hope -- sometimes in very highly publicized situations, and this certainly has been one of the most had publicized ever, that there is a tendency on the part of the congress and agencies to sometimes overreact. i hope we do not do that. if we do that, we could end up hurting millions of foreign and working people and this country. we do not want to do that. we do not want to drive gas prices to $6 or $8 a gallon. we do not want to put energy costs beyond the means of ordinary citizens. yesterday, jeffrey wrote this, "on one hand, pulling back in rethinking offshore drilling makes perfect sense. certainly, stricter safeguards need to be applied. just saying no is exactly the

wrong answer. people do not stop flying after an airplane crash. the u.s. should not withdraw from oil production because of one major leak." i share that opinion of him. i have a concern the as expressed by secretary salazar before a senate committee raising the liability cap to some extremely exorbitant level would hurt the small companies a lot more than the bp's and big companies. i hope that one way arrive at legislative solutions for the problems that we are confronted with and this that possibly we consider having higher taxes for some of the bigger companies and lower caps for the smaller

companies. i am also -- i also want to see bp and transocean recover from this instance. he mentioned his company has 22,000 employees. certainly, you know, i do not want them to harm to buy this or the thousands of stockholders that the companies have. i know transocean has 18,000 employees. that is what i was told. i do not know how many of those are in this country? >> i believe it is about 2500. >> 25 under. let me just ask one question. the last major oil rigs bill and this country was off the coast of santa barbara 41 years ago. how many oil rigs are there? i really do not know this. how many offshore oil rigs are

operating of the coast of the united states at this time? >> i know there have been almost 43,000 wells drilled. there have been 7000 production platforms of some sort in the last 50 years. >> 42,000 oilwells and 7000 production platforms. >> yes. >> at the command center briefing that we had with our u.s. parliamentary group, the figure of 3800 drill rigs in the gulf of mexico was given. >> ok. well, i guess the point is this. this is almost always a very safe and environmentally safe way to reduce oil.

i know that a lot people and the country wants to punish bp and other companies. i am very impressed by the fact that you said a while ago the of yardy paid 19,000 claims. i mean, that is unheard of. i commend you for that. i can tell you i have no connection whatsoever to bp or any other oil company at all. with that, i will yield back the balance of my time. >> thank you for the comments. >> thank you for holding this hearing. i have been in congress for 18 years. nothing has happened that will have devastated the state of florida like this bill. we certainly have a diverse opinion on this committee. i have heard people on this committee stage show, baby, a drill. that is not my opinion.

you need these safeguards in place. florida has been devastated by this. i want to put the statement from the u.s. travel association into the record. in florida, tourism generates $65 billion. we have over 1 million people working in this industry. we are devastated. people are canceling. they are not coming to the hotels. they are not coming to florida come in thinking that the fish is not safe. we are in lockdown devastation. i have a couple of questions. let's point out that in 2006, we pass legislation saying they you cannot drill off of florida coast because of the military men knew best -- military and menuvas. keep in mind it is not one to be

automatic drilling of a florida coast. i have a couple of questions for you. i am not an engineer. mr. newman, i understand other countries have a device that cost about $500,000 that would have prevented this. can you give us insight into that? >> yes, i believe you are referring to an acoustic control system. it is required in two regulatory regimes, norway and canada. there is a the only to areas of the world where it is required. >> does it work? >> it is another means of activating the bop. i will talk about the means of activating these bop that existed on the deepwater horizon. there were three manual activation panels on the raid. -- rig. the fact we have three is in

excess of the regulation. in addition to manual intervention, the bop was it did with two automatic response systems. one of which the industry refers to as the "dead man" and "auto s heer." there was an hour of the -- rov intervention. the acoustic control would have been a fit in addition to the four that already existed. because we have had an opportunity to manually b intervene on toop with the remote operated vehicles, the adulation has been unsuccessful in stopping the flow of hydrocarbons. i do not believe that another means of activating it would have made a difference. >> you are saying it is not safe? >> which procedure?

>> the drilling. >> i'm not sure i can make that statement until we know exactly what happened. >> we do know that what was ever in place and not work. >> we know that there was a cat across the -- catastrophic failure. >> florida requested $35 million for assistance. i think you approved $25 million. what is the factors that went in? i think the governor requested $35 million. what was the decision to decide on that number? >> i am not sure on the difference between $25 million and $35 million. >> 10. [laughter] ? i'm not sure what into the rationale between $25 million and $35 million. >> yes, sir. that'll be great. we are having a hearing tomorrow. one of the things you signed

march 5 by the state of washington -- 13 serious violations in this area. i am just wondering about the culture. you indicated you thought you had all but certain safeguards in place. you are constantly being signed by the state and not following your procedure. what is it that we in congress can do to ensure? we need more regulation, more safeguards or trust their fight. i am certainly in support of having the coast guard there when you all did the testing and maneuvers. at nothing the taxpayer should fit the bill. >> -- i do not think the

taxpayers should fit the bill. respond. >> could you repeat the question? >> on may 5, if you signed for 13 serious violations. >> i believe you are referring to the refinery. this company is dedicated to making the safety colter at every single level as good as it is come possibly be. as i said, we put a lot of procedures in place. we have made a lot of progress. the journey is never finished. we must get better. as far as this incident, we need to understand what happened. it is the time where signals were there, what happened with the equipment -- that needs to be understood. so that this industry can move forward in a safer way. >> all right. i yield back the balance of my

time. >> and recognize miss miller of michigan. >> thank you. he and i have an opportunity about a week ago to be down in the gulf. we went out with the coast guard into an aerial view of the spill. we have all seen it on tv and on the newspaper pictures. from my perspective, when you are flying out there and little bit of short you start to see the oil sheen and the spill and the various colors of the rain bow it was taking on, orange and purple and pink -- it is unimaginable to see it as it is. my personal feeling, i felt physically ill looking at it, thinking about what is happening

underneath the ocean and what was going to happen as this thing, like a doom, it is floating toward the gulf shores and now possibly getting in the loop stream. i would just make a general observation. we have a lot of people commenting about the energy needs of the country. there is no doubt have a tremendous amount of energy needs. we will continue to consume energy. we should. coming from michigan where we are about to unveil the electric vehicle and we are trying to get off the summit the reliance that we have on fossil fuel, i would just say that i would hope that this congress a much better look at nuclear. we have to get off of this oil

at some point. cap and trade and not even address nuclear energy. we are not going to build enough windmills. we do not even have the transmission grid to have enough electricity right now to power all of these elected because we are putting on. i hope that we think about not -- we need alternative types of energy. in regard to the spill in the committee hearing today, i will say i did cannot leave your testimony about how you are preparing and testing at that depth. i think it was mr. newman who may come is saying you are going to evaluate the response capability in the future. i say that probably understatement of the year, sir. the briefing that we had from the commander of the coast guard -- they are doing and unbelievable job -- will masoud the sombrero, at the dome,

suspended on 5,000 feet of steel cable buffeted by the ocean currents in the near trying to get thedome on to the pipe. it has been badly damaged. it did look like one of those videogames where you are trying to predict quarter in -- it sounds ridiculous -- that is what it looks like. it was mentioned at that time that the dome was technology that has been used and has been proven to work in the past. at 300 feet at death, not the 5,000 feet of depth. we do have 2,300 pounds square inch pressure. it has never been tried there. keep in mind that is ellis' 3,500 feet deeper than our nuclear suffering and even go. -- that is even 3,500 feet

deeper than our nuclear suffering can go. he said it has never been used a 5,000 feet. and do not know at what that the use it. do you have laboratories where you stimulate that type of debt? yet all these oil rigs there. it is beyond my belief that we are not stimulating this to be prepared and what might happen in the future. my other question is, you had the best in the world that came. a guy from brazil and everyone you are bringing from all over. to come up with a chemical version of antifreeze. have you had any success now for the next time, god forbid?

do you simulate that in a lab? are you prepared for this to happen in again? quite there is a tremendous amount of preparation. we knew hydrate would be a problem. it beforet predict the flo hand. this is unique and unprecedented. it is not experienced in action ever. we can model these things. is that a typical -- difficult debt that humans cannot touch. i do think we will learn a lot from this and it will be incorporated into set of capabilities. >> thank you very much. >> we have made vote in

progress. there will be time to continue the questioning. -- isn a the transocean' it true that bp is transition -- transocean's customer? it is bp who was seeking to achieve proper drilling operations through the use of the deepwater horizon. we also know that complex deepwater drilling operations require multiple specialized parties to achieve success. of the night of april 20 when the accident occurred, efforts were away that they were drilling.

who was ultimately in control of the drilling operation at that time debts there had been -- how would it have been resolved? >> he is well designed. it is ultimately bp who determines whether or not that well is being constructed to their specifications. >> if there is a conflict that day, who makes that decision? bp? >> it depends on the nature of the conflict. it is related to the design of the well, because it is bp's design, they will make the ultimate determination. it is a conflict with three back to safety -- with respect to safety, fuel the work force transocean know and understand

that they are obligated to stop any unsafe operation. >> do you agree with that? >> transocean normally has 120 people on the rig. redesigning well and tried to make sure the executions as are dumb. transocean had no qualified to operate on that rig without transocean doing it. >> would it be fair to guess -- what disagreements might there have been? do you know of any? >> i do not know that information. investigation will get to the.

the government has an investigation under way. i think the conversations in the digital data that was occurring before the well explosion is critical to understand what happened. >> when i visited down and had an opportunity to talk to a number of people involved, one of the things they said worse with the industry -- they said that the industry more than likely had mistakes made. one of the things they said was that they want to make sure that there are plans in place

and equipment in place so that if anything like this ever happens again we would be able to effectively and efficiently do with it. and'm listening to you all, correct me if i'm wrong, it sounds like you do not have confidence the we can do that. do you follow me? >> the guide is comment. the response is what everyone is concerned with. we are trying to stop the source of the blow of prevented. i do think the industry will understand what sort of generic capability may be needed to be on standby. there may be protocols for the industry to immediately be able to help and organize for that. there are a lot of things we are

going to learn how did this, redundancies and other things, that will put this on a path to make it safer. i really do. >> i am sure you heard my comments about the coast guard in wanting them to be much more involved. i think they can have a tremendous impact and probably would be very helpful. do you have an opinion? >> i think we are very fortunate with the leadership of the coast guard and their ability to react. more understanding on the front it would be a good thing. >> thank you very much. >> mr. buchanan. >> thank you. alice the past chairman of the florida chamber. we have a $65 billion tourism. the impact, i am from sarasota

tarball -- so gigantic. the impact it has on the whole region in every state -- we just got to take into mind it is not only one of the largest ecological disasters in our history, but when we get the impact it to have economically to a state like florida will we have 12% unemployment. we count on tourism. it is gigantic. i am against drilling off our beaches and stock. some people want as close as 3 miles. that has not been a popular thing for me. as a result, i have many experts in the industry come to me and

say what is happening here in this deepwater drilling could not happen. we have the deep water technology. we have the printers. i said, are you saying 100% cannot happen? absolutely, 100%. alice thought there could be a possibility because i was concerned about hurricanes . it would write into my congressional district south in may. n is, whate questio, is the percentage of this happening? i was told this cannot happen. it just cannot happen. i am bored by a hurricane blowing the platform away. could you give me a brief comment on that? let's i take it is unique and unprecedented. there has been 42,000 wells. it has not happen like this and hurricanes have come through many times and the safety

systems have worked. >> out the key the hurricanes as one of it. and never even imagined this. i am talking about something like this happening again. what is the possibility of that? i was led to believe that this cannot happen. just in general, anything happening. >> no one could give a guarantee that anything could not laughing. the important thing is to learn everything we can from this to lower that is going forward. i do think i'm confident the investigations will help as to that. >> one of the things he said earlier in your opening statement is that we have a new culture and environment. the washington post get a story that a special exemptions related to this waiver for

environmental studies and treaty. whitey said on one side that you are all into compliance and get your looking for an extension to get around some of the environmental requirements for drilling? >> i think what you are referring to is a categorical exclusion. exploration activity is categorically excluded. there are environmental studies that are done. there is a statement that is very extensive. there are more assessments done. the categorical exclusion utilizes the government said is that have been done. >> what are you doing to make sure they are safe? >> we had done some additional work. they are working on this

situation. we have to test the bop's in different ways. there is several things we are doing. all of the activity is around this. >> i know you are paying a lot claims as it relates to new orleans. how did it get things as loss of business in the florida? how are you going to deal with that? are you dealing with that? i have sullenness as i have a bunch of places on the beach and people are canceling. are you going to do with those folks as well? >> absolutely. our claims process stills with that. >> we have claims offices.

i can get back to you on where they are. i just wanted to ask mr. newman. what is your sense of the probability of this happening? they say it cannot happen. it happened. yet been in the business for a long time. is the one out of 10,000? 100,000? >> i think the fundamental question is what is on the inside of the bop? bop design constraints function extremely well. if you have the wrong step inside the bop like cement or casing or other debris, similar to what to have seen fly out of the well and land on the deck of the supply vessels, you have that step inside the bop. >> i yield back.

that raises further questions about who is holding responsibility. we will come back to the members after the floor votes would to probably take about 20 or 25 minutes. the committee will stand in recess. [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010]

>> our next member in line. massachusetts. >> thank you. bp drilling in the north sea? >> yes. >> we have leases in canadian waters. but do you do work in the north sea? canadian waters? >> yes. >> the go to listen to do work in the two countries are there yet identified as having more strict requirements. waters? >> yes. >> you have chosen work in wars thatou show as having more strict requirements than the united states so, therefore, you can obviously make a profit. i'm sure you're making a profit and god bless you for making the profit but basically what you told me -- did i hear it wrong

that you can do good business in places that have higher requirements, more strict requirements to safeguard our environment. is that a fair conclusion of the answers you just gave me? >> transocean works in 30 countries around the world and the regulatory regimes in the 30 countries span the spectrum and the united states -- >> you just earlier in response to ms. brown said that canada and norway have higher, more stringent requiments on safety issues than the united states does whether they would or would not have worked, you had speculation which i respect but the question i basically have is why shouldn't we hold you to the highest international standards there are in any country in this world in which you are doing business? is there any reason we should not? i didn't think so but thank you. i guess my other question is, i guess, mr. mckay, i get quoted

in the paper all the time. sometimes right and wrong. is it an appropriateuotation from mr. hayward who i understand is the ceo, an appropriate quotation, is this correct that you said that the spill in the gulf of mexico was relatively tiny compared to a very big ocean. do you know if that's an accurate quotation? >> i've seen that reported. i can just give you my perspective that any oil in the gulf of mexico is a very serious thing. >> i think that's appropriate. on the presumption that it's accurate, which, you know, there are times it is not, i really hope that you express to mr. hayward our displeasure wit that approach or attitude. not so much the comments. i appreciate the honesty of them if they're honest. if they're not honest and flip, then i would suggest that maybe he takes it a little bit more seriously. maybe if the spill is in the north sea closer where he lives

there might be other issues but maybe not. but either way, if that's an accurate statement, i will tell you that it's not going to win friends and influence people around here and maybe mr. hayward should take that into account. am i correct in understanding that bp's profits in the first quarter of this year in the neighborhood of $6 billion? >> i believe that's right. worldwide, yes. >> i appreciate that. i would hope that it's your intention -- i assume it's your intention to use that entire profit before you come looking for any sort of reimburse on anything related to the spill from the united states government. is that a fair assumption? >> we've been very clear that we are not coming to the u.s. government for reimbursement. we have said we'll live up to our responsibility -- >> understand that. there's been no figures on and everything we're responsible for. just in the hearing here, i've seen you do this at least two times. mr. cummings and mr. defazio. i appreciate that. m lawyer. th is the lawyer's full

employment spill as far as i'm concerned. i get that. but i'm really more interesd in not so much -- i understand there's going to be this i get it but i'm interested in what you are willing to do and if you use the entire $6illion and chase mr. newman or anybody else for it, fine. that's okay. if you have $6 billion in profits, you can't really honestly think that this government's going to pay for your responsibilities when you're walking away with a profit so you should be able to have a spill, fight it out in court, fine and walk away with a profit, as well? you think that's a fair thing for me to ask my taxpayers to do? >> i don't believe i've said that at all. i hope i have given no indication we want the u.s. government to reimburse us for this. >> but the fishermen -- >> sorry. i've been clear. we are going to make good those claims. we have been very clear since the outset. >> excellent. this is good news. i can tell my taxpayers that they will not be on the hook for

