BP has spent millions of dollars on advertisements, apologized for the accident and insisted that it’s doing all it can to get everything fixed. But stopping the oil spill in the Gulf doesn’t appear close. Disappointment and anger both from government officials and general public are also growing. But at the same time, the government’s role in the disaster and its policies are being questioned.
“The federal government underestimated the implications of giving a lot of latitude to a private entity like BP. What they need to do next time is obviously to make sure that, any company whether it’s Exxon or Shell in the future, they need to be consulted more,” Jaime Dominguez, a Political Science professor at Northwestern University, said. “They need to have safety reports submitted to the EPA to ensure that they are actually following all the safety precautions and procedures to ensure that such a tragedy doesn’t occur again.”
The government’s lack of oversight has been heavily criticized for the national disaster.
“Just like any business, they’re (BP) in the business for money. So at the end of the day, it’s about what’s producing profits and what’s reducing costs,” Dominguez said. “For BP, that may be the priority, but for the government it’s about issues of national security that ensure that we have safe and protected water and protected wildlife.”
In this accident, he said, the government has the responsibility to ensure that the culpable party, BP, is responsible. But in the future, changes need to be made about the government’s policies.
Making oil firms like BP submit safety reports to government agencies like the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is one expectation.
“Particularly in places like the Gulf Coast and the West Coast, their representatives, I think, are going to really put pressure on the government to ensure that every year they have some kind of reports,” Dominguez said. “These measures or procedures are effectively followed, because the criticism has been that there are red flags with the respect to the rig that blew up and BP of course because of the influence, the government didn’t really pay much attention to it.”
But another change may be more difficult to make: converting to alternative energy. Oil drilling is important for coast states’ economic interests. Although the spill gave a lesson, exploration of oil and gas will hardly be stopped.
“The Interior Department issued new guidelines on Tuesday under which shallow-water drilling in the Gulf of Mexico can resume,” the New York Times reported.
“I hope local governments are going to push for collaboration with local states, counties [and] federal government to push for greener technology. I think that’s the bottom line that we as a country have to move away from this dependency on oil,” Dominguez said.
