"When two Alaska state agencies received complaints in 2005 that a BP drilling contractor routinely cheated on tests of blowout preventers and that BP knew it, the agencies let the very companies accused of wrongdoing join the investigation."

Some oil companies have been drilling in the Gulf and elsewhere at depths far greater than the BP's blown-out Macondo well. That drilling raises unique engineering challenges -- and also raises questions about whether the companies have adequately addressed unique environmental risks.

"BAYOU LA BATRE, Ala. — Nine weeks into the disaster in the Gulf of Mexico, there is more money in this small, hardscrabble fishing town than there has been in decades, residents say. There are more high-paying workdays, more traffic accidents, more reports of domestic violence, more drug and alcohol use, more resentment, more rumors, more hunger, more worry."

"Tropical storm Alex became better organized as it slowly moved away from Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, and forecasters said it could become a hurricane on Monday or Tuesday. Coast Guard officials have said they do not think the storm poses an imminent threat to oil-siphoning efforts at BP Plc's blown-out Macondo well in the Gulf of Mexico."

"Robert Carlyle Byrd, the longest-serving member of Congress in United States history, who spent much of his career as a conservative Democrat and ended it by fiercely opposing the war in Iraq and questioning the state's powerful coal industry, died Monday. He was 92."

"On Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Martin Feldman struck down the Obama administration's six-month moratorium on deepwater drilling. A review of Judge Feldman's 2009 Financial Disclosure Report shows that Feldman is significantly invested in BP, which is on the hook for the Deepwater Horizon disaster."

"BP PLC and other big oil companies based their plans for responding to a big oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico on U.S. government projections that gave very low odds of oil hitting shore, even in the case of a spill much larger than the current one."

"Meet BP's Bob Dudley, the human relief well."

"A utility proposal to install smart meters throughout Maryland has been rejected by the state's Public Service Commission, jeopardizing if not ending what had been one of the Obama administration's leading investment commitments to smart grid technologies and consumer energy conservation."

"Federal rules governing pesticide experiments using people as test subjects must be rewritten and issued for public comment under a new agreement reached between the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and public health groups, farm worker advocates and environmental organizations."