The Obama administration on Monday proposed new offshore oil and natural-gas drilling regulations aimed at preventing the kind of explosion that erupted nearly five years ago on BP ’s Deepwater Horizon rig, including many provisions the industry has already adopted. The Interior Department draft rule imposes tougher standards on equipment designed to keep control of a well, including blowout preventers, and requires real-time monitoring for certain kinds of drilling that are in deep water or are done at high pressures. A blowout preventer, which is designed to seal off wells in emergencies, failed on April, 20, 2010, and helped lead to the explosion on the BP rig in the Gulf of Mexico, which killed 11 people and caused the biggest offshore oil spill in U.S. history. Interior Department officials stressed the collaboration between government and industry in strengthening drilling standards. “Both industry and government have taken important strides to […]