any aspect of this spil >> all costs related to the spill we will bear. >> i love that. i hope you make a big profit. i will tell you, though, i'd like to just ask my last seconds. have either one of you used the phrase that i've heard so often, drill baby drill? do you ever use the phrase? >> no, sir. i have not been part of that particular movement. >> i appreciate that. i would suggest that -- i would love people who used it to now come to this microphone and tell me how they feel today. and not that i'm against -- i think that mr. duncan's earlier commentary of the fact that the united states should not walk away from drilling, it is necessary part of life today but those that are so flip and so quick to say drill baby drill and have parties celebrating the concept i would suggest that the bush/cheney days are over. this country is no longer run by people with that attitude and i don't think the american

taxpayers stand for it. i still think that the attitude inside, we're not against providing the energy we need. we are for doing it in a thoughtful, safe manner. held to the highest standards possible, especially if there are other countries doing it and especially if you're doing business in those countries and no reason we shouldn't be held to it and i look forward to you fulfilling the requirements, mr. mckay. i understand lawsuits between everybody. so be it. but either way, i do look forward to us not having to be asked by anybody to come up with a nickel to deal with the cost associated with this spill and i appreciate your commitment to at. thank you. >> thank the gentlema mr. cao who represents new orleans, a major portion of new orleans, who's in the direct path of the environmental consequences and who is there to

greet us two weeks ago when our delegation of members for the canada interparliamentary group arrived for an over flight and been immersed in the issues and of the spill and conquences and very rigorously defending his constituents. i thank the gentleman for his constan constay. >> thank you. we have a limited time so i would like you to answer the questions very briefly if you don't mind. first of all, was not here and i'm -- i was just wondering whether or not anyone asked for what do you mean by the term legitimate? can you explain to me what do you me by legitimate clai? how do you decide whether a claim is legitimate or not? >> yes. we -- we use the oil pollution act as a guide and the coast guard guidelines that are within that for legitimate and they cover things like property

damage, personal injury cleanup costs. things like that. there are guidelines in the oil pollution act. >> how does this act affect, for example, fishermen trying to file a claim, small businesses trying to file a claim? >> i know some of the documents you asked for, if, tax returns a lot of fishermen might not file tax returns. how can they file a legitimate claim when they cannot submit some of the documents you request? >> we need jsh denly start wh income, tax returns. could be receipts from past catches and things like that. some substantiation of some sort. >> in the last couple of days, i have met with a nber of your employees, including mr. -- i'm sorry, i forgot, the vice president of bp. i conveyed to him the -- some of the -- my concerns in the implementation of the vessel of opportunity program, as well as

some of the programs, training programs, benefit programs, how they are being implemented in the minority communities because there are problems of language problems concerning accessibility. i wonder whether or not some of the concerns have been addressed right now. >> i don't know those exact concerns but i'll be glad to go back and check and get back to you as quickly as possible. >> what kind of plans do you have in the long term to address the issue of economic development to address the issue of the seafood and fishing industry for the states along the gulf coast? >> several studies. one major one is a natural resource damage assessment study that's going on now with the federal lead trustee is noaa.

they're doing that study which baselines -- has -- is baselining things and then will evaluate the damage to natural resources, the damage to fisheries, the damage to any natural resources. their restoration and their compensation based on that. >> but obviously, that deals more with tangible data. how do address in the lg term the issue of the psychological impact on the area? the fact that people might not be eating seafood from the gulf coast fearing they're contaminated? how do you bring back tourism to florida, to alabama, to louisiana? you have a long-term plan to address those issues? >> we are working with the states in terms of tourism as an example. we have given -- this was announced a couple days ago. about $70 million across the gulf coast to do advertising and help to -- to get the messages out that the states want to get out as regards tourism. as regards your other question,

on longer term effects, i don't have a specific answe for that but i do want to let you know that our intent is to stand behind what we are saying and it doesn't end when the cleanup ends. >> yesterday, members, they informed me that 16,000 ats have been approved yet as of now, only 680 are active, meaning selected to work. can you explain to me how -- what process do you use to determine which boats become active and boats are lingering and waiting? >> there are many more boats than are needed right now for the response for those type of vessels and i'm not sure i know the exact details but the area contingency plans, the parish plans, for instance, help us understand how implementation should occur with the unified command structure in terms of

deploying resources so the boats are actually at work are the one that is are needed to deploy boom or to protect certain shorelines based under the unified command resource deployment priorities. >> mr. chairman, if you would allow me one more question. >> oh, by all means. i'll come back to the gentleman as he's the only one. >> thank you very much. my next question is directed to transocean. i know that you have filed some kind of a pleading in federal courts trying to limit your liability to $27 billion based on, i believe, the limitation of liability act of 1851. that, obviously, is costing a lot of consternation among my people down there in the district. is it your position that the limited -- the limitation on

liability act of 1851 overrides potential liability under the oil pollution act? >> the limitation of liability action which we have filed only addresses nonenvironmental claims. o pa i believe addresses that. i think they're separate and distinct. >> okay. it is your position to transfer liability stemming from operations of your own vessels through contract with bp? >> there is a commercial contract between transocean and bp. and that contract does have liability and indemnity provisions in it. >> okay. if you can do us a favor by providing us with data and loss with respect to your records of inspection of the blowout preventer i would reallyha chai

>> further to the gentleman's question, the oil pollution act provides very specifically each responsible party for a vessel for facility from which oil is discharged or which pulls a substantial threat of a discharge of oil into or upon the naf gathible shores or shorelines or economic zone is liable for removal costs and damages. removal costs, all those incured by the federal government, the state govement, indian tribe, a state or a person consistent with the national contingency plan and the national contingency plan, called the gentleman attention to this as a guide for his constituents enacted in 1970 after the tori canyon failure in the english channel. d, that contingency plan is

updated and it also covers damages that include injury to, destructn of, loss of or loss of use of natural resources, economic losses, resulting from destruction of real or personal property, including loss of taxes, royalties, rents, fees, loss of use of natural resources, lses are recoverable by any claimant to usas a natural resource. that's your fishermen. without regard to ownership or management and damages for net cost to governments. it's a wide, wide area of jurisdiction. very significant in this case because % of the fish and shellfish of the united states are harvested in the gulf of mexico from its 660,000 square miles. now, we'll go to miss napolitano. i'm sorry. mr. taylor, i'm sorry. i didn't see mr. taylor come in

here. he's next in seniority. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i very much apologize. we're marking up the active defense act of 201. >> under what flag did that vessel operate? >> under the flag of the marshall islands. >> how my drilling rig or ships does transocean have? >> 139. >> how many of those are flagged in the united states of amica? >> i don't know the answer to that question. are any of the sister ships of the deepwater whorizon flagged under the american flag? >> there is one sister ship which ishe nautilus, nautilus, i don't know what flag the nautilus operates under.

>> would you -- mr. newman, you're obviously aware as mr. cao pointed out of the enormous amount of suffering the peoe of the gulf coast have gone first with the loss of 11 lives, but the enormous amount of suffering that continues as a result of this mishap. loss of salary. the country turn as to whether or not the shrimp industry will come back. seafood. loss of paycheck. my way, just deaf stated tourism industry. the seafood industry. seafood processors being told don't send me any american processed shrimp. we don't know if it has oil on it. i mean, you guys have really messed things up. so my question is, given the harm that this accident has caused, how much taxes did transocean pay to the united

states of america last year? because you have obviously cost our nation a great deal of money. so i'm just curious, what was the contribution of transoan to our nation tax-wise? >> i don't have that number available with me today. >> well, let me ask you another question. there's been a tendency for some foreign flag operators to create a separate entity for the work they do in the gulf of mexico. it's called a corporate inversion and they see to it that the cost that they pay to the parent company either through the mortgage on the vessels or the overhead costs that the parent company charges them, they see to it that that exceeds their revenues or it's very close to the revenues so they end up paying no u.s. taxes even though they're operating in the gulf of mexico. so my question to you is, is your -- is that part of your company that operates in the

gulf of mexico an inverted corporation? >> the company that operates in the gulf of mexico is a u.s. company. it is a delaware corporation. >> okay. but is -- is it owned by a parent corporation? >> yes, it is owned by a parent company. >> and where is the headquarters of the parent corporation? >> the ultimate parent company, transocean limited, is a swiss corporation. >> okay. mr. chairman, the reason i ask these questions is since the earliest days of our republic, we have reserved the right f american-made, american crude and american-built vessels. now, somebody somewhere along the line has given these folks an exemption from that law. and when we go to recover the funds that the enormous amount of money that the air force, the coast guard, the state governments, city governments hiring extra policemen, firemen, the call-up of theational guard, when we go to get those

funds, it has to be a heck of an easier to recover the funds from an american company that's got some assets here in the unite states than somne in switzerland. tell me aga where the ship was actually flagged in the marshall islands? >> the ship was operating under a marshall islands flag. >> marshall islands. again, given what the people of mississippi went through trying to get the insurance industry in america to pay claims in mississippi after katrina, i have a very strong suspicion we are going to have a heck of a time getting someone out of marshall islands or switzerland to pay these bills so, mr. chairman, i would hope that you would give and again they're pulling american minerals out of the ground on an american sea bottom with a foreign flagged vessel and quite possibly a foreig crusoe, mr. chairman, with all respect, i would certainly hope that when we go forward from this that you would give every consideration to extending the gentleman's act to cover this sort of vessel in

this sort of circumstance. i thank you very much. >> gentleman and i have had conversation about application of jones act to this situation and i have asked staff to prepare a guidance memorandum on the applicable law and the problems of dealing with the wto requirements and there are some legal obstacles that we have to overcome on some aspects of that issue so this is something that the gentleman and i and others of interest in the committee will work our way through but i appreciate the gentleman raising that issue. it's a vital importance. ms. johnson, you had an opening statement but no opportunity for questions. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. i apologize for being in and out.

i had another full committee hearing and a bill on the floor that i had to respond to. this question is mr. newman. there was some news report that indicated that though these people were very stressed when they came out from the aa of the work, they were asked to fill out a farm releasing your company from any liability. is that true? >> congresswoman, i don't know if you have had an opportunity to view that form but there is no release or waiver language in that form. you can appreciate that this exercise in understanding what happened and how we can prevent it in the future is a fact finding exercise. and the two questions that were posed on that form are mere statements of fact. >> mr. chairman, i'd like to ask

unanimous consent to make this form a part ofur permanent record. >> without objection, so ordered. >> thank you very much. what liabilities do you have? what responsibility do you have for the employees? >> with respecto our employees? >> yes. >> as i mentioned in my opening comments -- >> i might he missed them. i'm sorry. >> we are going everything we can to help the nine transocean employees to help cope wit this tragedy. >> okay. now, mr. mckay, why does bp feel that they are in a position to allow or not allow federal agencies access to the spill site to measure the volume of the spill? we have been working constantly with government agencies ranging from coast guard to mms to

department of defense, navy, air force, noaa, epa. all with open access to all the data. we have been working together on everything as far as i know. >> are you measuring the exact volume itself? >> the difficulty we have in this situation is it's in 5,000 feet of water so we don't -- we have no way of measure. it is coming off of a broken pipe so the -- we have been working with noaa scientists and other industry experts in trying to understand by judging from what it is -- estimated at the surface plus what we believe the oil will disperse in the water column to come up with the estimate of the flow rate. it's very difficult in the conditions we're in. >> in 2004, bp produced an analysis entitled "thunder horse drilling riser break." road to recovery. they tried to determine what had

happened in a 2003 spill. bp's own conclusions were that the company was not well prepared for the long-term recovery effort. is this still the same situation? >> i believe this study you are talking about was a riser incident where the blowout preventer worked. riser came off as it's supposed to and the drispill was the flu in the riser i believe. to further your question, i think we are going to learn a lot ofhat's happening here and i think everybody's planning and the regulations will have to take into account what we are learning. >> well, is it not correct that you kind of ignored your own study from 2003? >> no, i don't think that's correct. i don't think we ignored that. i think that taught us some lessons about how risers work

when the blowout preventer sheers and they're released. >> thank you. my time is expired. >> as a follow-up to ms. johnson's question, and it's one i was going to pursue later, mr. newman, is there any intent on the partf transocean to use this form in any defense against civil actions filed by any of your employees? >> mr. chairman, recognizing that i'm an engineer and not a lawyer, i don't believe that form would be admissible as a defense mechanism. >> at the outset of the hearing, i swore onhe witnesses, i said that the oath applies also to materials submitted to the committee. i will ask you to submit a statement to the committee in response to this question from your legal team.

questions have been raised by -- by those who escape the rig but who in a state of shock after -- in the immediate aftermath signed this form. and are confused about what its effect will be on their ability to recover medical costs and other medical expenses that they may incur. at the time, they didn't -- they didn't really know what they were signing. at least that's what they say. i want that response from your legal team. >> yes, sir. >> miss napolitano? >> thank you, mr. chair. sitting here listening to a lot of my colleagues' questions have brought some other issues to

mind about the number of wells that are currently in operation that are either below a thousand feet, below 2,000 feet and how many -- where are they located and what kind of oversight is there over their inspection of -- for safety purposes and what intervals? and where are they? and any of them use the same equipment? and i realize that this one permitted back in '01, at least that's the information i got initially, permitted in '01. to me and some discussion amongst some o us that maybe no permits ought to be issued below 1,000 until there's enough evidence to insure that the oversight and the safety precautions have been taken to prevent any future spills. and while i marvel at my colleagues stating that this is thousands of them that have not had the incidents, all it takes is one for catastrophe.

i would like to have some information. may not have it with you but i would like to have wit the chairman's permission reported to this committee of how many wells are in operation in deep watersnd what kind of equipment they are being handled with, what oversight, what intervals are you checking for their safety if se of the equipment is faulty, better to be prctive than reactive. answers. >> we will submit that information. >> do you have any idea offhand? i realize there's 7,000 platforms. >> i don't know the exact numbers. there's been about 2,300 wells drilled be -- i mean, deeper than 1,000 feet of water. there are production platforms producing this successful wells hooked up. and then, there are about 100 to 130 wells drilled in deep water each year so we can get that data to you and we can explain

-- >> would that report also please include any incidents that there may have had that you may have had problems with the equipment itself that might have caused something had they not been safeguarded by some of the b.o.p.s, whatever you call them? >> yes. we can submit our experience, yes. >> okay. the other issue, of course, is the -- there's the oil spill liability trust fund that currently has $1.6 billion in it according to my stf. which covers a lot of the costs and eventually it gets -- has to be repaid by the company, i'm understanding. is that correct? >> what we have said and we have tried to be clear from the start. we are a responsible party. have formally accepted that degnation. >> i understand but this is the oil spill liability trust fund. >> right. we're not going to access that fund. >> you are snot. >> no. what we have said is we are going to bear this. we will ignore the $75 million cap.

