Forums: Oil Of Cloves

WASHINGTON — Government scientists studying the BP disaster are reporting the best possible outcome: Microbes are consuming the oil in the Gulf without depleting the oxygen in the water and creating "dead zones" where fish cannot survive. Outside scientists said this so far vindicates the difficult and much-debated decision by BP and the government to use massive amounts of chemical dispersants deep underwater to break up the oil before it reached the surface. Oxygen levels in some places where the BP oil spilled are down by 20 percent, but that is not nearly low enough to create dead zones, according...

Energy: Mexico's state oil firm, our second-largest foreign supplier, is under attack from drug cartels. But that's not stopping the U.S. from investing more in its operations while American rigs lie idle in the Gulf. The volatile Middle East is often seen as the nexus of risk to U.S. energy supplies. But the biggest threat may be next door, in Mexico. It's bad enough that oil production there is declining due to underinvestment. But now the state oil monopoly, Pemex, is encountering a threat no one foresaw a few years ago: attacks from the country's notorious criminal cartels. The Los...

The following item moved on AP this morning: NEW ORLEANS (AP) — A small fire on a petroleum platform owned by Mariner Energy Inc. has been put out with a water hose and a hand-held fire extinguisher. Thursday’s fire was the second reported in a week aboard a Mariner platform in the Gulf of Mexico. Patrick Cassidy, spokesman for Houston-based Mariner, said the fire occurred while a maintenance crew was using a sawing device. He said the crew extinguished the fire and returned to work. There were no injuries. Cassidy said the platform, 109 miles south of Lafayette, has been...

When the third-highest-ranking politician in the Obama administration comes to Canada with her energy sidekick, oilsands producers and royalty addicted premiers rush into line for an arm-twisting opportunity. But House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi's voting record, her iffy re-election prospects, her meeting mix of aboriginal and environmental delegations along with her choice of political tagalong suggest the fix is in. A suspicious observer would think today's visit to Ottawa will be more about gathering input for a future trash-talking of the Alberta and Saskatchewan oilsands than a unbiased hearing of the facts.