Coast Guard, Not EPA, Blamed For BP Dispersant Orgy
I was wrong. It wasn’t the Environmental Protection Agency remiss in allowing BP to dump more than a million gallons of chemical dispersants on the oil floating above and below the Gulf of Mexico waters.
It was the Coast Guard.
The details are outlined in this statement released and contained in a Los Angeles Times news story Saturday by Rep. Edward J. Markey (D-Mass.), chairman of the House energy and environment subcommittee.
“After we discovered how toxic these chemicals really are, they had no business being spread across the gulf in this manner,” Markey said.
What may never be known is the harmful effect to the atmosphere the Coast Guard allowed by burning the surface oil collected and surrounded by containment booms.
As in the chemical dispersant cases, the Coast Guard determined it was the lesser of two evils to mitigate the damage when the oil settled on the Gulf floor or reached the shorelines.
Lesson learned. In a disaster of this magnitude, no decision is a good one that will satisfy everyone. My apologies to the EPA.