and we will not be trying to get reimbursement from the fund. >> okay. >> the gentlewoman would yield -- >> certainly. >> just to be clear about the oil spill liability trust fund. that is managed by the u.s. coast guard. it has a balance of $1.6 billion. the fees were allowed to expire in 1994. and then, reinstated several years later. and updated from five cents to eight cents. an that should be -- should have been adjusted to the consumer price index. but that is an amount which the coast guard or any other u.s. government agency draws against to pay up front costs if t responsible party is not paying the costs and then to collect costs from the responsible party. so, they neither transocean nor

bp draws against the liability fund. it is the government agency that does. just for clarification. >> thank you for the clarification, mr. chair. then, o of the other areas that keeps comingp is what is a liability claim simply because i realize this depends on who's asking but as happens in many of the other spills, decades later, there's still an impact in the communities, in the sea life, in the tourism. in many of those areas. will that extend through those timeframes because it isn't just the impact now or in the foreseeable future. it's long term. >> yes. we've been clear. the legitimate claims applies to the impact that is are caused by the spill. and we want to be fair, responsive and expeditious about that and i've always made it clear that it doesn't end when the cleanup ends. and so, hopefully we can get this thing stopped as quickly as

possible, minimize any impact and whatever impacts and could go longer into the future, yes. that's what we're sayi. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i may want to submit some other questions for the record and i yield back. >> and those questions will be received and transmitted to the witness. m mr.alitymeyer. you need t move up closer, mr. olson, so i can see you tre fading out against the background. i apologize for passing you over. you are now recognized. >> thank you. no apologies necessary. thank you for having me he today. i appreciate the witnesses coming up, giving us your testimony, expertise, perspectives on this disaster and what we should do here in congress. i think i can speak for most of us here, as well and probably all my focus is and was and shall be stopping that leakage, that well off the bottom of the

gulf coast. and once we do that then we can worry about what happened, why it happened and take the steps we need to take here to make sure that it never, ever happens again. i want to make sure i have a perspective on how much oil is being discharged out of the leak right now. i mean, you have seen reports this it's up to -- the one report and apparently the unified command said 5,000 barrels a day. i have also seen press reports saying it may be up to 80,000 barrels a day and i want to ask you and mtly for mr. mckay, what is the best -- is 5,000 barrels per day the most accurate or something more than that? >> that is our best estimate. obviously, it's continually being looked at. as you may know, we have gotten this riser insertion tube to work and getting increased volumes at the surface to measure and as we're -- i believe there's a new, small task force that's been put together by unified -- under

direction of unified command to get all the experts together in a room and try to understand with the latest available data is there a more accurate estimate but we understand there's a range ofuncertainty around the curnt estimate. >> thank you for that. how much is that riser tube you think taking off the discharge? i mean, can you put any numbers on that? 4,000 barrels a day, 2,000? >> last night or yesterday it was about 2,000 and we've been trying to ramp it up slowly so we don't pull water in and get hydrates. i suspect today it's higher but i haven't had an update yet today. >> okay. i just want to get an update -- i'm sorry. turn my microphone off there. the relief well, two to three months before that's up and running? >> we have two relief wells drilling. one's at about roughly 9,000 feet below sea level and the other spud organ operations on sunday, sunday of this past -- past sunday. so yes. to get to the total depth of the

well, it will take about three months to get there. >> one final question. this is just about the dispersants. i understand you have been using some dispersants down at that depth, 5,000 feet which hasn't been done in history as far as i've been told. just want to kind of get your perspectives on the dispersants, are they working? working? are they helpful? do you have any concerns about the environment post? they've not been tested at that depth. but we've got to stop this discharge. so i wanted your perspectives on how the dispersants are working. >> the dispersants in general have worked well. the sub seaevel dispersant, it's the first time it's been tried. it seems to work exceptionally well. one of the benefits, it seems to needless dispersant per unit of oil contacted. it has not been tried, so there are very, very strict protocols that the epa has put in place under their direction to monitor anunderstand what happens as we go forward.

it can be stopped at any time if there's any data that would say it should be. but it's important, and i think it's working. >> thank you very much. i appreciate all the hard work you all do. i know you're sort of writing the book. this is deeper than any of these have happened befe. being a member of congress that represents theohnson space center, it's sort of like apollo 13, they were basically writing the rules and figuring things out as they went. lets hope you all will be as successful as we were getting those astronauts back home. mr. chairman, yield back the balance of my time. >> i thank the gentleman. mr. olson, further to your question about the measuring the flow, the coast guard is establishing peer-review panel to bring together the best minds in the industry and academia to agree upon the best available technology to measure flow accurately at that depth under these conditions.

that is -- that actually is underway now. mr. altmire. >> thank you, mr. chairman. the explosion, the leak, the response, the cleanup, i'm interested in -- hi some questions about the spill. the leak. it's safe to say what we know right now, the explosion caused the spill. is that correct? >> the way we're looking at it is we had a well-controlled event of some sort into the well bore. there was a well control period and then an explosion. then the's a related but separate event about the safety equipment and whether that worked. once things happened. >> well, that's the second issue. thank you, mr. mckay. the failure of the blowout valve is what's responsible for the situation that we find oselves in today. >> the way -- the simplest way to look at it, we had a

horrendous accident due to a well control event and explosion. then we've had equipment, and we don't know why, that didn't work that i think effectively has been responsible for the size of the spill that we have now and the ongoing operations. >> and there are other scenarios of course that exist that would cause a spill, that would cause a leak of this sort. is that correct? or is this something that -- this is the only way that a leak like this could ever happen is by an event like thi >> i think a leak of this magnite would take a well control event and failure of a piece of equipment. >> is there any technology that exists that you know of that could have prevented this from happening? >> i don't know of a piece of technology that could have prevented it. i do think we will learn about how t build in potentially more redundancy and design -- sorry,

testing criteria for pieces of equipment to make it safer. i do think we'll learn from this to make it safer. >> we talked a lot earlier in the hearing about the acoustic control, the -- is it $500,000 piece of equipment, is that about right, that's accepted in norway and canada. do you wish, in retrospect, that bp had invested in this device? >> i agree with mr. newman on that point. i don't believe that particular device in this particular instance would have made a difference in that we had multiple triggering devices, and we physically tripped and triggered the dead man with an rov. it was not the issue or not the entire issue. i do think as the studies and post appraisals of that go forward, the consideration of different triggering devices, including acoustic, it's worth looking at. >> do you think that this congress should look at making mandatory those types of devices, moving forward?

>> i think the investigations and the panels that have been assembled and are going to work through this will come up with recommendations to change regulation or devices in the future. so i would say mandates -- i don't know. but i do think the panels in the investigations will come up with conclusions that then can be acted upon. but i think we don't know what happened yet. >> do you think that part of the reason this happened is because of the age of the device, of the apparatus that failed? >> perhaps that would be a better question for mr. newman since it's their blowout preventer. >> i don't think the ten-year age of the b.o.p. had anything to do with it. >> is there any reason to think that in any other rigs, offshore platforms that this is going to be a problem, that we should look into solving before something like this happens? >> i'm not sure i understand

your question. i guess my resnse is it -- until we know exactly what happened? then the real sequence of events, it's difficult to speculate about what a prevention mechanism in the future might look like. >> i guess what i'm getting at is, the two possibilities here is, one, that it was known that a scenario like this could take place, and there are devices, technologies that exist that could have prevented it, and that was not done. or, we don't know why this happened. we don't know how to prevent it. there's no technology that exists to ever prevent this from happening again, which of course changes the discussion in the congress about moving forward with these types of endeavors. >> i'm not sure we can bifurcate between those two until we know exactly what happened in this particular case. it's entirely possible we may, after the full fact-finding and

airing of exactly what happened, we may conclude that this was a scenario that the industry should have -- should have planned for. >> just a comment. i do believe the multiple investigations are going to determine cause of the explosion and that well control event as well as the issues around the blout preventer. it may take time. i do have confince that, then, things can be amended, adjusted and planned for and made safer. i really do believe that. >> thank you, both. >> there have been blowouts in shallower waters where the blowout preventeras activated, correct? but not at 5,000-foot depth. mr. newman. >> i am familiar with blowout events. the well in the '70s was in

shallow water on a jackup. >> shallow meaningless than 350 feet. >> yes. that well fled for about nine months. >> mr. hall. >> thank you, mr. chairman. for holding this hearing, and my prayers and condolences to those killed and injured in this event. mr. mckay, i was curious about the choice of dispersant, correx it, a former 11-year board member of bp sits on the board. do you know approximately how much money bp has paid so far to the company for this dispersant? >> i'm sorry, i don't. >> could you get the committee that information, please? >> we can get that. >> why do you think correx it would have been chosen over a

less toxic and more effective product like dispersant, which you would think would be a better choice and did bp talk to -- did your company talk to any manufactures of the other dispersas to find out if they were available? >> i've not been personal involved in the choices around the dispersants and what's happened in terms of talking to companies and understanding the availability, the effectiveness or choices they've made. we can get you some information, i've just not been involved in that. >> my understanding is that the company that manufactures dispersant, just for one out of the list of 13 approved disperse and thes says it could quickly produce 60,000 gallons per day, whicis more than is currely being used by bp for this spill, as i understand . so that would be a good conversation to have. after "exxon valdez,"

dispersants were found to concentrate in the organs of certain fish and other marine life and i assume it would do the same thing in the organs of human beings who consume those fish. as a condition for the sub service application of corrects it, bp was td to implement a monitoring plan on the plume, including measuring the toxic effect of the dispersant correx it. are those available to the public? >> the monitoring is ongoing, and i believe it's going -- it's being worked through unified command. i don't know how much of that has been posted or is public. but we can certainly get back to you on when it's expected to be and when the results are tabulated. but there's constant monitoring going on under the direction of unified command and with the relevant government agencies. >> thank you. i'd appreciate a written response to that.

and the directive also orders bp to, quote, detect and delineate the plume, unquote. is bp doing this? >> again, with assistance from the government agencies involved with the monitoring and the sampling programs under unified command or within unified command, i believe that is going on. >> could you please inform the committee in writing of the nature and extent of all sub surface plumes, and do you know whether the dispersant or disperse and thants you are usi harmful to human health, are they known carcinogens? >> i don't know offhand. we will get that back to the committee. >> are you prepared to assume liability of the human effects, not just the oil spilled, but also the disperse and thes ants >> we've said we will honor all legitimate claims related to the

impact of the spill. >> do you know, mr. musenewman,t the blowout preventer cost? >> i don't know what we paid for it back in '99 or 2000 when we bought it. >> what's a typical ballpark figure for the collection of redundant blowout preventer devices? >> i believe if we went out and bought one today i think it would cost in the range of $15 million. >> mr. mckay, do you know approximately what the annual advertising cost was for bp for that nice unfolding flower on tv in the beyond petroleum slogan to be broadcast into living rooms around the country? >> i know roughly, i don't know actly. last year it was about $10 million to $12 million,nd this year is probably $20 million, something like that. i don't know. i can get the numbers for you. >> so roughly about the same or

maybe more than the cost of a blowout preventer. i assume that bp is deducting the cost of this image advertising, which does not actually talk about your product, but just a sort of a feel-good image ad from the costs of doing business for tax purposes. do you know if that's correct? >> i don't know the tax treatment of that. i presume that is -- that's an expense and treated as such. >> well, that's an expense that i question the validity of. though it may be legal at the moment. but if one is merely advertising what appears to be, we're nice guys, we're good to the environment, please don't regulate us, which is the way some of us might perceive that, i would suggest that mr. chairman, we might in the future or somebody in this congress might lo at it. my time is expired. thank you, mr. chairman.

>> gentlemen was asked very important questions and we'll pursue that further. mr. teague on the house floor is also our committee and perhaps the house resident oil drilling practitioner and i want to yield to the gentleman at this time. >> thank you, mr. chairman, for having this meeting today. mr. mckay and mr. newman, thank you all for coming and answering theuestions here. you know, i'd just like to make a statemento start with. you know, i want to separate myself from some comment made earlier to politicize this problem that we have. i don't think this is the obama oil spill, i don't think it's the bush oil spill. i think it's a tragedy that we're having in our industry and i hope we find out that it's an accident. but you know at the same time now, i'm not trying to protect

bp or -- and i'm not trying to protect the federal agencies, like mineral management a companies like that. but you know, if -- it doesn't matter if mineral managements was lain their inspections or not,ou kn, we should be doing the best that we can do because, you know, our first obligations to our employees that we furnish them a safe environment to work in. so i would think we wouldn't use the fact that mineral management or whoever does the inspections did a poor job of inspecting, we'd want to, you know, have a clean environment and a safe work site and everything. and i'm convinced that bp and transocean both are those type of companies. and, you know, i think that there will -- there's going to be plenty of time for criticism and compliments, both at a later

time. but i do have a couple of questions that i wanted to ask. you know, one of them i about the b.o.p., and actually i have addressed b.o.s, the way you test them, have youad to make a change with any of the rams or seals or o-rings or anything at that depth? >> in terms of the testing? >> yes. when you test the b.o.p.s, have they, at different times, have the rams leaked and you needed to change the maybe the seals on the rams or the o-rings in the shaft or anything like that? >> yeah. because these are pass/fail tests, when the equipment fails the test, we have no choice other than to repair the equipment. it's the right thing to do. >> right. and you have done that at this depth before and you just tested these b.o.p.s a few days before this happened? >> the b.o.p. on the horizon was

tested on the 10th and on the 17th. let's be clear, congressman. when the b.o.p. fames the test, you have to ilate the well, make the well safe, then recover the b.o.p. up to the rig. this is not equipment that you can repair at 5,000-foot water depths. so you bring it up to the rig, repair it, and run it back down. >> do you all have a -- >> would the gentleman yield? the witness is not answering the gentleman's question. he asked specifically, did you test it a depth. i asked that question earlier in the hearing, your response was no. you need to answer mr. teague's question. >> on april 10th and on april 17th, the b.o.p. was on the sea bed in 5,000 feet of water. it was tested at depth and it passed those tests. >> that was n answer you gave earlier today.

>> okay. thank you. do you all have a kill line below the b.o.p. and are you tied on to the kill valve? >> i'm trying to remember the exact configuration of the b.o.p. there is a choke line and a kill line. i don't remember where those outlets are with respect to e rams. >> so at this time, are you td on top it and can you pump into the well bore somewhere? >> we're in the process of preparing to pump into the b.o.p. using either the top kill method or the junk shot method. >> okay. you know, i think what one of the things, like any time that we have an issue like this that's a situation, there's a lot of infmation and a lot of misinformation out there. and i think o of the problems

is the information that's out there abouthe positive test and the negative test. and i was wondering if you might be able to explain that a little bit so that maybe everybody could understand what's the difference between the positive test and the negative test. >> a positive test is a test in which you apply pressure to the casing in the cement. so you increase the pleasure to make sure the casing in the cement can withstand that pressure. a negative test is when you lower the pressure tonsure that nothing flows out of the casing and cement. >> when you all performed the negative test on this liner, did you displace the hole with sea water or did it still have the drilling fluid in the hole? >> i do not have the details as to how they actually went about performing that task, so i can't tell you which portion of the hole had mud in it and which

portion of the hole had sea water. >> this is for mr. mckay. i know that there's going to be a -- definitely a root cause analysis, and the information that is acquired from there, will you share it with the industry to -- and how soon will you share it with the industry so that, you know, we can keep something like this from happening again? >> yes. our internal investigation we're going to share everything with the industry as well as committees and the government. i don't know exactly how long yet. we're obviously trying to piece things together, and it will go as fast as it can possibly go. but we're right in the middle of it right now. but we will definitely share it. absolutely. >> okay. thank you. it's a bad problem. but i do -- and i don't know, yoknow, how it's going. it looks like it could go for a

while. one other question i wanted to ask, at what depth are you planning to intersect the well with the alternate wells? >> right, roughly right at reservoir depth. >> okay. i was just curious as to if -- the sooner we could intersect it the quicker we can stop the flow? >> yes, b we've looked at it, it's going to need to be right at reservoir depth. >> okay. very good. you know, i thank you all for being here today and for answering these questions and we'll stay in touch. thank you. >> mr. kagan. >> thank you, mr. chairman, for holding this very important meeting, and thank you for being here today. i've heard a great deal of your testimony early in your other committee appearances and i appreciate the fact that you are taking full and complete responsibility for cleaning up

this mess and for reck come pencing everyone who may have a clm, be it legitimate or somebody else may decide a really legitimate claim. i'd like to put a little frame around this and then maybe ask a few questions. from where i'm sitting, it really looks like the financial collapse that we had. because during our financial collapse we had to clean up the mess, we had to catch and punish all the crooks, we had to make sure we rewrote the legislative language and regulations to make sure it would never happen again. this c.c.r. approach looks like we're having to come in here with this big leak in the gulf. but let me just review and correct me where i'm wrong. is it not true that a foreign corporation bought foreign steel, built some ships, foreign flagged, came in, and as a consequence of all your economic investments, we've lost jobs in my ship building state of northeast wisconsin.

we've got steelmills that could be hiring more people, but you chose to hire people overseas and spd the money overseas. is that true or false? >> the deepwater horizon was built in a shipyard in korea -- >> so the ansr is true? correct? >> the deepwater horizon was built in a shipyard i korea. >> so it's true you took our money from the oil revenues and invested it overseas and hired people overseas and not in our great united states of america, and now we're suffering the consequences of it. with regard to your commitment to responsibility, this is your bp regional response plan, the oil spill response plan right here. and right on the front page you say that upon receiving indication of an oil spill or other chemical release that may threaten the waters of the united states, the following actions are critical to initiating or sustaining an effective response. one of them is to locate the

spill, and the second thing you mention is to determine the size and volume of e spill. and yet according to the press reports, you're refusing and here your testimony this morning, you're refusing to measure the rate of spillage that's coming through this leak, knowing rdon the published reports of other newspaper articles, that there are other facilities to help you do that, such as the national deep submerge ance facility at woods hole. they are able to assist you. would you be willing, yes or no, to contact the people at woods hole and begin to monitor and measure the extent of the leak that you have created? >> may i correct something you said or at least disagree with it? >> you may. >> we are not refusing to measure the leak. this leak is not measurable in terms of technology that we know, and have seen with industry experts as well as other government agencies. we would definitely -- >> you can use this type of technique to determine the velocity of the particles and if you know the area, it's rell

tevly straightforward mathematics to determine what the volume is. that's andy bowen who is director of woods hole. i urge you to contacthim. with regard to your decision and the acquiesce ance of the epa to use chemical dispersants, you're using correx it, correct? >> yes. >> and on one of the msds sheets, environmental precautions, do not contaminate surface water. so another msds for correx it, this would be for ec 7664-a, there's arsenic, are you aware there's arsenic in these compounds? >> i was not specifically aware of arsenic in the compounds. >> are you aware arsenic is a known human carcinogen? >> i do know that. >> all right, so you're aware that this carcinogen is being put into our gulf stream, into our food web now, are you not? >> i'm aware we're using these dispersants in an approved way

by the epa and other government agency. >> all right. and to follow up on your intention to be a very responsible cporate entity and responsible personally, would you here this morning or this afternoon now commit to funding any and all studies to look at the long-term consequences of the dispersal agents youe now using within the gulf? >> i can not commit to fund any and all studies, no, i cannot. >> which studies would you fund? or is that a hypothetical question? all right, so you -- but you would agree that it might be necessary to do some studies of the gulf life consequences of yourispersal agent being distributed. is that correct? >> i believe we are doing that through the protocols and monitoring as well as the -- >> you agree with me there might be long-term studi that might become necessary, is that correct? >> that may be true. >> these studies may run into the hundreds of billions of dollars. is that possible? >> i have no way of knowing.

