E2 Round-up: Interior report finds lax drilling oversight and gift-taking by regulators, officials let drilling trump science, and EPA requires BP to cut back dispersant use

“Although there is no evidence that those events played a role in the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, the report offers further evidence of what many critics of the Minerals Management Service have described as a culture of lax oversight and cozy ties to industry.”

The Interior Department, in a statement circulated early Tuesday morning, said the report “notes a number of violations of federal regulations and agency ethics rules by employees of MMS’ Lake Charles, LA, district office from 2000-2008.”

“Among other things, staffers in the office were found to have accepted sport event tickets, lunches, and other gifts from oil and gas production companies and used government computers to view pornography. Some of these staffers were tasked with inspections of offshore drilling platforms located in the Gulf of Mexico,” states Interior’s summary.

Interior said several people identified in the report have quit, been fired or referred for prosecution, and that those still with MMS have been placed on leave.

Interior Secretary Ken Salazar, in a prepared statement, emphasized that the report describes actions that occurred under the prior administration, noting it lays out “reprehensible activities of employees of MMS between 2000 and 2008.”

But Salazar said he has also asked acting IG Mary Kendall to expand her investigation to determine whether the any of the bad behavior continued after he implemented new ethics rules in 2009.

The new findings are the latest in a years-long series of tough reports about the minerals agency by the IG and congressional auditors.

Scrutiny of MMS has only grown since the Gulf of Mexico oil spill began. Salazar this month announced he’s splitting MMS into separate agencies, citing “conflicting missions” between its promotion of offshore drilling, collection of billions of dollars in leasing and royalty revenues, and regulation of safety and environmental rules.

MMS ignored warnings about environmental risks from federal scientists, the Washington Post reports

The paper finds that MMS “ignored warnings from government scientists about environmental risks in its push to approve energy exploration activities quickly, according to numerous documents and interviews.”

“Minerals Management Service officials, who can receive cash bonuses in the thousands of dollars based in large part on meeting federal deadlines for leasing offshore oil and gas exploration, frequently changed documents and bypassed legal requirements aimed at protecting the marine environment, the documents show,” the story continues.

EPA requires BP to cut back on use of dispersant chemical

EPA and BP are continuing to spar over the company’s use of large amounts of a dispersant chemical called Corexit amid concerns about its toxicity.

“In a sign of diminished confidence in BP’s ability to manage the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, federal officials Monday said they intended to require the company to dramatically scale back its use of oil dispersants and would initiate their own tests on the chemicals’ effect on sea life,” the Los Angeles Times reports.

“With an oil spill of epic proportions looming offshore, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Lisa P. Jackson — along with angry chorus of lawmakers — chided BP for its lack of transparency. She said that BP’s response to federal directives last week to find a less toxic dispersant was ‘insufficient,’” their story adds.