posted by mjs022
All of them would have bypassed the safety with the amount of oil that is speculated to be there. Comparing it to the Ghawar oil field in saudi arabia. BP see's the flipside of this as major dollar signs that outweigh the cost of cleanup.

BTW: Charlotte, NC here haha

That doesn't make sense.

If it is like a new Ghawar, they would have made so much money that they could afford the best equipment & procedures.

If it were a marginal field with profitability just on the edge then they'd cut costs radically.

But really, the truth is simple. As many actual oil industry insiders know (read www.theoildrum.com, not this board!), BP is just plain cheap and dirty. And though all petroleum companies are obviously profit-focused, not all are as aggressively flippant as BP is.

On the other hand BP is most friendly to non-petroleum (alternative) energy of the majors, ironically.

[edit on 16-6-2010 by mbkennel]