>> but it is possible, would you agree to that? >> i have no way of knowing. >> all right. so you have no way of knowing how much it would cost. and therefore, isn't it incumbent upon this congress and possibly the administration to ask you to set aside for this government, perhaps, to freeze some of your current assets of your corporate is worth $142.8 billion, would it be agreeable to you if the united states government would freeze, let's just start with a nber of $25 billion, for future studies and corrective actions that may become necessary? >> we have been very clear from day one that we are going to fulfill our responsibilities as a responsible party under the oil pollution act. >> i'll take that as a yes that $25 billion set aside and frozen would be a good idea. >> i did not say yes to that. >> so i'll take that as a no. is that correct? is that a no? >> what i'm not agreeing -- i'm not agreeing to that is all i

can say. >> okay. and can you tell me if anyone in either of your corporations, yourselves persally, are you two personally aware of anyone within your corporation having changed the records or falsified any records within your corporation at any time? >> i'm not aware of that. >> not aware of any instance of that. >> do you feel that anyone within your corporaon would be criminally negligent because of the loss of life that has taken place from this accident? >> i have no way of knowing that. >> okay. all right. well, thank you for being here. i see my time has expired. i'll submit written questions that i'd appreciate your complete and full and honest and responsible answers to. thank you, and i yield back my time, mr. chairman. >> representative johnson. >> thank you, mr. chairman.

mr. mckay, you're the president of bp, plc, is that correct? >> no, it's bp america. >> okay. and in connection with your job duties, you are aware of the fact that bp is a habitual violator of health and safety regulations? >> we have -- as i mentioned earlier, we have had some tragic accidents in the past. we are making improvements in the company. >> and those are violations -- somef your violations have actually resulted in criminal charges being brought against the company. is that correct? >> that is true. >> and actually at this time,

you stand as, or you sit as president of a -- a convicted felon, operation. is that correct? >> we have pled guilty to a felony in relation to texas city, that is true. >> so that makes you a convicted felon, then, is that correct? >> i don't know the nuance of the word, but we have pled guilty to a felony on -- as regards to texas city. >> well, let me ask you this question also, mr. mckay. do you have any idea -- can you give us any indication as to how bp intends to respond to secretary napolitano and secretary salazar's may 14th letter requesting clarification on bp's intentions regarding the $75 million statutory cap on

damages? >> yes, we have responded in writing to that and we've said we will not -- that, excuse me, that cap will not apply. we've resnded in writing to that and i can provide that to the committee. >> wl, in that connection, i'd like to ask you about the expedited claim process that bp has put in place. which features claims offices that are easily accessible. and you've handled about 19,000 claims thus far. is that correct? >> yes. 19,000 claims have been made. that's right. >> and -- >> sorry, can i correct one thing? i think i used the word "paid" earlier. 19,000 claims have been made and i don't know the exact number. something like 4,000 have been

actually physically paid. >> okay. and is it true that these claims that were filed came largely from shermen? >> i don't have a breakdown but i think a lot of them are fishermen and folks that are earning a living right on the gulf coast. marinas, small businesses on the gulf coast that have been immediately impacted. >> and it's -- it's also fair to say that the full measure of harm to that industry will not be known for years, is that correct? >> i don't know. i -- we'll have to s what the impact -- >> we don't know what the impacts are now, and the 4,000 who have signed, i guess t documentatn in return for

receiving some money, nobody knows at this time what the effects of this oil spring will bring to their industry. correct? >> that's right. >> and let me ask you something. because we've talked about releases and that kind of thing with mr. newman. but we haven't done so with gulf. has gulf oil, in its claims process, tendered and required the signatures of the claimants on any form that would preclude them from asserting claims for damages thereafter? >> we as bp have had no one sign those type of forms. no. >> you do have forms that they have signed, though, the 4,000 who have received payment. is that rrect? >> yes. >> and if you would forward to

my attention a complete package of forms that these claimants have signed, i would greatly appreciate it. will you do that? >> yes. absolutely. >> and last but not least, we've talked about the blowout prevenr. has it or has it not been tested at 5,000 feet or below. >> the blowout preventer that was in use on this particular well was deployed in the early days of february and since that time it has been at 5,000-foot water depths and it has been tested every seven days at 5,000-foot water depths. >> has that make and model of blowout preventer ever been tested prior to its deployment on the sea bottom for the

deepwater horizon vessel? >> that b.o.p. has been in use since 2002. it has eight years of testing data. >> yes or no, has that particular make and model been tested at depths of 5,000 feet more prior to this explosion? >> yes. >> and what were the dates and times of those, and would you provide me with copies of the reports and findings on the testing? >> congressman, part of the exercise we're going through is a full and thorough understanding of the history of the b.o.p., and we will make that available to the committee. >> so you don't have that information for review at this time?

>> i don't have it with me, no. >> have you reviewed any such docume documentation? >> i have looked at some of the test data for the b.o.p. >> you've seen test data that indicate testing at a depth of 5,000 feet or below prior to this catastrophe? >> i looked at the well operations report from april 17th, which indicates that a test was conducted on that date and that the b.o.p. passed the test on that date. >> but no information about prior dates? before it was installed? >> i have not personally gone back through the history of the b.o.p., but that is certainly part of the investigation that we're conducting. >> thank you, sir. >> thank the gentleman. just to follow up on one, because i'm a bit confused now. since there had previously been

other rig, there was damage in the hurricane and then we brought this rig in, was the blowout preventer the same or was it replaced? >> each rig has its own blowout preventer. so when the marianis was on that well last year,t was using the marians's b.o.p. when it left, the maranis took their b.o.p. when the deepwater horizon arrived, she arrived with her b.o.p. >> then if this accident happened happened, and a permanent drilling rig put in place, a yet another ow-- bp wod bring in their own at that point? >> when you install a plat form, you don't have use for b.o.p.s anymore. the wells are solid. >> so at that point -- >> no b.o.p.s. >> all right. i'm getting -- okay. ms. richardson. >> thank you m chairman. it's been reported there were

difficulties with the blowout preventers prior to this accident. something about some of the workers noticed some rubber or something that had come up. is that correct? >> i believe you're referring to the "60 minutes" segment that aired sunday. >> i am. >> mr. williams in that report does make reference of having seen a handful of rubber material come across the shale shakers which is a piece of equipment on the rig. but i would just inform the committee that the piece of material that we're talking about is -- it's about three feet in diameter, it's about 18 inches tall and it weighs about 2,000 pounds. and so a handfulf small chunks in relation to that large piece of rubber, i would characterize as almost immaterial. >> i'm going to repeat the question. my question was it was reported

that this had occurred. were you aware that it was reported? >> the first indication i had of it being reported was having watched the "60 minutes" segment myself. >> and are you aware of any of your other staff that might have been advised of this issue? >> i'm not aware of anyone else having been informed. >> okay it has been also reported there was a disagreement between bp and transocean at the commencement of you guys beginning this in february and there was thi staff meeting and there was a disagreement of whether to move forward. did that occur? >> i'm not aware of any disagreement at the commencement of the operation in february. >> okay. i'm going back to the "6 minutes" report that was this sunday. and they said that there w a meeting and there was a  disagreement of how and when to move forward. >> i believe the dagreement that mr. williams was referring to took place on april 20th. >> okay. so you are awa that a

disagreement did occur? >> the only indication i have of it is having watched mr. williams' segment on "60 minutes. >> are you aware a disagreement, whether a disreement occurred or not? other than what you saw on "60 minutes?" >> that's been the only direct firsthand account i have seen of a disagreement. >> and no one has sd to you that this occurred? >> that's the only firsthand account i have. >> no one else has said to you that this has occurred? first account, second account? >> i have hearsay references to it. >> have you heard other references other than mr. willms'? >> anecdotal hearsay evidence. >> thank you. you talked about bp now. you mentioned about a commitment for damages. one of the things that's been said in prior hearings is that there was a little back and

forth going on. are you committed to paying for the damages rardless of independent disagreements you might have with some other compies you work with? >> yes, i've testified and would like to make it clear again today, we are a responsible party under the oil pollution act. we will fulfill our obligations. blame, liability and those kind of things, whether it's between coanies or whatever, we'll fire that out later. but we are a responsible party in that regard. so what i'm saying is we're going to take care testify and we'll deal with other things later. >> thank you, sir. >> is it true that some of the cleanup workers are being required to sign a waiver? >> no, i don't think so. early on the first twu few days signing out boats, there was waiver language, it was brought to our attention and we tore it up. there are no waiver stipulations in any of the things we're doing. >> have you notified those workers that that's been torn up. >> i think it's obvious.

i think that was fixed early on. i do. >> will you go back and make sure? >> i will. >> okay. thank you. why is there a disagreement between the total amount of oil that's leaking? bp has said 5,000, other reports are saying otherwise. why do you think there's a disagreement? and do you stand by the fact -- do you stand by your point that it's only 5,000? >> i think there are a range of estimates and it's impossible to measure. that's the reality. and what we've been doing with government officials, government experts, industry experts is trying tcome up with the best estimate. and that has been done essentially by understanding what's happening at the surface and trying to understand volume there. adding to it, what we believe the oilproperties, how it would disperse in the water column as it moves to the surface and those two added together is the estimated volume. it's been clear from day one, there's a large uncertainty range around that. >> is it possible that it could be the larger number that's being reported?

>> it's theoretically possible. i don't think anyone believes it's quite that high that has been working on this. i believe that the uncertainty range is around that 5,000 number and it could be higher. but if the number you're talking about is 70,000 barrels a day, i don't -- i don't know this, but i don't think people that are working with it believe that that's a possibility. >> mr. chairman, could i ask my last question, please? thank you, sir. my last question, i have bp facilities in my district. i'm in carson, california. we also have offshore drilling right outside of my district, so this is an important issue. and let me just say, first of all, i areciate you coming. i haven't heard you take the fifth, either one of you, and you very candidly answered the questions, and that's what we need. what honest lessons could you say to us, to this committee, that we could consider to do, whether it's legislation or regulation to eure that this

never happens again? >> sorry. i think it's early but what would say is the redundancy in the systems that are ployed, the capability of being able to tervene in environment, we're learning a lot. we're learning a lot. we've got to parlay those learnings quickly into whatever regulaon should be and what industry capabilities should be, so i think it's early. but we're learning very quickly. >> so you're not required to know that prior to having the ability to drill? >> the response plans so far over the last 50 years have been, you know, quite frankly, concentrated on surface response. as we've gone through this, we pred kate a lot of the assumptions in the blowout valve that's accessible you can get on top of it with another one.

that's not the case in this unique situation. and i think we have t learn from that. >> thank you for your candidacy. thank you. >> confused as to mr. ms. edwards or mr. -- okay. ms. edwards. >> thank you, m chairman. and thank you, gentlemen, for being here today. i just have a couple of questions that i want to center actually around the response plan. because i think it's actually related to the flow rate. so if your response plan is designed for kind of a worse case scenario of 250,000 barrels per day and if you go with the -- what i think are conservative estimates of 5,000 barrels a day, you're probably at about 2% of your wor case scenario. do you -- so in fully implementing your response plan, is this the full implementation of your response plan for the

deephorizon spill? >> the sub surface response plans are very aggressive. the response plans on the surface encompass and utilize plans that go all the way from aggressive treatment offshore to shoreline protection skimming and things like that, booming, and then go on to land as to how to clean up and how to deal with issues. so the response plan is aggressive. it's being flexed and deployed based on the characteristics of this oil and where the oil's going. >> but in this response plan, if you are fully implementing an aggressive response plan and we're only at a 2% of a worse case scenario, what if the estimates are wrong and, you know, we're working at 5,000 barrels a day and they are closer to 70,000, 80,000 barrels

a day or more. what more can you do under the response plan that you've implemented? >> yes, well, i think the response plan, the plan itself and what's being done is roughly the same. it has to be deployed in different ways based on what the oil's going to dochl the priorities would shift, obviously, and the unified -- i think the unified command has made it clear tha the response plan is -- has considered worst case scenarios. it's not a response plan solely designed for 5,000 barrels a day. >> i know, i guess i'm just saying if you are implementing a full response plan at 5,000 barrels a day, which is a 2% of your worst-case scenar, i can't even envision what else cod be done or deployed if we were seeing a greater spill than what you estimate. leme just ask you about the estimate in the calculation. are you familiar with a professor steven whirly at

purdue university? >> i'm only familiar with news reports. >> i listened to him this morning and he saw the visual film that you all have now released at bp and he said that iginally he thought that it might be around 70,000 to 80,000 barrels a day, but upon looking at your film, which i can't figure out and maybe you could tell us why it hadn't been released until now, he said it is considerably greater than what he hadestimated, which is considerably greater than your 5,000 barrels a day. do you have any response do that? >> i don't know the nature of his calculations. as the chairman said earlier, there's been a task force put together to bring the best experters in t field to relook at all the data, all the evidence, all the video, and come up with what is a independent, so to speak, look with all the experts. all i can tell you is that our

folks, the government folks, and the independent industry experts have looked at this and come up with a unified command estimate. it's acknowledged there's a range around that and there's un -- >> but a range from 5,000 to 80,000 or more, i mean, if that were a leak at my house, i'd say that's a pretty hefty range. let me ask -- let me just ask you this. on -- with respect toour liability. are you saying that you are willing to pay whatever the liability is, even to the extent that it exceeds the $75 million cap? >> yes. >> and then, mr. newman, you, in your testimony, you spoke earlier about where the leak -- where the explosion occurred. you pointed out that it wasn't in the casings, that it was, you know, after the drilling was

complete. i can't remember if that was mr. mckay or mr. newman. but were you doing that because you are trying to draw a line as to where your liability might be? >> no, congresswoman, i'm just trying to help the committee understand to the fullest extent possible right now the facts as we know them and how those facts might lead, at least to a preliminary conclusion about what might have happened. >> and do the two of you agree that you are both jointly and severably liable for this spill? >> under the oil polluon act, bp, the responsible party with respect to the hydrocarbon spill, they have in the face of repeated questioning, they he asserted that responsibility. they've acknowledgedthat. >> and then lastly, mr. chairman, if you would not mind, going back to the assessment, if you could just clarify for this

committee how you came to the assessment that the spill that is taking place is 5,000 barrels a day. and how off or not you think you might be. >> we will provide that assessment. >> thank you. thank you, mr. chairman. >> mr. cohen. >> thank you, mr. chairman. i apologize for missing part of the earlier part of the hearing. i'm very interested and concerned, as are citizens of my district and constituents all throughout the country on this issue and what it's doing to the flo flora and the fawn in a of the gulf region. the entire united states of america will be affected by this but particularly memphis, new orleans, like a sister city, we consider the gulf coast as part of our world. part of all of our worlds. we need to be concerned. if i ask questions that have been asked before, i apologize.

