U.S. District Court Judge Martin Feldman on June 22 ordered an injunction against the federal government’s six-month moratorium on deepwater oil drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, issued one month after the April 20 explosion of BP’s Deepwater Horizon oil platform. The New Orleans-based judge agreed with the plaintiffs, oil services firms and others that the government was “arbitrary and capricious” in implementing the May 28 ban on new wells in more than 500 ft of water. Feldman said the government did not prove that the accident indicates a threat from the 33 rigs operating in the Gulf. The federal
Despite Florida Gov. Charlie Crist’s (I) authorization this month of as much as $200 million for a long-term effort to provide upgraded sewer systems for the Florida Keys, the prospects are poor for funding in total the estimated $937-million project. The governor’s action—which also extended the project deadline to 2015 from July 2010—does not provide a timeline for delivery of the Everglades Restoration bonds; it only authorizes the Florida Legislature to initiate the $200 million in bonding sometime in the future. Liz Wood, Monroe County’s senior administrator for sewer projects, says the nine municipalities and utilities that will build the
The Tennessee Dept. of Environment and Conservation on June 15 assessed a $11.5-million fine against the Tennessee Valley Authority in connection with the December 2008 spill that released 5.4 million cu yds of coal ash from TVA’s Kingston, Tenn., coal-fired plant onto surrounding land and into the Emory River. The fine is the first against the federal power-marketing agency since the accident, but TVA will receive a $3-million credit for remediation already performed. Cleanup could cost $1.2 billion. Under the state fine, TVA will perform supplemental environmental projects totaling $2 million. The remainder will be earmarked for the state’s solid-waste
The Shaw Group Inc. is working to pry loose and draw in a large portion of the nation’s dredging fleet―potentially seven cutterheads, five large hoppers and a dozen scows―for the emergency delivery of roughly 45 miles of permitted projects (of 128 miles sought) of barrier berm on the Louisiana coast... that state officials hope will protect inland marshes from the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill. The problem is, a lot of the equipment already is occupied elsewhere. Photo: Courtesy of Great Lakes Dredge & Dock Co. Big dredges operate with their own fleets of as many as 30 support vessels
The beauty of the Web is its ability to build an audience for significant presentations, even after an event has ended. A June 8 panel discussion at the National Building Museum in Washington, D.C., on the state of seismic building codes, couched in presentations of lessons learned from recent earthquakes in Chile and Haiti, is a fine example. Photo By Tom Sawyer, Enr. In Haiti, building codes are often inadequate or ignored. Related Links: Building Codes Shakedown: Designing for Disaster The presentations—by David Applegate, senior science adviser for earthquake and geologic hazards at the U.S. Geological Survey; Michael J. Armstrong,
President Obama has named Michael R. Bromwich, a former federal prosecutor and Justice Dept. Inspector General, to oversee a restructuring of the Interior Dept.'s Minerals Management Service. In the wake of the Gulf oil spill, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar announced plans on May 19 to split MMS into three divisions, separating regulatory functions from the job of collecting royalties from oil drilling. Bromwich, whose appointment was announced on June 15, will be in charge of developing the new structure. The White House said he "has a mandate to implement far-reaching change" at the agency. Bromwich, a partner with the law
As contractors mobilized to berm Louisiana’s shoreline to protect its wetlands from oil gushing out of a ruptured well in the Gulf of Mexico, the nation focused on the plan’s chances for success, the disaster’s economic and environmental consequences, and the future of the region’s offshore oil industry. A computer modeling study released on June 3 suggests the oil from the spill in the Gulf of Mexico may extend up the Atlantic coast and into open ocean as early as this summer. Crews mobilize heavy equipment to build oil-blocking berms on Dauphin Island, Ala. var so = new FlashObject("http://natalie.feedroom.com/construction/natoneclip/Player.swf","Player", "300",
Louisiana’s Office of Coastal Protection and Restoration awarded The Shaw Group Inc. the job as project manager on a $360-million project to construct berms along coastal barrier islands to stop the invasion of oil from the BP spill on delicate marshes. Related Links: Map of the project area on the west side of the Mississippi Delta Within 24 hours of signing the contract, Baton Rouge-based Shaw had two bucket dredges on their way to begin moving sand. The state signed emergency permits for the work late June 2, after it was announced that BP would fund the project as a
In a controversial emergency measure, BP will pay $360 million so Louisiana can build sand berms along six reaches of barrier islands in an effort to protect oil from invading the state’s delicate marshes and buffer against hurricane storm surge. Related Links: The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers decision to offer permits for emergency berming of six reaches of barrier islands around the Mississippi River Delta to prevent oil from entering marshes and bolster protections against storm surge. Map of the project area on the east side of the Mississippi Delta Map of the project area on the west side
A gigantic sinkhole formed May 31 in Guatemala City during heavy rainfall from tropical storm Agatha, which killed at least 146 people in Central America. The hole, reportedly more than 200 ft deep, swallowed a three-story building and most of an intersection. A similar but smaller sinkhole last year in the same vicinity was blamed on faulty sewer lines. City residents speculate that faulty wastewater treatment infrastructure triggered the latest geotechnical breach. The tropical storm swept ashore two days after a volcanic eruption. The first torrent ashore from the Pacific Ocean this year, Agatha created mudslides throughout the region that
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