Monday, July 26, 2010
BP was last night poised to boot out boss Tony Hayward - with a near £15MILLION pay-off.
The under-fire chief executive could go as early as today after being locked in talks over the weekend.
He will carry the can for the devastating oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico which has badly damaged BP's reputation in the US.
The cost of the disaster means the firm is expected tomorrow to reveal the biggest ever quarterly loss - almost £9BILLION - in UK corporate history. BP is to pay the US £13billion in compensation after four million barrels of oil spewed into the Gulf after a rig explosion in April.
Mr Hayward - slammed for his handling of the crisis - would be due a £1million salary pay-off, share options worth £2.7million and a £10.8million pension pot.
He is set to be replaced by US managing director Bob Dudley in the first step to a "Future BP". A huge restructuring could see the firm sell its refining operations and petrol stations to concentrate on finding oil and gas.
Mr Hayward was unavailable for comment last night. BP would say only that he "remains our chief executive and has the full support of the board and senior management". But his departure could be announced after a board meeting today.
Labels: BP, British Petroleum, Tony Hayward
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Who Owns BP?
Alarms and safety mechanisms on gulf disaster oil rig were disabled, chief technician at Transocean reveals
Vital warning systems on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig were switched off at the time of the explosion in order to spare workers being woken by false alarms, a federal investigation has heard.
The revelation that alarm systems on the rig at the centre of the disaster were disabled – and that key safety mechanisms had also consciously been switched off – came in testimony by a chief technician working for Transocean, the drilling company that owned the rig.
Mike Williams, who was in charge of maintaining the rig's electronic systems, was giving evidence to the federal panel in New Orleans that is investigating the cause of the disaster on 20 April, which killed 11 people.
Williams told the hearing today that no alarms went off on the day of the explosion because they had been "inhibited". Sensors monitoring conditions on the rig and in the Macondo oil well beneath it were still working, but the computer had been instructed not to trigger any alarms in case of adverse readings...
[Full Article]Labels: BP, Deepwater Horizon, Gulf oil spill, Transocean
Monday, July 12, 2010
Founding member of cap and trade lobby will reap financial bounty if worsening crisis is exploited by Obama administration to impose carbon tax on Americans
Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Monday, July 12, 2010
Former high-level BP contractor and Army Special Operations soldier Adam Dillon told a New Orleans television station that British Petroleum is not interested in cleaning up the oil spill because the company is run by “cutthroat individuals” who only care about money.
Dillon was fired by BP “after taking photos that he believes were related to the use of dispersants and to the cleanup of the oil.” Before his dismissal, Dillon was “confined and interrogated for almost an hour,” by BP officials.
“There are some very great, hardworking individuals in there. But the bottom line is just about money. There are some very cutthroat individuals. They’re not worried about cleaning up that spill as it is,” said Dillon, adding that he has “lost faith” in BP’s response.
Dillon was one of BP’s hired goons used to keep reporters from asking questions of cleanup workers on beaches in Houma, but turned whistleblower after he was fired for taking photos of the consequences of chemicals used by BP to clean up the spill.
“I saw something when I was out there,” he said. “I took pictures of something and I brought it to the attention of the command structure and whatever I took pictures of, 12 hours later I was gone.”
Dillon decided to speak out publicly because he placed his oath to his country over and above any loyalty to BP.
“I will never have loyalty to this company,” he said. “I will always have loyalty to my country. And my country comes first.
“What this company is doing to this country right now is just wrong.”
As we have highlighted, as one of the founding members of the cap and trade lobby, BP stands to reap a financial bounty if the Obama administration succeeds in exploiting the worsening oil spill crisis to push through a carbon tax.
The worse the situation gets, the more political capital Obama builds in his effort to impose a consumption tax on American citizens in the name of reducing dependence on foreign oil. Viewed from this perspective, BP has no real motivation in cleaning up the oil spill.
BP’s market value plunged by more than a third in the months following the oil spill debacle, but this has recovered somewhat in recent days and once the spill is finally cleared up, expect to see the price return to pre-spill levels.
