Top story: BP officials hinted that the company may not make voluntary payments, which it had previously consented to in the wake of the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, if Congress goes forward with plans to restrict the company's activities in the Gulf of Mexico. These payments include the $20 billion that BP promised President Barack Obama in a White House meeting that it would pay into an escrow fund to cover damages and government fines associated with the spill. BP executives say that if they are denied the right to drill in the Gulf of Mexico, which accounts for about 25 percent of the company's total annual profits, they might not be able to find the funds to pay for these programs.

Legislation designed to reform the offshore drilling sector passed the U.S. House of Representatives on July 30. It included an amendment that would prevent any company from receiving a drilling permit if it had suffered more than 10 fatalities at its facilities, or had been fined more than $10 million under environmental protection legislation -- conditions that only applied to BP. The amendment was proposed by Rep. George Miller (D-CA). The Senate has not yet acted on the measure, and the Obama administration has not expressed an opinion on this particular amendment.

BP is not only balking at paying money into the $20 billion escrow fund, but also financing a whole range of programs that it previously agreed to. These include $100 million to provide for oil workers who lost their income due to Obama's moratorium on deepwater drilling, $500 million for a research program to study the spill's environmental impact, and almost $80 million to fund the tourism campaigns of the Gulf Coast states affected by the spill.

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