The federal government lifted the ban on deepwater drilling last week, issuing new rules and tightening standards that must be met before drilling can resume.

The new regulations, issued by the Department of the Interior, tightened standards for well design, blowout preventers, safety certification, emergency response and worker training in the industry.

While all this sounds great, the industry–and federal oversight–have a lot of ground to cover. According to news reports, it was revealed at the Congressional hearings that BP had "copied and pasted" older environmental response plans from other companies–mostly from the Exxon Valdez spill. This is why BP's response plan listed the walrus as an impacted species and why several of the scientists referenced had long since passed away.

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