Essay on Ethics in the Workplace - Bp Oil Spill

The key aspect of the citizenship principle is that every employee should be a responsible citizen in the community. All officers, executives, managers and employees

In 2010, BP’s Deepwater Horizon rig exploded, causing millions of barrels of crude oil to be leaked out into the Gulf of Mexico. The extensive oil spill created a lot of pollution and far-reaching effects on the tourism industry. The resultant damage to marine wildlife such as fish will continue to be felt for many years to come. Weeks after the event, and while it was still in progress, the Deep Water Horizon oil spill was being discussed as a disaster that will impact global economies, markets, and mining policies. The potential consequences included structural shifts in energy policy, insurance marketplaces and risk assessment, and financial liabilities to be incurred by BP. The law that affected the operation of BP’s business was the Clean Water Act, which regulates the discharge of pollutants in US’s waters (EPA, 2008). Following the oil spill, regulations have been put in place to regulate oil drilling operations. The Obama administration proposed new regulations on offshore oil and gas drilling. The regulation focused on oil and gas drilling companies to use stronger blowout Preventers that have the capability to close an offshore well in case a drilling breach occurred accidentally.

The Gulf Oil Spill was and still is a issues for BP that require both its legal team and media relations department to work quick and together to both address the issues and protect the image of the company. In times of scandal or crisis companies have a plan of action to help resolve the issues and reduce how much of media frenzy it becomes. From who speaks at interviews, gives public statements, legal advising, and executing a solution. For BP this meant work with wildlife rescues groups, the Natural Resource Damage Assessment, and environmentalist. For BP getting the waters clean was important not only to them but for the environment and those who depended on the waters for survival in term of the sea life. So the concepts of social responsibility by Milton Friedman would play a part of BP ensuring the companies further survival.

The Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill occurred on April 20, 2010 in the Gulf of Mexico. This oil spill was the largest spill in history in front of the Exxon Valdez oil spill of 1989. This oil spill released about 4.9 million barrels of oil into the ocean. This spill not only wreck havoc on the marine life but also the economic players that depended on ocean such as fisherman, tourism, and offshore drilling located along the gulf coast. Along will the spill the oil rig which was named Deepwater Horizon also went up in flames. This proved that the issue went far beyond just an oil rig that blew a line. Since this oil spill had drastic impacts all along the coast, BP which was the most liable for this incident faced criminal charges based on what happened. BP which knew the risks of deep ocean drilling failed to take the necessary safety procedures to reduce the risks of such incident occurring, thus was the reasoning behind placing most of the fault on them and not the other companies. The lack of regulatory oversight led to the issues and cost-cutting procedures opened the rig up to possible malfunctions like the one that occurred. During the spill into the gulf, BP sealed the well with cement which seemed to stop a majority of the oil from escaping the well. BP also recognized that the well was “dead” which was proven wrong when scientists still could conclude was leaking minor amounts of oil into the ocean. This spill not only proved to be harmful to the environment but also

Ethics are very important in the business world and to the general public. Ethics is defined as a system of moral principles or the rules of conduct recognized in respect to a particular class of human actions or a particular group. Using a moral compass should be a requirement for every CEO and executive. Any person who will have some impact on society needs to understand the difference between right and wrong. Since businesses touch such a large segment of our society, codes of ethics must be established and followed to protect the general public. In the following pages we will discuss the 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill disaster and examine how it relates to (1) the state of business ethics since 2000, (2) examples of the classic

MEJRI, Mohamed, and Daniel DE WOLF. 2013. "Crisis Management: Lessons Learnt From The BP Deepwater Horizon Spill Oil". Business Management And Strategy 4 (2): 67. doi:10.5296/bms.v4i2.4950.

