New Regs, no new Rigs

New regulations to be out soon for safety in 500+ feet drilling in the gulf of Mexico. No indication when the new regs will mean rigs going back on line as new permits must be issued. There is no indication when that will start, only hope.

The Interior Department has said it will release new drilling regulations by the end of September aimed at increasing safety in the industry, which was rocked by the BP oil spill disaster.

The new rules are one of the conditions the department said must be in place before it lifts its temporary ban on exploratory drilling in waters more than 500 feet deep. The freeze is supposed to expire in November 30, but the Interior Department has said it hopes to end the ban early.

"Even when the moratorium is lifted, you're not going to see drilling going on the next day, or even the next week," Bromwich told a White House oil spill commission meeting. "It's going to take some time. (Reuters)

The American Petroleum Institute – which represents the U.S. industry – did not criticize the regulations, saying it needed time to study them. But it did raise concerns about the lack of clarity, and lengthy permitting processes delaying activity.

“There has to be a clear, practical, and certain process for project review that will protect the environment,” API director Erik Milito said in a statement. “We cannot have an approval process that creates unpredictable delays that could place at risk the flow of domestic energy in our country.”

“My biggest concern – once the moratorium has been lifted – has to do with the capacity inside the regulator to process permits.” (The globe and mail)

- However, rigs have and are leaving and none are scheduled to replace them.

The April 20 blow-out caused more than 4 million barrels of crude oil to spew into the Gulf after a fiery explosion killed 11 workers and sunk Transocean Ltd's Deepwater Horizon rig.

Below are rigs that had been working in the Gulf that have been or will be moved to overseas markets because of the drilling moratorium.

* Diamond Offshore Drilling Inc said on July 9 the Ocean Endeavor rig, which had been contracted to earn about $290,000 per day from Devon Energy Corp in the Gulf of Mexico, will move to Egypt under a new deal with Burullus Gas Co.

* Diamond said on July 12 it would move the Deepwater Ocean Confidence, under contract to Murphy Oil Corp, from the Gulf to the Republic of Congo. [ID:nnN12212133]

* Transocean, the world's largest offshore drilling contractor, said on Sept. 1 it has moved its Marianas rig, under contract to Italy's Eni , from the Gulf to work off Nigeria. [ID:nN01152276]

* Transocean said on Sept. 14 that its Discoverer Americas vessel, under contract to Norway's Statoil , is leaving the Gulf for Egypt. [ID:nnN14103743] (Reporting by Anna Driver in Houston and Brandon Randall in San Francisco)(Reuters)

Steve brings it to Congress

This is all that needs to be said.

Some Truths about poverty in the U.S.

The keys to poverty: Definitions, time, family.

Definitions change over time and Europe uses a different standard than the U.S., because of technology a middle class person could be said to be a wealthy as the richest people a hundred years ago. Could John D. Rockefeller have breakfast in Chicago and Dinner in Paris?

1959 was the first year they kept track of poverty, in the 50's it is estimated to have been around 23% and that was a decline from the late 1800's when it was between 30 & 50 percent!

The news yesterday was an increase of poverty to 14% and it was all over the news. They point out after the "war on poverty" it went down to 10%, but it had been as low as 11.3% in 2000.

Most who fall into poverty are there for only a short time, family is your best support system, not government. Those that are part of a permenate poor have other sources of income they are not reporting. As a tax preparer I find that the lower the income, the more hiding there is. The wealther clients just understand taxes are part of life and just pay it.

Those that avoid taxes avoid wealth

Ben Franklin's Creed: The American Religion

To Ezra Stiles, 9 March 1790 (B 12:185-6):

You desire to know something of my religion. It is the first time I have been questioned upon it. But I cannot take your curiosity amiss, and shall endeavor in a few words to gratify it. Here is my creed. I believe in one God, the creator of the universe. That he governs by his providence. That he ought to be worshipped. That the most acceptable service we render to him is doing good to his other children. That the soul of man is immortal, and will be treated with justice in another life respecting its conduct in this. These I take to be the fundamental points in all sound religion, and I regard them as you do in whatever sect I meet with them.

As to Jesus of Nazareth, my opinion of whom you particularly desire, I think his system of morals and his religion, as he left them to us, the best the world ever saw or is likely to see; but I apprehend it has received various corrupting changes, and I have, with most of the present dissenters in England, some doubts as to his divinity; though it is a question I do not dogmatize upon, having never studied it, and think it needless to busy myself with it now, when I expect soon an opportunity of knowing the truth with less trouble. I see no harm, however, in its being believed, if that belief has the good consequences, as probably it has, of making his doctrines more respected and more observed; especially as I do not perceive that the Supreme takes it amiss, by distinguishing the unbelievers in his government of the world with any peculiar marks of his displeasure.

The Works of Benjamin Franklin (New York: Putnam’s, 1904)