#whatstheplanepa campaign
The Problem: Dispersants
During the 2010 BP oil disaster, unprecedented amounts of toxic oil-based dispersants were used to allegedly minimize harm to people and wildlife from the crude oil itself.
Aerial spraying and deep sea injection continued daily, for months. Nothing like this had ever been tried before — it was all a giant experiment.
The results are in.
Oil and dispersants create a toxic cocktail that can be lethal to wildlife and humans. One study found that dispersants can make oil up to 52 times more toxic.
Our Solution: Legal Action
On January 30, 2020, ALERT with its allies filed a lawsuit to force the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to finalize its rules governing use of chemical dispersants in oil spill response.
- The National Contingency Plan was last updated 26 years and uses outdated science to justify expedited and unlimited use of toxic dispersants.
- The plan fails to implement inclusion of local government and citizens, as required by law, to combat government and industry complacency.
- The plan fails to take into account unconventional oil that sinks (tar sands dilbit) or explodes (fracked gas and oil).
This affects everyone.
By not maintaining a current, science-based national emergency response plan for oil spills, the EPA is putting at risk some 133 million Americans who live near the coasts – that’s 39 percent of the U.S. population. The EPA is putting at risk millions more Americans who visit and recreate at coasts – and the millions more who live near lakes, rivers, or along oil pipeline and railroad corridors.
It’s not a matter of if, but when the next oil-related disaster will occur.
Offshore oil drilling and oil transportation – whether by tanker, pipeline or railcar – are risky business.
We need to stop offshore drilling until oil companies can clean up their oil spills without poisoning people, wildlife, oceans and coastlines.
It's time for Action!
We want the EPA to update the entire National Contingency Plan and keep it updated, but we’re not going to wait around for the EPA to do its job. We are proposing action right now to better prepare and protect citizens, communities and Tribes for the next oil spill.
YOU can make a difference.
The Advocate Toolkit.
Download the #WhatsThePlanEPA Toolkit!
One month of action in April.
Join us in remembering our nation’s three largest oil disasters – the 31st memorial of the Exxon Valdezoil spill in Alaska and the 10th memorials of the BP Deepwater Horizon oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico and the Enbridge pipeline tar sands oil spill into the Kalamazoo River, Michigan.
Our new campaign #WhatsThePlanEPA is three-fold – litigation, advocacy and community organizing. We have filed a lawsuit against the EPA over rules governing use of toxic dispersants. But we need YOU to work with us and demand change in your own community and state.
More ways you can help the campaign.
BE AN ALLY - SIGN ONTO THE CAMPAIGN
I stand in solidarity with oil spill survivors to demand accountability and system change. It is time for us to hold the U.S. government accountable for the harm it has inflicted upon its citizens during oil-chemical disasters – and to DO NO MORE harm.
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