If the government manages to justify a carbon tax in the eyes of lawmakers by pointing to an environmental catastrophe in the Gulf, BP can look forward to massive long-term profits from both a sustained rise in the price of oil allied to a carbon tax that will be passed on to consumers.
BP’s botched efforts to cap the leaking oil well have done nothing to alleviate the problem, while the company’s use of the chemical Corexit is worsening the damage caused by the oil spill while causing sickness amongst large numbers of cleanup workers. The Obama administration has similarly dragged its feet in responding to the oil spill, waiting for months before it accepted help offered by thirteen different countries whose sophisticated technology could have fixed the leak within weeks.
BP’s reaction to the oil spill has proved that the company is more concerned about blocking media access to information about the situation than actually cleaning up the consequences of the spill.
Watch the clip below.
Labels: BP, British Petroleum, Paul Joseph Watson
Friday, July 9, 2010
In an under-the-radar release of new test results for its Gulf of Mexico oil spill workers, BP PLC is reporting potentially hazardous exposures to a now-discontinued dispersant chemical -- a substance blamed for contributing to chronic health problems after the Exxon Valdez cleanup -- among more than 20 percent of offshore responders...
[Full Article]
Labels: BP, dispersant, Exxon Valdez, Gulf oil spill
Monday, July 5, 2010
The Defense Department has kept up its immense purchases of aviation fuel and other petroleum products from BP even as the oil company comes under scrutiny for potential violations of federal and state laws related to Gulf of Mexico well explosion, according to U.S. and company officials.
President Obama said last month that the company's "recklessness" in the gulf contributed to the disaster, and he promised that BP will "pay for the damage." Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. said on June 2 that Justice Department lawyers were looking into possible violations of civil and criminal statutes. "If we find evidence of illegal behavior, we will be forceful in our response," he said.
BP, meanwhile, remains a heavy supplier of military fuel under contracts worth at least $980 million in the current fiscal year, according to the Defense Logistics Agency. In fiscal 2009, BP was the Pentagon's largest single supplier of fuel, providing 11.7 percent of the total purchased, and in 2010, its contracts amount to roughly the same percentage, according to DLA spokeswoman Mimi Schirmacher...
[Full Article]Labels: BP, British Petroleum, Defense Department, Department of Defense, Pentagon
Sunday, July 4, 2010
BP was facing fresh criticism over its approach to safety on Saturday night after critics said it did not use an industry standard process to asses risk ahead of the Deepwater Horizon disaster.
The procedure, known as a safety case, was developed in Britain after the catastrophic Piper Alpha oil rig explosion of 1988 in which 167 people lost their lives.
Royal Dutch Shell confirmed that it always develops safety cases – a lengthy written document – on each of its thousands of wells in the world, even though they are only mandatory in some countries...
Labels: BP, British Petroleum
Saturday, June 19, 2010
[From WashingtonsBlog.com]
As I noted on May 19th, BP has been telling cleanup workers that they don't need to wear respirators or other protective gear.
As Jerrold Nadler, the New York congressman whose district includes the World Trade Center, said today:
We're repeating the same catastrophe in the Gulf. You see pictures of people wearing regular clothes who are wading in and scooping oil off the water. Hundreds, maybe thousands of people, are going to get sick unnecessarily.More egregious still, sources on the ground say that BP is telling cleanup workers that they will be fired if they wear respirators:
Why?
Because - as part of their PR campaign - BP is doing everything it can to prevent dramatic pictures or headlines regarding the oil spill.
For example, BP has been keeping reporters out of areas hardest hit by the oil (and see this, this, this and this) and threatening to arrest them if they try to take pictures, hiding dead birds and other sealife, and using dispersants to break up the thick plumes of oil. Indeed, attorney and environmental advocate Monique Harden says that BP is "running the Gulf region like a prison warden".
