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EPA has some very basic rules that explain almost every bad event associated with his particular incident.

One of those rules is to NOT pour contaminated liquids or other materials into open waters (lakes, rivers, streams, or the ocean).

This is the infamous "no dumping" rule ~ and I gather it is manifest in a number of places in the vast body of EPA regulations and advisory notices.

When it comes to taking a recently drilled well, sticking on the anti-blow out device, and then tapping into the main transmission pipelines there are several stages of the game where you have to connect one pipe with another.

The pipes, if the same diameter, are connected with sleeves, or more often they are of different diameters. They are then cemented together with a very high quality, high pressure cement.

So you slide a large diameter pipe over a small diameter pipe (and there are required critical distances for the over-ride so the pipes don't just blow apart), and then you pump in the cement between the inner wall of the outer pipe and the outer wall of the inner pipe.

All very simple. Now do that under immense pressure. Now it's not so simple.

To keep the pipes the required distance apart so the cement can flow around them and make a seal you need "stays" which are really simple devices that hold the two pipes apart. Halliburton says 21 stays would do the job. BP said 7. I don't know who is right, but the job was done with just 7 and it blew out.

Here's where "brown mud", a common well drilling substance, comes in.

The big pipe is around the little pipe, so what they do is pump in "brown mud" to fill the hole. The "brown mud" stays semi-liquid, but it maintains the pressure evenly ~ it's like a gigantic semi-soft "stay". Once the 'brown mud" is in they begin pumping in the cement and it displaces some of the "brown mud" that just washes away. They test the seals. They pump in more cement. They test the seals. They pump in more cement, and they go through a simple process of making sure cement fills the gap between the pipes, that it is secure, and that the oil doesn't leak out.

Once they're done pumping in the cement, all the "brown mud" is out of the way.

EPA doesn't like this because its possible for the 'brown mud" to come into contact with raw oil in the well. When it comes out it effectively "dumps" oil into the water.

The EPA solution is to simply use steel stays between the pipes and pump in sea water to maintain the pressure until all the concrete is in. That way no "brown mud" spills oil into the ocean.

Turns out sea water is no substitue for "brown mud".

Again, the rule is "no dumping". It's then interpreted in a variety of ways throughout EPA rules. It's then applied by EPA personnel to a variety of applications ~ right or wrong!

EPA is thoroughly responsible for all of this.