Doctors given new access to the proprietary chemical recipes that oil and gas drillers use to crack into Ohio shale would be prohibited from sharing the information with the public under an energy proposal moving through the Ohio House.  More »

Federal regulators crafting new regulations to boost the reliability and power of emergency equipment used as a last line of defense against surging oil and gas at offshore wells will get feedback from energy companies, drilling engineers and other experts on Tuesday.  More »

Some people are absolutely sure gas drilling threatens public health, while others are absolutely sure it doesn’t.  More »

Charlie Williams, who heads the oil and gas industry’s new Center for Offshore Safety, talked about his plans.  More »

Engineers and energy companies are rolling out sensors and software designed to give drillers above the water line and those onshore a better view of what is happening on the sea floor.  More »

As the OTC gets underway to record numbers here in Houston, one oft repeated phrase from industry and government is that safety should come first. James Watson, head of BSEE, also announced that the government plans to speed up its rulemaking on safety requirements by skipping the “notice of proposed rulemaking” stage and going straight [...]  More »

Translating safety from panel discussions to practice  More »

Safety – or at least the talk of it – seems to be everywhere at the Offshore Technology Conference.  More »

Oil companies need to borrow a page — and perhaps a whole playbook — from the airline industry to deal with the growing risks and challenges of deep-water drilling, a Talisman Energy executive said today.  More »

Here’s some of the things I’ll be looking for at this years annual gala of oilfield geek chic.  More »

Offshore federal regulators are bulking up enforcement staff and focusing more on industry safety results than on specific rules, the head of the new Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement said at a meeting Thursday in Houston.  More »

Two years ago, as the crew of the Deepwater Horizon drilled into a massive new oil find deep under the Gulf of Mexico, the seemingly unthinkable happened: One of the most technologically advanced drill rigs in the world, valued at $560 million and commanded by professionals and engineers with decades of training, exploded and sunk after a series of catastrophic failures.  More »