7 Years ago, in the Gulf of Mexico one of the worst catastrophes that has happened in modern history, happened. Moreover, in the United States. The “BP” Gulf oil spill as you might of hear it called. Although, British Petroleum has made every possible attempt to rename the mishap. Years later this incident has had a huge impact in the local infrastructure. Furthermore, this was a compounding effect on the Gulf, 5 short years since Hurricane Katrina leveled the coast. This was just another hit to the gulf residents. The public relations of BP and this catastrophe were atrocious in the since that BP ran away from the camera while they had no possible answer as to how they were going to stop the massive spill. Another impact was sustained by the

There were a number of causes for the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, most of which had more to do with the human element that with any technology itself. The four biggest ways that humans contributed to the disaster, as explained by journalist David Coburn, was the fact that British Petroleum’s (BP) past success built a sense of complacency, the shifting the burden of proof, the normalization of deviance and the fact that promoters for an industry also serve as that industry’s regulatory enforcers.

This paper will explain some of the effects of three legal issues and three ethical issues surrounding the London-based British Petroleum Company’s involvement in the explosion of the offshore oil rig Deepwater Horizon and the subsequent oil spill into the Gulf of Mexico. There are many legal issues surrounding this disaster, but the three this paper will focus on are the Oil Pollution Act of 1990, maritime laws, and criminal charges

These social responsibilities and many other ethical issues were realized by many people when on April 20, 2010 British Petroleum had a major oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico. Also, known as the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill, the BP Oil Disaster, the Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill, or the Macondo Blowout. BP was mostly at fault, but Transocean, the rig operator, and Halliburton, the contractor,

Recently, oil spill management has become a serious concern and subsequently, it has become a big issue as it takes a large, specifically trained team effort to solve the devastating problem. It also requires consistent efforts of the workforce. The Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico was perhaps another major contributing factor to highlighting the need for Oil Spill Management to be addressed. The director of the US Bureau of Ocean Energy Management Regulation and Enforcement, Michael Bromwich stated that this oil spill proved that oil and gas organizations were not prepared to deal with oil spills. (Merolli, 2010).

The series of ethical issues that took place leading to the disaster are complex, and other factors such as economic and political issues arose after the catastrophe happened. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the ethical issues that took place before the disaster happened, and investigate the moral obligations, social responsibility and justice at an individual and organizational level. The ethical dilemma is broken down into three categories, which include the company’s management priority to reduce costs and time, neglecting safety issues addressed by staff, human misjudgment and errors in neglecting pressure reading; and finally, overlooking the technical design flaws that were not tested by BP before installing to use. The

Deepwater Horizon oil Spill: BP’s drilling platform in the Gulf of Mexico had an explosion in April 2010, causing the “largest oil spill catastrophe in the petroleum industry history”. It caused the death of 11 men and injury to several others. “More than 150,000 barrels of crude oil gushed into the sea, every day, for almost 5 months and up to 68,000 square miles of the Gulf 's surface were covered” (1).

In the month of April 2010, Deepwater Horizon exploded, killing 11 workers and releasing oil from the well into an ocean. This paper will discuss BP management, ethical and social behavior. BP along with a few of its partners Transocean and Halliburton was involved in the gulf oil spill. The explosion of the drilling rig Deepwater Horizon was the root cause of the oil spill. This paper will focus on BP organization behavioral issues that caused the economic, environmental, and human losses. The research further focuses on what BP leadership could have done as a precautionary measure using highest ethics and management behavior.

The oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010 resulted in considerable damage to the environment, economy and human livelihoods. While BP, as one of the parties involved in the operation of the oil drilling on Deepwater Horizon rig, suffered huge financial loss and reputation loss, it was found to be the one to be mostly blamed due to its lack of risk management. As poor risk management can lead to an astonishing disaster like this, it appears to be necessary for every business to learn from BP’s mistakes and try the best to prevent such disaster from happening again. This report studies this case, focusing on two issues identified in BP’s risk management practices, namely its sloppy preparation for risks and its inappropriate communication strategy after the crisis happened. No evidence showed that BP had a sufficient emergency plan for the worst-case deep-water oil spill although the depth of the oil drilling was one of the deepest. BP’s unseriousness towards safety was also indicated in their attempt to shift blames to its contractors and the unaccountability shown by the words of BP’s executives during interviews. Based on the examination of BP’s deficiency in risk management, the lessons that can be learned from it are discussed. In brief, firstly, accurate risk assessment and appropriate emergency plan should be available before the operation is started. Secondly, post-crisis communication should show the world that the company cares and is accountable