In Deep Water The Anatomy of a Disaster, the Fate of the Gulf, and How to End Our Oil Addiction

About this book

Deepwater Horizon was supposed to be the cutting edge of energy exploration: drilling 5,000 feet below the surface of the Gulf of Mexico, the $560 million rig would be indispensable in helping to solve the ongoing energy crisis.

Then, on April 20, 2010, BP's dismal safety record came home to roost. An explosion followed by a massive fireball resulted in eleven lives lost, the sinking of the rig, and the release of millions of barrels of crude oil into one of the world's prime fishing grounds: tens of millions of barrels suffocate the Gulf's waters, and the resultant slick covers 2,500 square miles. Wildlife throughout the region is devastated, and so is the human community dependent on harvesting the area's resources.

Published in collaboration with Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), In Deep Water: The Anatomy of a Disaster, The Fate of the Gulf, and How to End Our Oil Addiction is the first book to appear in the wake of this environmental catastrophe, the largest offshore spill in American history.

Written by Peter Lehner, executive director of the NRDC, together with Bob Deans, In Deep Water provides a brief account of the disaster as well as the policy failures that caused it – and lays out a blueprint to avoid similar catastrophes in the future.

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Biography

Peter Lehner, executive director of NRDC, also teaches environmental law at Columbia University Law School. Chief of the Environmental Protection Bureau of the New York State Attorney General’s office for eight years, he created and led the environmental prosecution unit for New York City.

Bob Deans, author of the 2007 book The River Where America Began: A Journey Along the James, was the chief Asia correspondent for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution and other Cox newspapers, and spent eight years covering the White House. He is a former president of the White House Correspondents’ Association.