Labels: BP, oil cleanup
Friday, June 18, 2010
BP Death Clouds Already Onshore
HorseofPaulRevere — June 14, 2010 — BP Oil Spill:Toxic Gases Spreading Inland, Scientist Says Move Out of Gulf...EVACUATIONS OF THE GULF REGION ARE COMING, FEMA WILL OPEN ITS ONE-WAY DOORS.
Gases such as Hydrogen Sulfide, Benzene, Methylene Chloride, and other toxic gases pose a greater risk to human health than the presence of oil washing up on Gulf of Mexico beaches. The allowable levels of Hydrogen Sulfide and Benzene according to the EPA are 5-10 parts per billion and 0 respectively.The EPA reported the level detected in the Gulf at almost 1,200 PPB for hydrogen sulfide and 3400 PPB for Benzene during the month of May. The amounts pose a serious and even fatal health risk to people and animals.
For some official level reports on these deadly gases click below
http://www.infowars.com/may-levels-of...
A QUESTION WE MUST ASK OURSELVES. How bad could this go? We are just at the beginning. Consider death and debilitating illness caused by the following, simple exposure to the crude oil and make-up, or the chemical dispersant, the close proximity to the 'burn-off' of such 'contained' areas, the fumes and toxic vapors being given off 'naturally' at the surface of the Gulf of Mexico. Also consider the unseen GIANT PLUMES of oil snaking their way through the depths of the ocean, poisoning all marine life on their way to everywhere. What about the marshlands, deltas, swamps and low lying areas dependent on the waters for their survival. I mean the animals AND the people. Food intake, let alone money for the fisherman, will be 0. All of these things, and much more, ARE ALREADY HAPPENING. Many will be hungry.
Labels: BP, British Petroleum, David Dees, Dees Illustration
Thursday, June 17, 2010
Former BP Chairman and current BP CEO both dumped stocks in weeks before disaster
Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Thursday, June 17, 2010
BP was aware of cracks appearing in the Macondo well as far back as February, right around the time Goldman Sachs and BP Chairman Tony Hayward were busy dumping their stocks in the company on the eve of the explosion that led to the oil spill, according to information uncovered by congressional investigators.
The Mining and Mineral Services agency released documents to Bloomberg indicating that BP “was trying to seal cracks in the well about 40 miles (64 kilometers) off the Louisiana coast,” according to the report.
The fissures, which BP began to attempt to fix on February 13, could have played a role in the disaster, though this is a question still being explored by investigators. Improperly sealed, the cracks cause explosive natural gas to rush up the shaft.
“The company attempted a “cement squeeze,” which involves pumping cement to seal the fissures, according to a well activity report. Over the following week the company made repeated attempts to plug cracks that were draining expensive drilling fluid, known as “mud,” into the surrounding rocks,” states the report.
As we previously highlighted, eyewitness evidence indicates that Deepwater Horizon managers knew that the BP oil rig had major problems before its explosion on April 20. A crew member who rescued burning workers on the rig told Houston attorney Tony Buzbee of a conversation between Deepwater Horizon installation manager Jimmy Harrell and someone in Houston. According to the witness, Harrell was screaming, “Are you fucking happy? Are you fucking happy? The rig’s on fire! I told you this was gonna happen.”
The fact that BP managers were aware of problems with the rig and were seemingly unconcerned about fixing them only lends more weight to the already startling indications of some having foreknowledge of the disaster.
As we highlighted last week, on page 37 of British Petroleum’s own investigative report into the oil spill, it is stated that the Hydraulic Control System on equipment designed to automatically seal the well in an emergency was modified without BP’s knowledge sometime before the explosion.
Highly suspicious stock and share trades by people connected to BP before the explosion indicate some extent of foreknowledge.
Goldman Sachs dumped 44% of its shares in BP Oil during the first quarter of 2010 – shares that subsequently lost 36 percent of their value, equating to $96 million. The current chairman of Goldman Sachs is Bilderberg luminary Peter Sutherland, who is also the former chairman of British Petroleum.
Furthermore, as reported by the London Telegraph on June 5th, Tony Hayward, the current BP CEO sold £1.4 million of his shares in the fuel giant weeks before the spill.
