There are regulations proposed in Congress to make it illegal for regulators to consider results from all studies of ecological effects after "one off" events such as the Gulf Oil spill. I presume it also applies to smaller events like a pipeline leak.

The stated motivation for this banning of research is because these studies are not "repeatable". This seems like a pretty blatant attack on the potential for the entities which benefited from the activity that led to the accident to be held accountable.

With a rule like this on the horizon, there's no way I'd be willing to allow any oil company to pursue any construction with any risk of an ecological effect anywhere near my back yard.