EU: Oil and water don’t mix

The European Parliament’s environmental committee sent out a mixed message on Tuesday (September 28) when it urged the Commission to ban all deep-sea drilling for oil in European waters while extending a helping hand to the “crisis stricken” automobile industry by voting to lower the long term limits on CO2 emissions for vans.

Greenpeace EU transport policy adviser Franziska Achterberg said: “By resisting efficiency targets that it can easily reach, the car industry is destroying the climate and prolonging Europe’s addiction to oil. As long as they continue producing inefficient vehicles, carmakers will encourage oil companies to take more risks to reach oil in dangerous places”.

Deep-sea drilling is dangerous business

Greenpeace activists have this week been drawing attention to the dangers of deep-sea drilling in the North Sea. Members of the environmental group attached themselves to the anchor chain of a ship owned by the US oil giant Chevron preventing it from leaving Shetland and sailing to an oilfield where it was scheduled to start drilling. The activists have had to give up their protest after Scottish judges granted a wide ranging interdict (Scottish injunction) ordering Greenpeace to stop any further action preventing the ship from reaching its destination.

“There is no safe way of extracting oil from the bottom of the ocean”, said Achterberg. “The Parliament should apply all its weight to avoid any chance of another Gulf of Mexico-style environmental disaster in Europe”.

Back in Brussels, the majority of the members of the European Parliament’s environment committee voted to freeze deep-sea drilling until more stringent regulations are put in place. A non binding resolution has been drawn up and will be put to the full Parliament next week. The aim is to put pressure on the Commission as it finalises a response to British Petroleum’s Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico