*Note: This column was posted on Campus Report online on November 6, but did not get posted on the AIM site until November 8. It was November 7 that a ship crashed in San Francisco Bay and an oil spill took place. Thus, the line in the column, “When was the last time anyone heard of a major U.S. oil spill?,” was overtaken by events.

The Washington Post reported Saturday that the Smithsonian Institution has put on hold a $5 million donation from the American Petroleum Institute over objections from two of the museum complex’s Board of Regents including U.S. Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT) about accepting money from the oil industry for a project on the world’s oceans.

The main objection came from the regents’ longtime executive committee chairman Roger Sant who ironically made his fortune as the founder of power company AES which is a member of the American Petroleum Institute.

Since that time though Sant has become a major advocate of protecting the seas including $10 million for the Smithsonian project Ocean Hall which will cost $49 million overall and include a web site to showcase ocean research, a Sant chair for Maine Science and other related programs.

"I have some real concerns about this," Sant told the Post. "I want to be sure that the sponsor’s behavior is consistent with the message we’re trying to deliver. It is a question mark given the record of oil spills in the past two decades."

Sant also told the Post that when people think of oil and oceans they think of spills. "I know the industry has done quite a bit to minimize [spills] in the future," he said. "I think it is in everyone’s mind that oceans and oil are not consistent."

As the former chairman of the World Wildlife Fund, Sant is showing both his bias and ignorance of the oil industry today. Major oil spills have declined dramatically and rarely occur in U.S navigable waters. When was the last time anyone heard of a major U.S. oil spill? Also I don’t know where he gets the idea that people associate oil and oceans with spills. To me it seems far more likely that ocean drilling would be associated with these words.

In case Sant hasn’t noticed many of the large oil companies who are members of the API have begun to embrace the idea that global warming is real which should go hand in hand with his own beliefs.

For the API’s part the money they want to contribute will go towards sponsoring a web site called Ocean Portal where they would have their logo appear and receive acknowledgement of their support. The content of the site will be left to the Smithsonian.

Sant and Leahy need to get their collective heads out of the sand and accept the American Petroleum Institute’s offer and stop turning the Smithsonian into some sort of political football.

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