On April 12th, just over one week before the Deepwater Horizon rig exploded, Halliburton, the world’s second largest oilfield services corporation, surprised some by acquiring Boots & Coots, a relatively small but vastly experienced oil well control company.
Halliburton is named in the majority of some two dozen lawsuits filed since the explosion by Gulf Coast people and businesses who claim that the company is to blame for the disaster.
Halliburton was forced to admit in testimony at a congressional hearing last month that it carried out a cementing operation 20 hours before the Gulf of Mexico rig went up in flames. The lawsuits claim that four Halliburton workers stationed on the rig improperly capped the well.
Labels: BP, Deepwater Horizon, Goldman Sachs, oil rig
Sunday, June 6, 2010
Tony Hayward cashed in about a third of his holding in the company one month before a well on the Deepwater Horizon rig burst, causing an environmental disaster.
Mr Hayward, whose pay package is £4 million a year, then paid off the mortgage on his family’s mansion in Kent, which is estimated to be valued at more than £1.2 million.
There is no suggestion that he acted improperly or had prior knowledge that the company was to face the biggest setback in its history.
His decision, however, means he avoided losing more than £423,000 when BP’s share price plunged after the oil spill began six weeks ago.
Since he disposed of 223,288 shares on March 17, the company’s share price has fallen by 30 per cent. About £40 billion has been wiped off its total value. The fall has caused pain not just for BP shareholders, but also for millions of company pension funds and small investors who have money held in tracker funds...
Labels: BP, British Petroleum, Deepwater Horizon, shares, stock
Friday, June 4, 2010
Firm's stock sale nearly twice as large as any other institution; Represented 44 percent of total BP investment
The brokerage firm that's faced the most scrutiny from regulators in the past year over the shorting of mortgage related securities seems to have had good timing when it came to something else: the stock of British oil giant BP.
According to regulatory filings, RawStory.com has found that Goldman Sachs sold 4,680,822 shares of BP in the first quarter of 2010. Goldman's sales were the largest of any firm during that time. Goldman would have pocketed slightly more than $266 million if their holdings were sold at the average price of BP's stock during the quarter.
If Goldman had sold these shares today, their investment would have lost 36 percent its value, or $96 million. The share sales represented 44 percent of Goldman's holdings -- meaning that Goldman's remaining holdings have still lost tens of millions in value...
Labels: BP, Goldman Sachs, oil rig
Sunday, May 9, 2010
Bureau Of Land Management Was Doing A Surprise Inspection On Oil Rig 2 Hours Before It Exploded
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHj97pvEHkM
UniversalAgent — May 05, 2010 — Exclusive interview of Zac Zimmerman of Zimmerman Oil reveals little-known fact that the Bureau of Land Management was doing uncharacteristic surprise inspections the day of the oil rig explosion in the gulf, and they were on THAT VERY RIG just 2 HOURS before the disaster started! Full interview on Invisible Hand Podcast #6, available at libertycappress.com and on iTunes. Go directly here: http://www.libertycappress.com//?p=2060
Interview With Zac Zimmerman Of Zimmerman Oil
(To Download.. [Right Click][Save Target As (IE) / Save Link As (FireFox)])The Invisible Hand #6: Interview with Zac Zimmerman of Zimmerman Oil
This week’s show includes my interview with Zac Zimmerman of Zimmerman Oil, who reveals the shocking information that the Bureau of Land Management was conducting a surprise inspection on the Deepwater Horizon just two hours before the oil rig exploded last month. He also discusses the disturbing nature of the armed BLM “SWAT teams” that have been dispatched by the President to inspect the rest of the oil rigs in the Gulf, and the foreboding possibility of a peak oil crisis in the future.
(A preview of this interview was posted on YouTube two days ago, and made mention on the Declare Your Independence radio show with Ernest Hancock in hour two of his program on Wednesday, May 5th, about 20 minutes in. Thanks Ernie!)...
[Full Article]Labels: BP, Bureau of Land Management, Gulf of Mexico, oil rig, video
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