Local environmental officials are collecting water, sediment and marine animal tissue samples to create baseline measurements for our environments. All these samples are being sent to a lab in Texas, with ties to BP and the oil industry.
Some people are questioning the independence of the Texas lab. Taylor Kirschenfeld, an environmental official for Escambia County, Fla., rebuffed instructions from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to send water samples to the lab, which is based at TDI-Brooks International in College Station, Tex. He opted instead to get a waiver so he could send his county’s samples to a local laboratory that is licensed to do the same tests.
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