first, mr. mckay and mr. newman, this dome that you all came up with that you brought down after about three or four weeks and failed, when did you all come up with that concept? >> that particular coffer dam was used in prior spills in shallow water. >> so it was not a unique process, it was just that the depth -- >> the depth is different, and the issue with it in terms of why it didn't work on first try was that hydrates formed. >> it froze. water got in there. why didn't have you some study done or done some research to see if it would have worked or prag since you have wells at that depth and many more deeper. what was done to make sure that would work? >> of course we don't know the specific fluid until the well is drilled and we're still learning about the fluids. so that particular fluid is a

very unique fluid in that it has very high gas and it has a propensity for forming hydrates at that depth. >> you say the fluid, you mean what's coming out of the earth right now and polluting the gulf of mexico? >> yes. yes. >> why didn't you try something -- couldn't you have used -- you took that fluid out of the earth and you put in your boats and you sold it. couldn't you have used that fluid, or maybe i'm wrong because i'm not a chemist, couldn't you have used that and test it'd to find out if it would work? >> this particular well is the first well drilled on that structure ever. and wh i'm really trying to say is the fluid's unique. the technology used in shallow water, it's not been used offshore in 5,000 feet of water. it was difficult to predict what -- >> there's no way to sim plate it? >> we did sim plate it and we said we're worried about hi hydrates. >> right now you've got a hose

you stuck in there and it siphoned off 1,000, 2,000, whatever. when did you come up with that concept? >> within the rst couple of weeks. >> why didn't have you this idea two years ago? >> we have a unique situation here. i don't think anybody could have predicted we have a blowout preventer that didn't work, a lower marine riser package, 4300 feet of riser damaged and trenched in the gulf of mexico. so what we had to device was a system, we had to fabricate it and build it that can fit inside that pipe with drill pipe inside it and rubber diaphragm thataph can help keep the water out. >> don't you think you should have envisioned the worst possible case scenario when you're dealing with an ecosystem, unique, special and so important to the people, let alone the flora and the fauna, and shouldn't you have prepared for it and had this type of technology on day one going down there?

why do you have to wait for calamity to occur t come up with, oh, what should we do now? >> well, respectfully, i don't think we've been doing that. we've been workg parallel paths since the first moment this happened. first, to act wait the blowout preventer if possible, we worked for ten days trying to do that. parallel to that -- >> mr. mckay, understand this. i'm talking about a year ago. why didn't younvision the worst possible case scenario that all this stuff would happen and what do we do if there's a gap 5,000 feet down and this oil is just going out? >> as i've said, we pred kate that a blowout prevent ser either going to work, can be manually intervened with or not, or can be approached, if not. we've got a unique situation where we've had this thing on top of it that was supposed to release and it didn't. so therefore we're having to engineer solution that's as thaa

very unique situation. i don't ink that could be predicted by anyone. we are learning a lot through this and i think the subsidy capability and some of the specific capability that the industry needs to put in place and the regulators need to look at, i believe we'll learn through this and i believe we're going to need to do some of that. >> can you assure me that the atlantis rig that some think could be questionable and an expert engineer, i don't know if you used to work for you all or not, has questioned that it is secure and doesn't need some type of review? >> the atlantis is a production platform. the have been some allegations made that all the drawings weren't there. we did an internal study and i unrstand how to read in detail but i understand all the drawings were there to safely start up and operate that platform as well as meeting regulations. the mms is looking into that. we've done an internal investigation an investigation and the mms is going to look into it which we welcome and

will fully cooperate. >> senator inhofe said if we increased from $75 million to $10 billion, the liability of the major oil companies this would be a mistake because it would cause small oil companies not to be able to afford to do this type of work. and he was concerned about them. are you also concerned about them and think it's a bad idea? >> i've not had time nor have we talked internally abou policy and limits. what we've said is in this incident for us, we're going to fulfill our responsibilities as a responsible party. we believe that means, in this case, waiving that $75 million and standing behind all legitimate claims that, due to this, that will impact the environment and the economy of the folks that are affected. so we -- i can't comment on specific legislation or specific caps. >> i appreciate your attitude. you've advertised bp and come before judiciary committee and others at other times and talked about your green perspectives. i would hope you'd put more emphasis on your green work.

it's obvious when we only use 25% of the earth's fossil fuels and yet we only have capacity to have 2% of them here, there's n way we can use fossil fuels to serve our energy needs in the futurend to do it safely. we need to look at wind and we need to look at solar and we need thave bp be a leader in emphasizing that and moving on where you won't have these type of catastrophes. you won't havehese type o issues. and god forbid something like this happens in the arctic. i want to see your hose and your dome. it ain't going to work up there. you've already ruined the gulf, i don't want to see you ruin the rest of the world's oceans. come up with the worst possible case scenario and figure out a way to do it. if you have to put a man in a tube and stick him down there our put a polar bear in there, you ought to do it. thank you. >> thank you, andr. defaz yo has a few questions. >> a few quick follow ups.

there ve been press accounts, this is directed to either of you, but particularly bp, and e allegation was since you're paying $500,000 a day for the rig it's sort of at this changeover time when you're cementing the well that there's a lot of pressure to get it done with and move on. and there were questions raised about the curing of the cement and that. who madehe final call that the well was stable, the cement was cured and you could start, you know, with the -- you know, basically shutting down there, the drilling -- removing the drilling, those sorts of things. who makes that call? is it halliburton? is it bp? or is it mr. newman's company. i assume halliburton or bp, but i'm not sure. >> i would say is in terms of the procedu and where the procedure steps are done, that's

the procedure is written by bp and the execution of that is generallby transocean and other contractors. many of these decisions are collaborative. i think it's going to be really important in the investigations to understand the timeline and every single step between when the positive and negative pressure were done, what happened after that, who was involved, what conversations were made, what information was available, how was it utilized? i think all of that has to be put together to put what's going to be a complicated jigsaw together. i believe it can be, and i believthat's what has to happen. >> anything to disagree with there,r. newman? >> as i said in my opening comments, congressman, the process of drilling a well is a collaborative process that it requires the expertise of a number of mpanies, specifically with respect to the cement and the design of the cement, the formulation of the cement, the placement of the ment would have relied on the expertise of the cementing

contractor. >> okay. all right. i guess that's something we'll have to get to later. two other jus really quick points. to mr. newman, there was on the "60 minute" show we've heard a lot and you said you've seen it. there was apparently an employee from the rig who was in the show. appeared to be injured. i'm just curious on this form where it says they were not a witness and i was not injured, was that individual required to sign this form since he was clearly injured? because there's an allegation that basically people were held hostage until they signed this form. >> nobody was required to sign the form. there was no coercion. there was no force. i don't knowhether mr. williams has signed one of those or not. >> okay. all right. so there was no coercion whatsoever. and then finally just an observation on mr. cohen. i mean, i think in looking at th -- i don't think there's any small act, little mom and

companies out there doing deep water drilling. we could have one more risk oriented as opposed to one that is just a cap which would mean the larr companies are doing more risky deep war, you know, exploration and extraction. they have more resources and they may be subject to a higher cap so that may solve mr. inhofe's or other people's problems. i don't know how mr. mckay would feel about that. sort of a risk basis in terms of a cap. >> to be frank, we're concentrating on dealing with this and trying to get this stopped. >> all right. okay. thank you, mr. chairman. >> this will be your last series of questions. >> thank you for your patience and for your capacity to endure this long without much of a break. mr. newman, is the rig insured?

do you have insurance? >> the company carries -- >> -- construction cost? >> the company carries a comprehensive coverage of haul and marine insurance. the rig was injured. >> at something similar to its $350 million construction cost? >> no, similar to the kind of decision you and i would make about insuring a home. we don't insure our homes at the original construction costs. we insure them at the market value. the rig was insured at the market value. $560 million. $560 million. can you explain to us why you are now in district court seeking to limit your liability under an 1851 law to $27 million? >> two reasons behind the company's filing of the limitation of lbility action. first and foremost, we were instructed to file by our insurance underwriters.

in the immediate aftermath of the event, they instructed us to file that limitation of liability action and so we did that to respond to their request and preserve the company's insurance program and secondly, with the number of lawsuits that have been filed against the company in various jurisdictions at the federal level, at the state level, the limitation of liability actions serves to consolidate all of those actions into one venue. >> i will say it is appalling having been in new orleans over a three-day period and seen the number of ads on tv about every 20 minutes there's an ad from a law firm. there are numbers moving into louisiana to file and pay people to sign up for legal services. so i can understand your willing. but on the one hand, you have insured your rig to cover the company's costs.

on the other hand, you move to protect yourself against those who wouldn't be compensated anywhere near what the company would be under its insurance. >> believe me, chairman, if i could have the rig back and the 11 people back, that's clearly the decision i would ma. >> i understand that. >> i just want to make that clear. mr. mckay, you said we couldn't have predicted -- that's not exactly your words -- that gas would escape, that the blowout preventer would fail. we'll learn from this. and we want you to learn from is. but in aviation, when an aircraft is operating at five, seven miles altitude, there's no curb to pull over, look under the hood and see what's wrong. it has to be right before it leaves the ground. at 5,000-foot depth, it's a

comparable situation. you don't have the ability to send someone down and a rig to look at what's going wrong and fix it. operate with remote vehicles. you know that. you've had the experience. the norwegians operate in similar depths. their rigs are verified by a third party entity that makes sure that all those safeguards have been put in place. when an aircraft comes down from 35,000 feet to land at an airport, it's operating roughly 165 miles an hour. very little margin for error. that's why the flaps are deployed. and the thrust reverser is activated. and then the brakes are applied. and if any one of those fails, or two of the three fail, the other is supposed to protect

that aircraft and bring that aircraft to a halt. it seems to me from my years of experience and safety investigations that there is not this kind of backup and redundancy at those depths in the ocean with those enormous pressures, with the temperature at roughly 30 degrees, which at freshwater would freeze but saltwater can sustain tha kind of temperature, that there is not the kind of safety mind-set underwater drilling that there is in aviation. now if you have a takeaway from this experience, is that there needs to be. you need to he redundancy in those operations.

there is -- i said it earlier. half of the seafood and shellfish production of the united states in these 660,000 square miles of gulf. there are wave action on the surface that i observed in the overflight. i have photos taken of it. there are underwater currents that often go in thepposition direction of the air currents. there is movement of the dispersant and the oil andts contamination of the sea life. it may , in some cases it may be irreversible. if you had, i your industry and the american petroleum institute and the mineral management services inside the coast guard had all been thinking about constructively how we operate safely at those depths under those pressures, at those temperatures, you might have

installed the protections. those are photos on the screen there that i took from the coast guard aircraft. this is sobering and stunning, as miss miller said. it takes your breath away to see the effects. so i want to understand -- i'll just ask this one question -- whether you've -- you and transocean together have worked out a scenario of redundancy of the blowout preventers at that depth and those temperatures and if not, why not? and if you did, and rejected it, why? we have recommended or at least provided some ideas to the department of interior, and mineral management services that we would suggest to recertify

blowout preventers to test in some additional ways and different ways to relook at the design and see if redundancee extra redundancy should be built in and a subsea capability for the industry and how that should be assembled. and that is what i would say that we think right now are improvement areas that could be looked at quickly. >> mr. newman? >> i agree with mr. mckay's assessment of actions that can be taken in the interim, but the real answer to the question is only going to be discovered when we complete all of the investigations. >> we'll leave it at that. those photos you saw passing on the screen were in the impact area in the gulf. quite sobering. thank you very much for your testimony. members will have follow-up

questions. we expect your responses to them. thank you. our next panel will include lisa jackson, administrator of the environmental protection agency, dr. jane lubchenko, under secretary of oceans and atmospheric and noaa administrator. elizabeth bernbaum, director mineral management service. re admiral brian solerno, assistant commandant, accompanied b rear admiral peter neffinger and dr. silvia earl, explorer and resident national geographic society. i've added her to this panel because she has a plane to catch, and i want to be sure we have her testimony.

dr. earl, you may take your seat at the end of the table here. i asked this panel, as the previous panel, to rise. i ask the panel to rise. with regard to the testimony that you provide to the committee on transportation and infrastructure and all subsequent communication regarding this hearing do you solemnly swear to tell the whole truth and nothingut the tth so help you god? you are sworn in.

i will begin with dr. earl in recognition of her longstanding commitment to another event and that she has to catch a flight, which is hard to do these days in washington. dr. earl, your testimony, i read all the testimony last night. it was positively lyrical. i recall your presentation at an aspen institute conference 12 years ago. i was enthralled by your love of the ocean environment, your grasp, your understanding, your intimate understanding of it all. and there's a portion of your testimony that reminds me of lord byron's epic poetry in which he describes the ocean as

deep, dark heaving, mysterious and eness. deep and dark it is. heaving when there is a powerful storm. mysterious, we are beginning to understand the mysteries of the ocean, thanks to your work and that of others. are understanding that a calf sperm whale born at the same time of discovery of these oil wells can outlive them only if we let it. but endless environs where it is not, you are going to describe for us the ends, the limitations. please begin. push yourutton so we can hear you. and bring the microphone closer.

jimmy? somebody make sure the microphone is working? >> thank you chairman oberstarr, members of the committee, all assembled here. you've seen plenty of bad news, bad news images relating to the deep water horizon oil spill. with some images that will be shown while i speak, i want to illustrate that the gulf of mexico is not as some believe an industrial wasteland, primarily valuable as a source of

petrochemicals, a few speciesf ocean wildlife that humans exploit for food, for commodities and recreational fishing. there are other assets, and i hope we'll soon be seeing some of them. they were documented during a five-year project with the national geographic with noaa and the goldma foundation and a partnership, too, with members of about 50 organizations, industry,rivate institutions and others. dozens of scientists from around the country who explored the coastline of this country from 1998 through 2003. for more than 50 years, i've had experience on, around, under and over the gulf of mexico as a marine scientist and an explorer. i've started and led engineering companies devoted to the development of equipment for axis to the deep sea.

and i've served on a number of corporate and dozens of non-profit boards. and from 1990 to '92, served as the chief scientist of the national oceanic and atmospheric administration and had an up close and personal experience with the "exxon valdez" spills as well as extensive evaluation of the environmental consequences of the 1990-'91 persian gulf spill. so i really come to speak for the ocean. the gulf of mexico is a big blue body of water as a trinational treasure better known perhaps for yielding hurricanes, petrochemicals shrimp and in recent years, notorious dead zones than for its vital role in generating oxygen, taking and holding carbon distributing

nutries,tabilizing temperature, yielding freshwater to the sky that returns as rain. contributing to the ocean's planetary role as earth's life support system. as with the ocean as a whole, the gulf of mexico is most valuable for those things that we tend to take for granted. at least we could take them for granted until recently. we now understand that there are limits to what we can put into or take out of this or any other part of the ocean without unfavorable consequences back to us. ironically, fossil fuels have powered civilization to new heights of understanding, including awareness that the future of human kind depends on shifting to energy alternatives that don't generate carbon dioxide and otherwise cause planet threatening problems. think about it. fossil fuels have taken us to the moon and to the universe

beyond. made it possible for us to see ourselves in ways that no generation before this time could fathom. provided the backbone of the extraordinary progress we enjoyed in the 20th century and now into the 21st. but we now know that those of us alive have participated in the greatest era of discovery and technological achievement in the history of human kind, largely owing to the capacity to draw on what seem to be cheap but, by no means, endless source of energy. at the same time that we have learned more, though, we have lost more. cheap energy, it turns out,s costing the earth. despite the enormous advances in knowledge, the greatest problem that we face now with respect to the deep horizon o spill is ignorance and with it, complacency. i mean, it seems baffling that

we don't know how much oil is actually being spilled. we don't know where the oil is in the water column. we can see from the surface we don't know what's below the surface. we haven't seen what it's actually like on the bottom at 5,000 feet in the gulf of mexico. we have glimpses. some of the glimpses of what's as -- what's in as much as 2,000 feet of water are being shown on the screens as i speak. but our access to the sea at th critical point in history is sorely limit ed. i only have a few minutes for my remarks. so i'm going to skip through the -- some of e testimony that i'm submitting for the written record. and dive into some of the key issues that i want to focus on. many questions have been raised,

and i'll raise them again about the use of the dispersts that really are more cosmetic than helpful in terms of solving the real problems. if i could speak for the ocean, i would say halt the use of subsurface use of dispersants and limit surface use to strategic sites where other methods cannot safeguard coastal habitats. the headlines lament oil birds, oil beaches and oiled turtles, dolphins and whales as they should. but where's the constituency concerned about oiled kopapos, some of those creatures that are heavy lifters with respect to generating oxygen and driving food webs in the ocean. thediatoms, jellies, terrapods,

