Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) said Monday that he “could very well” vote for Sen. Lisa Murkowski’s (R-Alaska) plan to block any Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) climate change rules even though it goes much further than his competing measure.

The Senate is slated to vote Thursday on Murkowski’s resolution, which cannot be amended or filibustered but nonetheless faces a tough road to winning 51 votes.

“It is a message about EPA,” Rockefeller told reporters in the Capitol on Monday evening. “I think it will send a message regardless of how many votes it gets.” That message, he added, “would be with respect to EPA’s closing in on coal.”

President Barack Obama expressed confidence in shallow-water oil exploration but said there is no assurance that deepwater drilling can be conducted safely. 

"What we don't have right now is an assurance that in these incredible depths … that we can actually handle a crisis like this," Obama said during an appearance Tuesday morning on NBC's "Today" show.

The administration had earlier this year announced plans to support expanded offshore drilling in the Gulf of Mexico and along the Atlantic coast, but has backed off those plans and issued a moratorium on new deepwater drilling until the causes of the spill are known.

"The production wells that are already pumping oil, those don't seem to be the problem. The problem seems to be with drilling and starting a new well," Obama explained. "Shallow wells aren't a problem, because the risers essentially come above the water."

The president has been under pressure from lawmakers in both parties to define how it would pursue and support drilling going forward. While most Democrats have said the spill provides the impetus for legislation that would shift the U.S. toward alternative energy, Republicans argue that the spill shouldn't shut the door to domestic oil exploration.

Obama reiterated, though, that the commission he had appointed to examine the spill, led by former Sen. Bob Graham (D-Fla.) and former GOP Environmental Protection Agency chief William Reilly, would be instructive in reshaping his policies toward drilling.

"I want them to report back to me, because obviously you can't take the word of oil companies when they say they have a bunch of redundancies and backup plans, when something like this happens and it turns out they have no idea what they're doing," he said.

BP has long run afoul of environmental and safety rules

The nonprofit investigative journalism group ProPublica and the Washington Post have jointly published a story that finds “A series of internal investigations over the past decade warned senior BP managers that the oil company repeatedly disregarded safety and environmental rules and risked a serious accident if it did not change its ways.”

Those reports focused on BP’s Alaska drilling operations, but the story adds:

“Similar themes about BP operations elsewhere were sounded in interviews with former employees, in lawsuits and little-noticed state inquiries, and in e-mails obtained by ProPublica. Taken together, these documents portray a company that systemically ignored its own safety policies across its North American operations — from Alaska to the Gulf of Mexico to California and Texas.”

Obama said Monday evening that he wants to figure out "whose ass to kick" over the massive oil spill.

Majority Leader Harry Reid and Speaker Nancy Pelosi are headed for a clash over energy and climate legislation.

Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) acknowledged Monday that his plan to greatly expand oil-and-gas leasing in the eastern Gulf of Mexico won’t proceed in the wake of the BP oil spill.

Dorgan, a senior member of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, steered a provision through the committee last year that would shrink the no-drilling buffer in the eastern Gulf to 45 miles from Florida’s shore.

But the BP spill has scrambled offshore drilling policy, creating major new hurdles for any plans to expand development, especially as oil threatens Florida’s beaches. Asked if his plan would be scaled back, Dorgan said, “I expect it will.”

Schumer softened his earlier statement that climate legislation would be offered as an amendment to an energy bill.

The Obama administration and Congress may consider ways to legally bind BP to pay damages resulting from the oil spill, Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-N.D.) said Monday.

Dorgan, the second-ranking Democrat on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, worried BP might be able to back out of its pledge to pay all "legitimate" claims from the spill without the force of law.

"We need to bind them at this point, to make sure that — six months, 16 months from now — they don't say, 'Well, you know what, we didn't mean we were going to stand behind all of it,'" Dorgan said this afternoon during an appearance on CNBC.

A group representing offshore energy companies is pressing the new chief of the Minerals Management Service to clarify drilling rules and allow development to proceed.

The letter from the National Ocean Industries Association to acting MMS chief Bob Abbey calls for issuing “guidance” to offshore oil-and-gas drillers “as soon as possible” outlining new safety measures needed for companies to receive approval of drilling permits and exploration plans.

“Such guidance should be timely, measurable and achievable,” states the letter from Randall Luthi, the group’s president, who headed MMS under President George W. Bush. The minerals agency regulates offshore oil-and-gas drilling.