Rear Adm. James Watson is said to be tackling permitting challenges
Rear Adm. James Watson, the new head of the Interior Department's Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement, continues to get good notices from some of those in the oil and gas world, and on Capitol Hill, who were most critical of his predecessor, Michael Bromwich.
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View full sizeCoast Guard Rear Adm. James Watson shows Vice President Joe Biden around the unified command center for the Gulf of Mexico oil spill on June 29, 2010.Watson met last week with Jim Noe, executive director of the Shallow Water Energy Security Coalition, and the two largest lease-holders in the shallow waters of the Gulf of Mexico, and they emerged from the meeting encouraged. "After meeting Admiral Watson, I am cautiously optimistic that we will be able to solve the continuing permitting challenges and I am hopeful that Admiral Watson shares our interest in creating a transparent and predictable regulatory regime. We are also encouraged to have an administrator that is a trained engineer and who has the skill set to understand the technical aspects of the industry," Noe said.
"We took the opportunity to tell Admiral Watson that while the BSSE has managed to improve its permitting process after a very rocky start the time for the approval of a drilling permit has roughly doubled since pre-Macondo days. We also explained to Admiral Watson that the need to ensure we remove the permitting bottleneck is more important now than ever before since shallow water drilling has dramatically improved. From the low point of 18 working rigs during the summer of 2010, we now have 42 active shallow water rigs."
Noe said they invited Watson to the Gulf to see for himself. Sen. David Vitter, R-La., and Rep. Steve Scalise, R-Jefferson, also left from separate meetings with Watson in December sounding cautiously optimistic notes.
Bruce Alpert can be reached at balpert@timespicayune.com or 202.450.1406. Jonathan Tilove can be reached at jtilove@timespicayune.com or 202.450.1404.