the eggs and the young of this year's vital offspring of tuna, shrimp and menhaden. not only is the unruly flow of millions of gallons of oil an issue but also the thousands of gallons of toxic dispersants that may make the ocean look a little better on the surface, where most of the people are, but make circumstaes a lot worse under the surface where most of the life in the ocean actually is cosmetic cures do not solve the problem. they are almost certainly making matters worse for life in the ocean. another issue, we should be prepared, and i gather that noaa and others are responding to the need to deploy available subsurface technologies and sensors as well as those at the surface to evaluate the fate of

the underwater plumes of oil as well as the finely dispersed oil and chemicals and their impact on floing surface forests of sargasm communities, life in the water column and on the sea floor. there needs to be immediate gathering of baseline data both broad and detailed to measure impacts and recovery. there must be salvage operations to restore the 40 or so species of affected large wildlife creatures and their habitats. but perhaps at least as significantly there must be initiatives to create large reserves in the gulf to facilitate recovery and ongoing health of the thousands of less conspicuous species of --nd the mari ecosystems from the deepest areas to the shallow shores. it's urgent that large permanently established areas in

the gulf of mexico be designated for full ptection from extractive activities. their deep coral reefs and the flower garden banks, the closest shallow coral reef to where the present spill is taking place. protected areas are critically needed to safeguard important spawning areas for bluefin tuna, for grouper, snapper,harks and even the wiley species of shallow and deepwater shrimp aside from the importance of such areas for healthy ecosystems to survive, they are essential if fishing is to survive, to continue as a way of life in the gulf of mexico. after all, if there are no fish, there are no fishermen. d already, owing to the heavy fishing pressure in the gulf of mexico as in other parts of the world, the populations of fish that were around when i was a kid expring the gulf of mexico

are now depleted by as much as 80%, groupers, snappers. some speciesy 90%, such as the sharks. bluefin tuna and others. implementing and expanding the proposal called islands in the stream. a concept long ago proposed by noaa for a network prove techs in the gulf would be a great place to begin. the need to be better assessment so the economic impacts and the modes of compensation for the present oil spill and for future problems. the heart research institute at texas a&m at corpus christi has put a figure of known economic consequences at about $1.6 billion. that does not take into account the free services of -- that are

being affected but for which compensation is not being proposed but perhaps by suggesting that there be protected areas in the gulf of mexico as a way to restore and enable the ocean itself and life in the ocean to recover unimpeded by other impacts would be a good place to, in a sense, compensate the ocean for the problems that have occurred. surely we must make substantial investments in the development of technologies that can help solve the problems and assess the problems. investments in human occupied, robotic and autonomous systems that gon the water, under the ocean, not just at the surface. there must be sensors and

stations for exploration research, monitoring and safeguarding the living ocean. you think about it. the u.s. coast guard, noaa, the epa, the navy, they all have aircraft. they all have ships. but what is -- what is in the national fleet that will take us under the sea? we've already this year seen the loss of two underwater systems that are not being supported any longer by the harbor branch oceanographic institution, the johnson sea links that for years have provided access down to thousand meters 3,000 feet or so, since the 1970s. the alvin submersible, the workhorse of the submersibs for scientific exploration since 1964 is about to be retired. it will be retired before its

replacement is ready to go. meanwhile, japan, russia, china and france have systems, manned systems that can go and make observations to at least half the ocean's depth and no nation has a system that can go back to full ocean depth. a visit there to place only once in 1960, 50 years ago, for about half an hour in the marianna trench. how many systems can go to 5,000 feet with human observers. right now, it's a handful. and only the alvin in this country really qualifies. the pisces ss have been in that league, but we're woefully unprepared to send anybody down to just take a look. to be able to evaluate with more than just a camera system as good as they are. and where are the facilities that you can pull off the shelf for the coast guard to go down, for example, to evaluate on their own, not necessarily

relying on industry provided systems. industry does have a fleet of remotely operated systems. they need them for spection, for monitoringfor maintenance and repair. but the ocean itself needs to have an understanding that is currently lacking for lack of the technology investment. we put billions into what takes us into the skies above and it's paying off handsomely. we've negleed the ocean and it's costing us dearly. so perhaps this is a wake-up call. a mighty 2 by 4 to alert us to the needs to seriously commit to the technologies for going deep into the sea. we need to embark on expeditions to explore deep water as well as the near shore and shallow water systems in the gulf of mexico and elsewhere in our coastal waters. if you look at the nation's

clusive economic zone, it's larger than all the rest of the united states put together. there's another whole country out there under water and a lot of it is in deep water, presently inaccessible by means that we have at our disposal. consider back to the coast guard and there is an agency that we call upon when there's an emergency, but it's not only not being provided with adequate technologies to deal with what goes on under the surface of the sea, but to see a budget cut this year while the other encies and the military have received boosts. it doesn't seem reasonable, especially in light of the needs that aregrowing. speaking like an ocean, speaking for the gulf, we need to encourage tri-national support and collaboration among scientists and institutions around the gulf to invest the good minds that are there, to

come up with solutions that are not just divided by national borders, mexico, cubeacuba, the united states, but really takin into account the entire system. we need to mobilize those good minds to address those situations like the mexican summit that took place five years ago that helped launch a regional governance of u.s. and mexican states. a new summit is being planned by the hart research institute to take place later this year to address next steps to ensure that assure an economically and ecologically healthy gulf o mexico can be developed in future years. cuba is a country that some of us have been worrying about with respect to the possibility of oil spills heading north as exploration and drilling of picking up in that country, and now they are faced with worries about the consequences of this major spill from the united states heading sout

and while we are investing in rapid expansion of safe energy alternatives that do not result in the release of carbon dioxide, new standards of care need to be implemented for industries extracting oil and gas from the gulfnd elsewhere in u.s. waters. think about it. the public needs to know what actually it is like out there in the deep waters of the gulf where activities are taking place. thorough documentation of the nature of the sea floor showing those deep coral reefs, showing the nature of life in the water column, in the whole area around where operations are taking place should be made public before operations such as drilling, establishing platforms and laying pipeline and so on take place. and the changes in the environmen measurednd made publicly available. it's not that we shouldn't be doing these things but we should know what the costs really are.

the environmental issues need to be takennto account and be the basis when necessary for excludeing operations in order to protect vital environmental concerns. >> dr. earle. >> two minutes. one minute. >> i'm going to have to limit you to one minute. >> this is my -- >> in your own interest so that you can -- >> well, it's not enough time to touch on all the concerns, but the biggest problem boils down to complacency that comes from ignorance. we are pointing to bp, transocean, to cameron, to government agencies, anywhere we can for blame. but actually, the blame for this and other catastrophes or costs related to our demand for cheap energy is something that a of us need to bear. we all must share the cost of those who demand cheap oil at

any price. the loss of human lives, the destruction of the life-giving gulf, simply cannot be justified as an acceptable cost of doing business. but if we really do go forward, with a commitment to do things differently, henceforth, we will have gained something of enduring value. we must do better about thinking like an ocean and thinking on behalf of those who will benefit or sfer from the consequences of our actions. cheap energy is not only costly in terms of human lives lost, it's also costing the earth, so to speak. it's clearly costing the ocean. thank you. >> thank you very much for a very moving, compelling testimony. the only voice for the ocean that we will hear. and i am so in harmony with your

views about looking in outer space for life in water. i frequently refer to that. we spent several billion dollars looking for water on mars. we started out looking for water on the moon. and recently, i watched the science channel project on europa, one of jupiter's moons where there is speculated to be water below the surface. and finding some sort of space vehicle that will go down punlue into that subsurface and fin there is water. and then that raises the next question, whether there is life in that wate we've got it right here on earth. >> yes. >> it's right in front of us. right at our doorstep in the gulf. 660,000 square miles of it.

and you illuminated the bacteria, phytoplarchthon, microorgisms that make a rich life environment but yet within that ecosystem, we've lost numerous species. what will be the effect of this spill? much of it will be beyond our vision, beyond the human eye or even ility to detect as you have so well described it. and you reference the dispersant approved by epa to make the ocean look better. but as you say, it warns -- there's a warning that there was a skin and eye irritant and it's harmful if you inhale it, can cause injury to red blood cells, kidney or liver. there are 15 of these

dispersants approved by the national contingency plan. to the best of your knowledge, has any of tse dispersants been tested on the flora or phona of the gulf waters? >> i'm not aware that they have or have not. >> what is your best scientific guess that if these -- if the organisms of the -- those upon which higher life depends are exposed to this substance, what happens to them? >> that is the question that should be addressed. the kinds of tts that are typically done are on specific kinds of animals. i have not seen the reports of the very -- the list that is now

being approved. but the reports on the dispersants used for the exxon valdez suggest that it's not good for contact with humans, it's not good for contact with the creatures that live in the sea. >> at the briefing in the command center, we were told that the -- it takes roughly four hours from the -- forhe oil to make the journey from the bottom, from the mud btom of the sea floor to the surface. the dispersants are being injected at the speng point of the well. but the dispeants take only two hours to get to the surface. and there was speculation by admiral landr and others in the command center whether the

dispersants really are having an effect upon the oil column as it rises to the top if it's getting up there faster than the oil. >> i think the problem is that we're dealing with speculation. we need some real answers. and not to know is not acceptable. we need to be able to access the water column, to go out and see for ourselves both with remo systems, with cameras if you will, and ideally to be able to go in small submersibles go out to where the action is, go into the water column, observe what's happening. sample what's there. it's right now because of the ignorance factor, it's easy to gloss over what actually may be happening. >> very sobering thoughts, and there are other questions i would like to explore with you, but i know you have to catch a flight. i'm going to ask mr. cao for any

questions or comments he might have. >> that's really my concern, like yours, centers on the effect of the dispersants on the wildlife as well as on some of the species, as you said in your report. but as of right now, the only data that you actually have are the ones tham the "exxon valdez" and none other? >> other information is available. it isot available to me as i speak here, but the -- the role of dispersants across the board is to break the oil up into smaller pieces. some of the chemicals used for this are more toxic than others. but ne of them are exactly a recipe for good health for creatures who live in the sea. >> you mention that we have to

invest in creating, inventing new deep water submersibles. how far are we if we were to invest money to develop such a vehicle that it can go down to the deepest part of the ocean floor. >> the technology exists. the oceanographic institution deployed this past year in 2009 a remotely operated system that went to full ocean depth seven miles down on nine differe occasions. the cost of deploying it is expensive. and it is the only one in the world that exists. so the technology is there. there are no human occupied systems that can go to full ocean depth, although the technology exists. it did exist 50 years ago.

consider where we were with aviation and space technologies 50 years ago. as compared to where we are today with access to the sea for us and for our instruments for our sensors. we've come a long way. but when an iss of this nature comes up, why do we not have off the shelf capability for the coast guard, for noaa and for others who might be able to not just go out and help with the evaluation of what is happening. how can we not know how much oil is being released? how can we not know the size of the problem? we're dealing from the surface to try to access what is largely a subsurface issue. and what about tracking and following the aftermath and where is the before evidence?

actually, investment has been made by scientists over the last half century in trying to understand how many kinds of creatures live and where they live in the gulf of mexico and elsewhere. new volume just came out in 2009 that was the result of efforts by more than 100 scientists. they fou well over 15,000 species of organisms living in the gulf of mexico. these are in a volume that is about five inches thick and that has just been published by texas a&m. and it is evidence of what's there. but we need some baseline data that very specifically looks at what was it like before the spill. what is it like now. what would i be like now. what can we learn from it and what actions can be taken to restore health to the areas that

have been affected. not just compensation for the fishermen or for the loss of revenues to today's business operations throughout the gulf of mexico, but what about the loss to the gulf itself that would be pain far down the line for future generations as well as present ones. >> thank you, and i yield back. >> mr. chairman, i'll be very brief. thank you for your -- all of your efforts and for your work over the many years. and i am sure, as i listen to you, i couldn't help but think that when you hear about these plumes and you think about the 5,000 to 70,000 barrels of oil going into the ocean on a daily basis, that must make your heart

ache. i'm sure. and as i saw the pictures there, i was just -- i guess there's absolutely no doubt in your mind that substantial damage has probably already been done. you think so? >> what's amazing to mes that the gulf is as resilient as it has been in the face of thousands of wells that have been drilled and that operations, the spping on the surface, the heavy large-scale fishing operations that have taken place. there's still plenty of reason for hope. the ocean is still resilient and the gulf of mexico is almost a laboratory of resilience to show how some of these sophisticated operations can take place side by side with the productive kind of ocean system,ot what it was a thousand years ago or even a

hundred years ago. but still, a viable productive system. but there are limits to what we can g away with and still have fish prospering, still have the spawning area for the western atlantic in the western gulf of mexico. there are such things as going too far. we killed the last of the munk seals that once proser iffed as far north at galveston, texas. all gone from the caribbean sea. they were killed largely for their oil and for their meat. treated as commodities. >> one other thing and then i'll be finished, mr. chairman. you ha spoken about the coast guard and i'm chairman of the committee -- subcommittee that oversees the coast guard. you are absolutely right. at this critical moment, there's no way that we should be cutting

the coast guard budget, and the chairman has been very adamant about that on a bipartisan basis we've been advocating to make sure that we have those funds. but we also -- and i've been just phing to try to make sure the coast guard is even more a part of the process of overseeing some of these situations so that hopefully they will -- this kind of thing will, if it happens, we can address it more effectively and efficiently and quickly. but i really appreciate it. i'm sure the coast guard appreciates your comments. and with that, mr. chairman, i'll yield back. >> thank you. mr. cobel. >> n question. >> mr. duncan? >> no, thank you, mr. chairman. but i know we need to get on to the other witnesses so i'm fine. >> mr. schuller passes. dr. earle, thank you for those insights, for your

understanding, for your love of the ocean and for the lyricism of your presentation. you may be excused. >> thank you. and administrator jackson, great to have you with us. thank you for your leadership in so many arenas with the epa and restoring its voice and its compass in leading us toward a clean environment. please begin. >> thank you, chairman. to the chairman, ranking member micah and members of the committee. thank you for inviting me to testify about epa's role in responding to the bp deep water horizon rig explosion, but first let me express my condolences to the families of those who lost their lives in that explosion. we owe them our very best efforts, whether it be in the response or in the investigation. while there is no perfect solution to the environmental

disaster that the gulf of mexico is facing right now, epa is committed torotecting our communities, the natural environment and human health. that commitment covers both the risk from the spill itself as well as any concerns resulting from response to the spill. in the last three weeks, epa has dispatched more than 120 staff, scientists, engineers and contractors to alabama, florida, louisiana and mississippi to perform rigorous testing and monitoring of air and water quality. we are tracking any possible adverse impact stemming from controlled burning of surface oil, possible chemicals rising from the oil itself and issues caused by the use of dispersants. we are working with state officials, with local university scientists and other federal agencies to get the best available data, share that data in a timely fhion and to ensure proper response for the gulf coa people and their environment. at the president's direction, i have personally travelled to the region, the region i grew up in

and still consider home twice over the past weeks to personally oversee epa's efforts and to meet with the loc communy to ensure their questions and ccerns are addressed. for weeks, epa responders have been monitoring air pollutants, cluding particulate matter, hydrogen sulfite and total volatile organiccompound or vocs from the oil in the gulf as well as the controlled burning of that oil. these pollutants could pose a health risk to local communities and this monitoring is essential to ensure that communities are protecteds bp takes direct response actions. epa is also monitoring water quality by conducting surface water testing along the gulf coast. both in areas that have been impacted and those not yet affected. all of this information is being made public as quickly as we can compile it. we have been posting regular updates to our web page, www.epa.gov/bpspill. which has been a critical resource since the beginning of

this event. a primary concern is to ensure the safe application of chemical dispersants. oil dispersants are chemicals applied to the spilled oil to break down the oil into small drops below the surface. ideally, dispersed oil mixes into the water column and is rapidly diluted, bacteria and other microscopic organisms then act to degrade the oil within the droplets. however, in the use of dispersants, we are faced with environmental trade-offs. we know that surface use of dispersants decreases the environmental risk toshorelines and organisms at the surface and we know that dispersants break down over weeks rather than remaining for several years as untreated oil might. but we are also deeply concerned about the things we do not know. the long-term effects on aquatic life are still unknown and we must make sure the dispersants that are used are as nontoxic as possible. we are working with

