BP: Big Profits & Big Pollution

According to Reuters, BP has just announced they haven't been sure how much oil they were siphoning off from the leaking well in the Gulf of Mexico.  You might think it was an easy thing for BP employees to do, just look into the collection container and measure, right?  Well, it might seem easy to you, but BP's folks on-site were apparently just guessing.

BP said on Monday the oil collected by the mile-long siphon tube was at times as low as 1,360 barrels of oil per day in the six days to May 23 with the tube capturing an average 2,010 barrels per day in the time period.

The average figure is less than half the 5,000 barrels per day the company estimates is leaking into the sea and comes after it said it was managing to siphon off around 5,000 barrels per day a few days ago.

Of course, some experts have made significantly higher estimates for the size of the leak than BP provided, too. That's not surprising, BP has a profit motive, not a truth motive.

You know what is surprising, though? It got hard to find this story on the Reuters website, almost immediately. It's amazing BP can't even get the measurement where they're collecting some of the oil. You don't think Reuters is under pressure from BP or investors, do you?

Meanwhile, comparisons to the impact of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster are growing almost as fast as the pressure on the Obama administration to act. BP may have created jobs, but few who have seen the massive and spreading disaster think their response has been adequate, and we all know it will fall to the government not only to hold BP accountable, but ultimately to clean up the mess, too.

Thomas Hayes is an entrepreneur, journalist, political staffer, and photographer who contributes regularly to a host of web sites on topics ranging from economics and politics to culture and community.