The Environmental Protection Agency temporarily banned oil giant BP from receiving new government contracts Wednesday, citing a “lack of business integrity” over the 2010 Deepwater Horizon explosion.
ProPublica reporter Abrahm Lustgarten has been covering BP since 2005, reporting on the company’s subsequent $7.8 billion settlement and outlining the potential impact of sanctions early on. In May 2010, Abrahm noted:
“The most serious, sweeping kind of suspension is called ‘discretionary debarment’ and it is applied to an entire company. If this were imposed on BP, it would cancel not only the company’s contracts to sell fuel to the military but prohibit BP from leasing or renewing drilling leases on federal land. In the worst case, it could also lead to the cancellation of BP’s existing federal leases, worth billions of dollars…even a temporary expulsion from the U.S. could be devastating for BP’s business.”
What do these new restrictions mean for BP, its U.S. operations and drilling in the Gulf?
Join Abrahm for a live discussion of BP’s debarment tomorrow, Nov. 29, from 1 p.m. – 2 p.m. ET. Leave your questions for Abrahm below, or tweet @ProPublica with #InvestigateThis. Come back here at 1 p.m. tomorrow for the live Q&A.