Spilt oil

In yet another oil spill last week, the oil major Shell has admitted that more than 200 tonnes of oil has spilled into the North Sea, making it the worst single leak in the region for more than a decade. Gannet Alpha spill comes under the "gold standard" regulatory regime of the UK. Most of the rigs have exceeded their original design life (typically 20 to 25 years).

Shell's oil spill in the UK North Sea comes barely a week after the UN issued a strong condemnation of the company's environmental impact in the Ogoni region of the Niger Delta. In a string of allegations, the UN environment programme accused Shell of failing to meet its own environmental standards.

This is not specific to a company, but what one needs to bear in mind is the danger fraught by such spills to the ecosystem.

In the US, public support is building up against the proposed 1700 mile long Keystone XL pipeline to transport Alberta tar sands from Canada all the way down to Mexico! What a rupture could do to farmlands and wildscapes on way can be imagined, besides the pollution! Just this June, 42,000 gallons of conventional crude oil was dumped into the Yellowstone from a much smaller pipeline.

And yet, nations are going ahead with big plans in the eco-sensitive Arctic region. Who is to decide what's good or bad? Which country can take the onus of potential damage?