If you can't cap it, don't drill it

Next year Anadarko - one of the companies responsible for the Deepwater Horizon spill - will begin drilling in deep water off our coast next year. So how long will it take them to plug the well if they cause a similar "accident" here? Two weeks:

An international petroleum company manager says it would take up to 14 days to cap a deep water well in the event of a blowout.

Anadarko is planning to drill two deep water exploration wells off the coast of Taranaki and Canterbury next year.

[...]

Mr Boggan says if there was a blowout in a deep water well, four jumbo jets would need to fly a capping stack from the UK and the cap would then need to be shipped to the site.

And in the meantime while they're pissing around, their well will be spewing oil, poisoning our oceans, our ecosystems, and our beaches. Anadarko clearly thinks that's acceptable. But they don't live here, and its not their backyard they'll be poisoning.

If you can't cap it, don't drill it. Companies who want to drill in New Zealand should be forced to keep this equipment here, on-site, in case of any accident. Otherwise, they should not be allowed to drill. Its that simple.