The Government Should Grant Equal Access and Funding to Independent Researchers of the BP Oil Spill

The Deepwater Horizon explosion and resulting oil spill has been widely considered as very destructive not only on the environmental habitat surrounding the Mexico gulf but also for the thousands of business establishments and residents that were affected by the incident. With the large volumes of oil that leaked into the sea, it is widely regarded as the largest oil spill in the history of the petroleum industry and the one of the worst oil spill in the U.S. The extensive damage to wildlife and marine habitat has been a major concern to local residents, environmental experts and to the U.S. government itself.

Because of the major environmental disaster that is had caused, scientists are now scrambling to collect valuable data which will be used to determine the extent of the disaster and effect it will bring in the future. Although the oil blowout has been capped and the surface oil slick already been dispersed, there may still be the presence of toxic chemicals that has combined with sea water. These chemicals are a huge threat to the surrounding habitat and may disrupt the food chain. Scientists believed that despite of the successful cleanup operations, there are more work to be done in assessing the long term effect of the disaster.

But despite of the massive efforts of scientists to conduct research, there has been an unequal treatment with regards to funds, access to vital information and access to key locations in the gulf. Since the location of the oil spill is owned by BP, only those who are directly working for them or those who are working for the federal government’s Natural Resource Damage Assessment program are given enough funding and the privilege to access those important sites. Other independent researchers are discarded or have limited access to the research site.

The results of the numerous will be used to pursue the legal remedies that BP will be facing. Without proper transparency on these researches, expect a one-sided result which will surely favor BP. The results will be in total secrecy without uncovering the truth to the public. Independent scientists are now asking the government to grant them access to affected sites in order to conduct their own research and investigation on the disaster. Without the commitment to provide appropriate funding and vital access, the rehabilitation and restoration of the gulf will be in jeopardy.