manufacturers with bp and with others to get less toxic dispersants to the response site as quickly as possible. epa has previously authorize use of several dispersant chemicals under the national contingency plan, in order to be places on this list, each dispersant chemical must undergo a toxicity and effectiveness test. however, i am increasingly concerned that epa can and should do more. as we emerge from this immediate response, i commit to reviewing the regulations regarding dispersant registration and listing and chairing the results of that work with this committee. on friday, epa and the on-scene coordinator authorize the application of dispersant under water at the source of the leak. the goal of this novel approach is to break up and degrade the oil before it reaches the water's surface and comes closer to our shorelines, our estuaries and our fish nurseries. based on our testing, this can be done bysing less dispersant

that is -- than is necessary on the surface. but let me be clear that ep reserves the right to hold the use of subsea dispersant if we conclude that at any time the impact to the environment outweighs the benefit of dispersing the oil. as with our other monitoring initiatives, epa and the coast guard have instituted a publicly available monitoring plan for the subsurface dispersant application to understand impacts to the environment. this data is coming to epa once a day. and if the levels in the samples are elated, epa will reconsider the authorization of dispersants. epa islso preparing to support any necessary shoreline assessment and cleanup by identifying and prioritizing sensive resources and recommending cleanup methods. epa in accordination with the states will continue to provide information to the workers a public about test results as well as assisting communities with potential debris disposal

and hazardous waste issues. chairman, as a native of new orleans, i know firsthand the importance of the natural environment. to the health, economy and culture of the gulf coast. as i mentioned, since the accident, i have been to the region twice. i've listened to people in numerous town halls from venis to waveland, mississippi, and other communities in between. i have learned in those meetings that the people of the gulf coast are eager to be part of this response. they want to be informed and, where possible, empowered to improve their own situation on their own. we have a great deal of rebuilding to do both in material terms and in terms of restoring this community's trust that government can and will protect them in a time of need. this is one of those times. i urge that we do everything within our power to ensure a strong recovery and future for the gulf coast. epa will continue to fully support the u.s. coast guard and play a robust role in monitoring or responding to potential public health and environmental concerns as local communities

assess the impact on their economies, epa, in partnership with other federal, state and local agencies will provide all assets to assist in the recovery. at this time, i'll welcome any questions you have. >> thank you very much for your presentation, and administrator lubchenko icompliment you on your presentation on the news hour the other evening. i thought you answered the questions exceedingly well with great balance and apparent command of the subject matter. you may proceed. >> thank you, mr. chairman. and thank you for the opportunity to testify before this committee on the department of commerce's national oceanic and atmospheric administtion's role in the response to the bp deep horizon oil spill. i especially want to focus on the criticaloles that noaa serves during oil spills and the importance of maximizing our contributions to protect and restore the resources, communities and economies affected by this tragic event. i'd like to begin by expressing

my condolences to the families of the 11 people who lost their lives in the explosion and sinking of the deep water horizon. this is a difficult time and our thoughts are with them. noaa's mission is to understand and predict changes in the earth's environment to conserve and manage coastal and marine resources to meet our social, and environmental needs. noaa say natural resources trustee and is one of the federal agencies responsible for protecting and restoring the public's coastal natural resources when they're are affected by oil spills or other hazardous substance releases. the entire agency is deeply concerned about the immediate and long-term environmental, economic and social impacts to the gulf coast and the nation as a whole as a result of the bp deep water horizon oil spill. noaa's experts have been assisting with the response from the beginning of this spill, providing coordinated scientific weather and biological response services. offices throughout the agency

have been mobilized and hundreds of noaa personnel are dedicing themselves to assist. over the past few weeks, noaa has provided 24/7 scientific support to the u.s. coast guard in its role as federal on-scene coordinator both on-scene and lou our seattle operation center. this noaa-wide support includes twice daily trajectries of spilled oil, information management, over flight observations and mapping, weather and river flow forecasts, shoreline and resource risk assessment and oceanographic modeling support. noaa has been supporting the unified command and planning for open water and shoreline remediation and analyses of various techniques for hand ling the spill, including open water burning and surface and dp water application of dispersants. hundreds of miles of coastal shoreline were surveyed to support cleanup activities. noaa's nationa marine fisheries service is addressing issues relating to marine mammals, sea turtles,

recreational fishery in federally protected waters of the gulf and updating the dimensions of the closure to ensure fisher and consumer safety without needlessly restricting productive fisheries in areas not affected by the spill. as the lead federal trustee for many of the nation's coastal and marine resources, the secretary of commerce, acting through noaa is authorized pursuant to the oil pollution act of 1990 to recover damages on behalf of the public to address injuries t natural resources resulting from an oil spill. opa encourages compensation in the form of restoration and this is accomplished through the national resource damage assessment process by assessing injury n service loss and developing a restoration pla that appropriately compensates the public for the injured resources. noaa is coordinating the damage assessment effort with the department of the interior as a federal co-trustee as well as the co-trustees in five states and representatives for at least one responsible party, bp.

the event is a grave reminder that spills of national significance can occur, despite the many improvements that have been put in place since the passage of the oil pollution act. although the best remedy is prevention, oil spills remain a grave concern given the offshore and onshore oil infrastructure pipes and vessels that move huge volumes of oil through our waterways. to mitigate environmental affects of future spills, responders must be equipped with sufficient capacity and capabilities to address the challenge. response training and exercises are essential to maintain capabilities. continuous training, improvement of our pabilities, maintenance of our capacity and investments and high priority response related research and development efforts will ensure that the nation's response to these events remains effective. training and coordination with other federal, state and local agencies that might have response and restoration responsibilities is critical to success in mitigating efforts of future spills. there are a number of

improvements to our ability to quickly respond to and mitigate damage from future spills that would benefit the nation. one such activity is increasing our response capacity. if another large spill was to occur simultaneously in other location in the u.s., noaa would have difficulty providing the level of response expected. we would be happy to identify specific difficulty coordinate l of response expected and we would be happy to share the effectiveness of the respon. our activities have been aggressive, strategic and science base and i assure you we will not relent in our efforts to protect the livelihood of gulf coast residents and mitigate environmental impacts of this. it thank you for allow mego testify on noaa's response efforts and i am happy to answer your questions. >> we appreciate your testimony. thank you very much. miss birdbaum from the material

management. >> i want to express how sad we from the mms sta are about those who lost their lives from the deep water horizon. manymms employees have worked their entire career in an effort to keep this kind of thing from happening and we will not rest until we deterne the causes to do everything possible to reduce the chance of it happening again. all leasing and operations on the federal offshore are governed bylaws and regulations to ensure safe environmental operations. the authority to rulate oil spill planning is dered from the oil pollution act 1990. mms regulations require all ocean operators of oil handling or transportation facilities submit and oil spill response plan to mms for approval. under the regations an offshore lessee is required to submit it to mms for approval before or at the same time as

submitting an exploration development plan for review. they must outline availability of cleanup equipment and trained person yell and ensure full response capacity can be completed during an oil spill emergency and varying degrees of response effort depending on the severity of the. it mms reviews and approves these plans every two years unless there is a significant plan that the plan be revised immediately. changes that would trigger a review is a change to the plan that reduces ability to respond or change in worst case discharge scenario. bp's regional that covered the deep water horizon was first sued in december 2000 and last issued december of 2009. it indicated a worst case discharge of 250,000 barrels per day. bp's eimate for the worst case discharge for the well-being drilled by deepwater horizon was

up to 263 barrels per day because it fell below the regional levels of the sorp. they were not required to submit specific site sorp. they submit one to ensure managers and spill operating teams and other contractors are familiar with theplan. training includes annual reporting spi reporting procedures, deployment strategies for response equipment, oil spill trajectory analysis and any other thing needed to respond to a skill. to test preparedness, mms coucts unannounced exercises, prepared a spill scenario, using data from the operator approved plan, without notification initiates the drill without esnating a pre-designated point of contact. they must fully notify the response staff as if there was an actual event taking place.

mms must also require the deployment of operation of spill vessels or dispersement aircraft. in the gulf coast region, mms conducts 12 or 15 such exercises annually. since 1994, they conducted six on bp, the most recent drill, november of 2008 was a skimming vessel deployed to respond to the drill. and they maintain omset. the renewable energy test research facility in leonardo, new jersey where operators test for oil spill under saraing conditions. it is the only place where oil spill response, research testing and training can be conducted in a marine environment with oil under colorado array of wave and oil conditions. the facilitate provides an environmentally safe place to develop testing and provide unique tests for a variety of oil spills.

this completes my prepared statement. i'd be happy to respond to prepared questions. >> thank you for your testimony. i understand the next two witnses are going to split their time. is that correct? >> we'll go quickly, sir. >> admiral, you may proceed. >> thank you, chairman and distinguished members of the committee. i appreciate the chance to appear before you together with my colleague, the deputy national incident commander. the tw of us will discuss the lo of theffshore drilling unit, deepwater horizon and response to the skill. in my role, i oversea strategic integration of operational missions and policy for mission execution. it's from that perspective i appear befor you today. this event began with a fire and explosion on-board the deepwater horizon. the coast guard is, among many other things, a life saving service. saving lives is at the core of who were. on behalf of the coast guard, i

would also like to express our sincere condolences to the families of the 11 workers who did not survive the event. i would also like to acknowledge in grateful appreciation the swift response of the crews of the offshore supply vessels operating in the immediate area, in particular the motor vessel damon b. blankston and offshore vessel tide water marine who recovered the bulk of the survivors that evening. coast guard aircraft and cutters conducted searches of the area lasting several days, despite our best efforts, none of the missing crew members were recovered. the deepwater horizon was a foreign flag mobile offshore drilling unit however the crew is comprised of u.s. citizens required for operations on the outer continental shelf and required to have a certificate of compliance issued by the coast guard before it was allowed to operate. the most recent certificate of compliance was issued in 2009 and dow remain in effect until 2011 and there were no

outstanding safety deficiencies. the coast guard shares jurisdicti with the minerals nagement service in the regulation of offshore activities. the coast guard has the lead for the rig, vessel, heart of the system itself, whereas the minerals management service focuses on drilling portion and vital equipment associated with drilling. we have yet to establish the reasons for the casualty, to understand what has happened y the coast guard and mms are jointly conducting marine board of investigation. the investigation will look into the adequacy of federal regulations as they pertain to mobile offshore drig units and outer continental shelf activities. with respect to the oil response, this is a spill of national significance. since the mid-1990s, the coast guard and other federal agencies have conducted exercises every three years, based on spill of national significant scenarios, to make sure we have the right framework and capabilities to manage a spill for the whole of

government approach. the most recent exercis occurred one month prior to the tragedy. many coast guard person whole participated in that exercise are now engaged in the actual response. nevertheless, there is much to learn from this casualty. the coast guard intends to charter a specific preparedness review to focus on adequacy of contingency plans and response efforts. such a plan is common after a major incident and used to prepare for future events. thank you, mr. chairman. i look forward to your question questions. >> good afternoon mr. chairman y chairman cummings and distinguished members of the committee. as admiral salerno, i am the deputy commander for the deepwater horizon gulf oil spill, appointed following secretary napolatano designating

this of national significance. it's to insure preparation of necessary resources and facilitate collaboration between federal, state and local governments and coordinate strategic communications throughout the whole of  government. i have a written statement i will submit for the record and keep my comments brief in the interest of our split time. with when the deep horizon sank on the 22nd, it caused an complex problem where we must rely on remote tools to stem the flow and source of the spill. as you heard, to meet this challenge, there is a very large organization, unified commands that stood up at the regional and massive level and all initiated massive response to the spill. that is led by rear admiral mary landry and nationally by admiral

that allen as national incident commander snfrpt the unified commands implement the area contingency plans, strategies and responsibilities previously agreed upon by stakeholders and prioritize cleanup sites for booming and other staging resources. these resources are directed to appropriate areas depending upon projections of the spill and wind and sea states and requires monitoring and modeling on scene we do with our colleagues from noaa and epa. bp is the responsible party and are responsible to respond with sufficient oil spill response capability. as noted, they're responsible for cleaning up the oil, remediating the damages and restoring impacted natural resources. as the federal law on seen coordinator, we insure bp meets constant oversight and direction and weill continue to monitor bp claims process to insure it

is robust and fair. the efforts on this response have been extensive and without precedent. as of today we recovered over 7.8 million gallons of oil-water mix applied, over 600,000 gallons of surface dispersants and deployed nearly 1.4 million feet of boom, staged another 380,000 feet of boom and there is another 1.4 million feet on order and arriving shortly, with over 20,000 people and some 10,000 or 1,000 vessels responding. we understand the impacts of this spill on the nation and local communities. i have personally visited the gulf region and spent many days in the last few weeks, overflying the spill sites and meing with local officials and affected populations and observing first hand trying to protect environmentally sensitive areas in local communities. we will continue coordinating

the aggressive government response to this spill while insuring bp meets their obligations. this includes the recent establishment of a working group of scientists and experts to determine accurately the flow ra and total volume of oil that has been spilled both to date and expected and that will be guided by a peer review process as ll. mr. chairman, i thank you for this opportunity and i welcome any questions you may have. >> the chair wishes to thank the nel for their testimony and a bit of housekeeping, we do have a series of votes on, on the house floor. i understand you, administrator jackson, have to leave, so i would ask -- you do, too, dr. lubchenco? all right. maybe we can do this very quickly and then ask the other three if they would come back for members that have left to vote that i knowre coming back to ask questions. administrator jackson let me

thank you for having your top staff in st. charles for the spruce mining permit. i won't ask you anything on that. i believe i couldn't tell who they dislike more, epa or me. i appreciate it. it was chance for people to have their voice heard. let me ask you, many of the response actions taken to date, such as the use of disbursements and surface skimming, of which you've testified to already and placement of floating booms are essentially the same techniques deployed during the response to the "exxon valdez" spi over 20 years ago. we certainly don't expect our military to fight wars with weapons that are outdated and designed 20 to 30 years ago, so why should we expect our federal agencies to respond to oil spills that use outdated techniques and eqpment? >> i couldn't agree more with the ntiment, mr. chairman, whh is that we, as i've been putting it, our ability to

extract this oil and use it has far outpaced the investments that we've made in dealing with response and preparedness. >> any other panel wish to answer that question? >> mr. chairman, i would wholeheartedly agree with what administrator jackson said. it's clear the techniques w are using today have really not advanced significantly. it would be well rth and investment to bring those into the modern age. >> it doesn't take a rocket scientist too tell us something went drastically wrong in this situation. mate take a rocket scientist to tell us how to plug this well but obviously something went terribly wrong. i guess i would ask general question to the panel, has deep water exploration for oil gotten too big too fast for its safety britches? how can we ensure an oil spill

of this scale and magnitude never happens again? >> i'll try responding to that. >> don't think we'll know for sure what happened here until we can actually pull the op stack and determine the end of the investigation will rely on engineering review of that as well as review of witnesses and so on that's already begun. until wenow that, we won't really understand what's gone wrong here. we are conducting a massive safetyreview. the president asked interim salazar to determine what we can institute to make deep water drilling safer. we are in the process of working on that. the secretary will get that to the report may 28th. in the meantime, the secretary suspended issuance of new drilling permits for new wells in deep water pending the completion of that report. so we are examining that safety

question, we know it can be made safe and know the nation relies on the oil we get from the gulf of mexico and do everything we can to make it safe and reduce e risk. >> as younow in my other hat as chairman of the natural resources committee, the secretary will be our witness, i requested numerous documents from you and secretary and still waiting response from those as well. that's another issue before our committee on natural resources. so we'll wait until then. as time is short, let me ask -- yes, mr. cummings. >> mr. chairman, i'll be very brief. first of all, tha you all for being here. miss jackson, thank you very much. i was just on down in new orleans over the weekend. they were very complimentary of your agency's efforts. you don't usually hear those kinds of things.

i want you to know that. i completely agree with your statement people of the gulf coast want to be informed of the impact of the spill and applaud the commitment of the administration about openness with regard to the spill. on the last panel, questions were asked of bp on its commitment to openness, which is a real key question. can you provide the committee with the assurance you will provide and compel, as to the extent that you can, bp to provide all tests and monitoring results taken in relation to this spill? >> sir, i'm absolutely happy to. i'll also suggest maybe you want to hear from the national incident command any data that epa has, whether we take it ourselves or comes into our possession because we directed bp to take it, i've directed my staff we will put it up on the website and make it available. we can't always do that as timely as people would like because we have to go through lab analysis and whatever, but

that is our commitment. i've also said and believe that one of the things bp can and must do is make all the data it is come fold take politically available, data as part of the response. >> one other quick question. you know, my colleague from maryland, miss edwards, and a number of members have asked questions about the amount of oil coming out of this big. it it struck me that it seems that you all have to rely to a degree on what bp is telling you and others. i'm trying to figure out, do you feel like you're getting the necessary information you have to get from bp to do your job? i can easily see how, you know, they could underestimate various things and go to a lower end

opposed to higher. are you all satisfied with the kind of information you're getting from them? >> i would say in general. epa and estimating the flow of oil, that's not within our area of expertise. there are people on the panel who can speak to that specific issue. i think one of the lessons learned from this, in this idea of a unified command, we are directing them to do things, and we are working to get a job done. but we have a different responsibility as government agencies to make sure we do that with transparency and people have a right to know and understand what we know, as we can give it to them. so i don't direct bp directly. that happens through -- commander and i have infinite respect for that neffenger and that allen.

people turn to the government and want too understand that structu structure. >> thank you. i'll direct that to our other witnesses later on. >> miss politano. >> thk you, mr. chairman. it's good to see some of the people we've met before, thank you very much, mr. chair. one of the questions i brought up to the entire panel is something that is very bothering to me, and i understand there may be some information you might have, miss bibaum, in regard to number of wells in deep ocean, how many permits have been issued, whether they're being reviewed, checked out for any possible leaks? have there been any incidences, how deep are they? where are they? so there's an ability to understand much more what's happening in the oceans we may or may not know could have a catastrophe in the future? >> thank you, miss napolatano.

excuse me. we define deep water as anything over 1,000 feet below sealevel. there are nearly 2,000 total wells in deep water at this time. i have 1988, as of yesterday. not all of those are exploration wells of this type. many of those are production wells, producing oil, which have a very different set of risks, exploration wells are more risky. we have conducted at the direction of the secretary of the interior an emergency inspection of all of the drilling rigs working in deep water. we did that within two weeks of the deepwater horizon incident. >> how deep? >> yi don't know what the deepet one is drilling at. i don't know. >> can you get it? >> i will get that information for you. our inspectors found a couple incides of non-compliance, not unusual on an inspection.

we correct those and begun a separate sweep of the deep water platforms and take longer because they are more complicated facilities and are more of them. we expect that will be completed in july and we will have done a full sweep of everything operating in deep water. >> deep water up to -- do you have any others going beyond the 5,000 range? >> yes, but i don't know the deepest facility. >> would there be ability to identify them where they're at and what their status is? >> absolutely. we have huge databases of that and can provide that to you? i'd like know where they're at, who's responsible for them in case anything were to happen and what we can do to ensure their safety toy protect our coasts and coastlines. the coast guard has done a great job. i know for years, you've operated under very difficult circumstances. i've been a number of times look

looking at the age of your -- i would call them a yacht, i'm not a sea going person, to me, anything other than a row boat is a big boat. somehow we may be failing to ensure our coast guard has the sufficient infrastructure to deal with many issues. is this going to be deterring from your services of the rest of the cover? >> ma'am, as you mentioned correctly, a lot of our shippings and aircraft are quite old. and the coast guard has embked on a very aggressive recapitalization program to replace those older vessels, as eluded to by the chairman earlier. there are new ships being built. two new os have joined the

fleet within the last two years, additional ones are on the way now, being built. we will go through a period of time where some capacity is coming offline and it's not a one-for-one replacement. it is part of an overall program to replace that aging infrastructure. the capabilities we're using in the gulf right now, we feele do have the right capabilities in placeo manage the current spill. >> is that for certain? >> whatever that is. if this spill -- when you surge the number of people you have to surge for a major event like this, it challenges any agency over an extended period of time. thellenge for us would be if this were to go on for an extended period of time, is the long term sustainability and the capacity to sustain this over a long period of time. >> certainly want to hear about if there is need for additional assistance. miss jackson, i want to thank

you personally for the great work your district in the west does for us and other areas. thank you, mr. chairman, i yield bac back. >> do you have any questions of the dr. lubchenco or administrator jackson? >> s, mr. chairman. may i be recognized? >> yes. we are out of time on the floor but 152 have now voted. >> administrator jackson, what is the epa's role of oil slicks that they indicate may be an enormous environmental problem and how complete is the epa's understanding of the size and number of these oil slicks as well as their potential effect on the environment? >> sir, in the interest of time, i'll defer to administrator lubcnco because epa has a very small role in marine

environments. if this spill had happened on land, epa would actually be running the response unless the president appointed a commander, as he has done here with the coast guard. in terms of the science, they are science advisoadvisors, espy on issues of whe the oil is and where it might go. >> congressman, would you like me to respond? >> yes. >> we've been -- i think it's fair to say we've mobilized all of our resources to track all of the oil and understand where it is. it's much easier to do that at the surface than it is to understand where the oil is below the surface. is is an unprecedented event in that regard. there is much more -- much less of the oil at the surface, and what we are doing -- so it's a chlenging issue. and what we are doing is tackling it in three different ways. we are running a series of

oceanographic models of how the water moves at different depth is in the gulf, to understand where the oil is likely to go at different depths, both when it comes up from the leak as well as the oil that might have been submerged with disper sants, so models, and we have been employing the noaa aircraft to drop instruments into the ocean to take data on the way down, to give us a better sense what's happening at different depths. three, we've been mobilizing research ships to go out and physically take data, deploy instruments, and get a better sense. we're in the early stages of doing that and we do not have a comprehensive understanding, as yet, of the full extent of where that oil is. we are devotg all possible resources to understanding not only where it is, but what its

impact might be. >> does the amount of oil flowing from the breaches affect your analysis of the oil beneath the surface? >> no, congressman, they don't. it is important for us to understand what the total volume of flow is, but both the mitigation efforts as well as our efforts to analyze where it is are not contingent upon a precise estimate. from the outset, we've assumed the spill is significantly large and without specific really concrete precise estimates, we've made every effort to hope for the best, but deploy resources, assuming it's a lot larger. >> thank you. >> thank you, administrator jackson and dr. lubchenco.

we appreciate your being with us. >> thank you, mr. chairman. >> >> tim kaine outlined the strategy of his party, yesterday. after taking a break, the members returned to finish the hearing. you can watch this and other things that we cover on c- span.org. today on c-span, tim kaine looks at the elections from this year.

and then scenes from the white house dinner with pres. calderon. then "washington journal," then coverage of his speech before congress. >> on book tv, on "afterw ords," michael graham defends the team party movement. he is interviewed by abc news. >> clarence thomas, on the confirmation process. >> i did not have a fun experience and i just do not wish that on anybody. and also, something that was said when i first got there. this has stayed with me. it doesn't matter how you got

there, all that matters is what you do after you have gotten there. >> with a new nominee going into the confirmation process, learn more about the highest court in the latest book from c-span. pages of conversation with all of these justices, to provide insight. available in hardcover and also as an e-book. >> madeleine albright chairs the strategic concept expert group, which is made recommendations about the future of nato. and also, eric kanter, and a look at the global -- >> good afternoon, and welcome to the national press club. i am a reporter from bloomberg

news, and we are the world's leading professional organization and we are committed to the future about programming with the free press, worldwide. for more information, go to our web site. to donate to the program, please visit press.org/library. i would like to welcome the guests of the speaker and working journalists. i would also like to look in the audience from c-span. after the conclusion of the speech, i will ask as many questions as permitted. i would like to welcome our guests. to the right, --

[reading names] rod kuchrow, and the speaker's -- blanche lincoln is facing a runoff against bill altehalter. and the democratic party establishment was taken back by

pennsylvania, as they nominated a former republican for the senate race. for the democrats, these are indeed interesting times. the governor took charge of the democratic national committee on january 21 after her home serving on the campaign of barack obama, and after four years as the governor of virginia. virginia was recognized as the best date for business in america. this was the state where a child was most likely to have a successful life. they were promoting democratic officeholders throughout america, and building a grass- roots infrastructure, with policies and politics. many political observers believed that this is headed for massive losses in the november congressional elections, as

voters are angry over deficits, the bailouts, and the ambitious agenda by president obama. today, we are interested in hearing how he plans to prove them wrong. welcome to the press club, toim kaine. [applause] >> thank you very much. thank you so much. please, have a seat. i want to thank you all for that very warm welcome, and the invitation to be with you today. i have been looking forward to grace this podium and it will be great to answer your questions. i am happy to be the chairman of the oldest political party in the world, and we're going to look forward to move this nation

out of a decade of diminished position in the world. i welcome those who have joined me, -- who have joined me, and she has been described as the former first lady. the chair of the -- the secretary of the democratic party and we have other members and staff, and volunteers in the audience. thank you for being with us tonight. three years ago, barack obama said that he would be running for president of the united states. he has for america to join him in tackling the health-care crisis, expanding educational opportunities and promoting national security, with a move for energy independence, and re- establishing the global leadership of america and doing this in a way to lift up the middle-class families who were hurting. he said, when the times

demanded, citizen leaders who were capable of hard work in challenging times would push for fundamental change. this year, the president is calling on his supporters to help for them to continue to deliver on this promise. the democratic national committee is preparing for the unprecedented mid-term effort, reaching out to americans from all walks of life. in particular, to the millions of people who voted for the first time in two days and -- 2008. the message to americans is very simple. with united republican opposition, the democrats and the president have taken bold action to lay a foundation for long-term prosperity and are providing greater choices and opportunities for the american people. there is a lot to be done and the president cannot do this by himself. he needs people in state capitals across the nation, with

the absence of any meaningful operation from the region cooperation from the republican party. knowing all these challenges, we are confident that we can go against the prognostication. let me talk about this. in january 2009, barack obama found the economy in a free-fall and we were losing jobs by 750,000 per month. the stock market was falling along with the dreams of retirement for millions of american families. the $237 billion left over from the clinton administration had been squandered. the republican party has followed policies to create the conditions for this, and this produced something that we had never seen. a decade of low wages and no job growth.

today, the americans are still paying the price as we continue to dig out of the worst of a lost decade -- and the worst recession since the great depression. but because of the leadership in congress and from the president, we're in a different place. the economy is growing and instead of losing jobs, we have gained jobs and we are offering hope. there is strong reason to believe that america will create more jobs in 2010 than in the entire eight years of the bush administration. this did not happen by accident. many economists talk about the collapse of the banking system and the prospect of the second great depression. he and the democrats did what was required. they met their responsibilities and made politically-challenging choices to prevent -- to prevent the catastrophe. they put the country in the

future first. in the time of maximum peril, the republicans in congress decided to sit on the sidelines and leave it to the president to clean up all of this. they were rooting for the president to fail. and this was the most cynical reason. they thought that if he failed, they would succeed. and so with no support from republicans, president obama and the democrats wrested the american economy from disaster. they treated two million jobs across america and provided tax cuts to 95% of working families, with critical investments in the nation's infrastructure, and president obama inherited a health care system -- this was broken. and with no support from republicans, he and the democrats in congress had a

historic victory, making necessary reforms to make coverage more affordable and available to millions of americans, including small businesses and seniors. this is sending the most abusive practice of the insurance industry. they are making certain that no one will lose their policy simply because they are sick. obama also inherited a broken financial system, which was unable by regulators who turned a blind eye to bad behavior. democrats on the verge of reform that will give americans the choices that they need to choose the right mortgage for their family, and this will end the need for taxpayer-funded bailout of banks and other financial institutions. more american children with health insurance, great supreme

court appointments, and the eradication of the leadership of the taliban. and a new global commitment to eradicating nuclear weapons. obama, 15 or 60 months ago, was given a government that was not working for american citizens. and he has begun to address the biggest challenges of america. there is still more work to be done to find energy solutions and reform immigration law, and to restore america to first place in higher education. that is why this is so important to get the democrats in this fall. we were in a ditch, and we had to build a ladder. we have to keep climbing rather than go back. the president has made great efforts to reach across the aisle to find common-sense solutions, the republican party is continuing business as usual

in washington, with partisanship and obstruction, even before he was sworn in office. they were going to fight his agenda, no matter what the issue. but this was not just political reasons. they have blocked progress to help special-interest allies, showing that they represent oil companies and wall street firms. and if republicans are back in charge, they have said that the priority will be to roll back the benefits that obama has taken on, and they want to counsel -- cancel aspects of the recovery act. they want to put off hard decisions that have to be made to strengthen the fiscal foundation. we are back in the ditch where we were in 2009. but we're not going to let this happen. that is why we will fight for

democratic candidates. we have a very tough battle, and the americans are anxious about the economy. and many are still feeling the problems from the deep recession. and the incumbents of both parties are being held accountable. the incumbent democrats and republicans face the prospect of competitive primaries and potential losses, and both parties have seen candidates suffering primary defeats. the protest -- the voters are wanting high standards, focusing on the long-term challenges and individuals who can put aside business as usual, to do the heavy lifting. and the voters have rewarded -- and they will continue to do this for the strong democrats to deliver great results. arlen specter it fell short in the primary, and he will not represent the democratic party. the senate will be losing a

courageous -- a courageous public servant, but this is also a great campaigner and a supporter of the agenda. and there is also the special congressional election. this is the latest in a string of special elections in congress, going back to the contest last november, and this demonstrates that democrats are able to win in conservative districts, including pennsylvania. john mccain was the winner here in 2008. and this is a blow to republicans who said that they would be winning this race, and they say that this was exactly the kind of thing that republicans were needing to win to be successful. previewing the republican message for 2010 -- the republican candidate ran against the president. and he said that he would repeal health insurance. the republican candidate lost by

a significant margin. this also shows that conventional wisdom says that the cycle will be difficult for democrats, the final chapter on the election is yet to be written. equally surprising was the republican primary in kentucky. the most powerful politician in kentucky saw has candidate defeated by the member of the tea party, rand paul. there is a civil war occurring on the republican side. the democrats of that -- they give the choice between a candidate who is in the mainstream, and the republican candidate showing the most extreme efforts of the republican party.

and he is basically in opposition at time when we need constructive answers to the challenges that we face. the republican party has a problem. they are feeling the bite of the tea party. they defeated a long-serving u.s. senator. in florida, the electorate has been split in half. in the state of maine, they hijacked the republican party convention, and they filled their platform full of conspiracy theories. in arizona, john mccain has had to reverse course on his lifelong political positions to fend off a challenger from the tea party. i saw logical -- ideological litmus tests are becoming normal.

the republicans are going to the right. the republicans are becoming less understanding of moderate candidates. this may become less appealing to the swing voters. and as we move from the primary season to the general election, i believe things will continue to change. the economy will improve. and the employers will begin to show jobs, and i believe the americans are going to do the democratic thing. we have already seen some significant movements suggesting a retire for a democratic congress that is wanting to solve problems, rather than a republican congress that would oppose the president at every opportunity. they can choose obama and the democrats, who have taken action to turn around the economy, to empower america with choices, or

they can choose republicans, and their failed economic policies took america into a ditch, and their obstructionist topics have made it so difficult to get out of this. and they're asking for the key is backes back. i am certain that a few of you have heard about the plan of the democratic national committee. we will commit a high level of resources to campaigns, with a 50-million dollar investment in local elections. and we know at the end of the day, this is never about money. so what you do -- we have been developing the most sophisticated plan in our history. we are running against a significant headwind, in terms of the history. if you look at the last 70 mid-

term elections, 28 house seats and four senate seats are lost. and the economic -- difficult economic times make this even more difficult. but we are used to the. the number one priority is getting first-time 2008 voters to vote again in 2010. because if we can enhance the turnout of the 50 million voters from 2008, we will make a difference in the close races across the country. many of those people were inspired by the president. some of them were attracted to the focus on change or the issues that he was advocating for. and they were tired of republican rule lets all the decline in middle-class success. the goal is to harness the forces that motivated them in 2008, to motivate them in 2010 for the democratic candidates.

we have to show the success of the president and the connection to the support of his allies. with the organizing for american movement, we have volunteers across the country to make this connection in a personal way. we believe that we can make a difference of 2-4% in the elections and this may be the difference between a democratic and republican victory, in many of the important races. and we're going to work harder than ever to engage and empower regular, reliable voters better out there every year. they were critical to the success of barack obama in 2008 and will also be this november. we're going to run one of the biggest-ever mid-term voter registration campaigns. we know that we have not registered every voter. and we will institute the best

voter protection efforts to make certain that every american will know how to cast their ballot. we cannot afford to stop climbing out of the ditch. we know that we have our work cut out for us, but we will try to define the 2010 electoral choice. in 2008, the voters came to cast their ballots because they understood what was at stake and they believed that this matter. we will make certain that americans understand that this election is going to determine if we will move forward, with republicans can roll back the changes that we have made, and we will let americans know that their vote is as important right now as it was two years ago. thank you very much. [applause] [captioning performed by national captioning institute] [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2010] cable satellite corp. 2010]