Dems unveiled spill bill earlier today

[AmericaIsGreat]

Some things it would do:

- Eliminates the $75 million liability cap for offshore oil spills.
- Amends the Death on High Seas Act to eliminate the cap on liability for workers who die at sea.
- Repeals the Limitation of Shipowner's Liability Act of 1851, which Deepwater Horizon owner Transocean tried to use to curb its -liability for the incident.
- Holds oil company CEOs accountable for safety failures on rigs and drilling operations.
- Sets tougher standards for inspection of blowout preventers and other equipment intended to shut off wells in the event of an emergency, and require independent certification by a third party.
- Requires more layers of redundancy on safety equipment to close wells in case of an accident.
- Sets new standards for the cementing and casing of wells.
- Raises penalties for safety violations.
- Requires all companies drilling in the outer continental shelf to pay royalties on oil and gas, a measure that sponsors say would bring in $53 billion dollars in lost revenue over 25 years.
- Ends the practice of granting categorical exclusions to detailed environmental analysis for offshore operations.
- Adds protections for whistleblowers who call attention to safety violations in oil and gas operations.
- Bars companies with poor safety record from obtaining new leases.

Cut from http://motherjones.com/blue-marble/2010/07/democrats-bp-oil-spill-laws

Only needed the biggest American ecological disaster in history to get some changes proposed.

[SydneyDundee]

1. ..I predict it will be watered down..as it impacts big petro-dollar US companies too much!

[Scurrilous]

2. K & R

:thumbsup:

[lunatica]

3. You mean that while we were all bitching about nothing being done

Someone actually got something done?!

Who knew?