What Michael Bromwich knew about the offshore oil and gas industry could have fit into a thimble, he says, when President Obama appointed him to overhaul the former Minerals Management Service nearly a year and a half ago.

But his inexperience, Bromwich says, helped him lead MMS's temporary successor and, most recently, serve as director of the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement, a post that he will leave tomorrow. Coast Guard Rear Adm. James Watson will replace Bromwich.

In his final briefing with reporters as the bureau's chief, Bromwich said regulatory reforms his team implemented -- though at times wildly unpopular to industry groups and oil-state lawmakers -- might have saved the industry from future spills.

"We have characterized it as the most significant reforms in the history of offshore drilling regulations, and I don't think that is pat," he said from a fifth-floor room in Interior Department headquarters, where he has held hundreds of meetings with industry. "These weren't just paper standards. ... We made them abide by those standards."

But even as offshore activity gains momentum following the BP PLC oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico -- approvals of new deepwater wells soared in October -- Bromwich said he fears a change in leadership in Congress or the White House in next year's elections could unravel many of the regulations he fought to establish.

He said he is also deeply concerned with Congress' plan to trim federal agency spending by an estimated 9 percent in 2013, a consequence of the failed deficit supercommittee. The move could severely hamper Interior's ability to hire the inspectors and engineers it needs to efficiently process offshore permits, he said.

"This agency for 28 years fought a losing battle for resources," he said. "I am worried that the larger budget climate may gravely threaten the gains that we've won and stall out the agency."

Bromwich, a Harvard University-trained lawyer who joined Interior in June 2010 after serving as a federal prosecutor and inspector general for the Justice Department, said the past 17 months have been the most challenging but also the most interesting assignment of his career.

By his tally, Bromwich has made 19 major speeches, testified to Congress 15 different times, appeared before a presidential commission three times and spoken at numerous press briefings about the agency's reforms.

The new regulations -- which included a drilling safety rule, performance-based operating standards and a new requirement that companies prove they can contain oil from a runaway well -- at times drew the ire of Gulf Coast lawmakers and Republicans who complained they were slowing down new exploration in the Gulf.

But Interior's decision to resume deepwater drilling in early spring also raised alarm in the environmental community, drawing lawsuits that threaten development to this day.

"Fairly quickly, we set the tone for the industry that this was not the agency they had dealt with," Bromwich said. "There was a lot of grousing about it ... less by individual companies, more by trade associations and the industry's allies in Congress. But we stood firm, and we stood tall."

What's next?

Bromwich also helped establish tougher ethics rules, an investigation and review unit, a detailed Interior-U.S. Coast Guard spill investigation, stepped-up recruiting efforts and a massive reorganization of the former MMS.

Bromwich said his position as an outsider at times made it easier for him to upend Interior policies.

As an example, Bromwich cited a recent decision to extend Interior regulations to drilling contractors, a move that he said made sense but had previously been deemed "administratively inconvenient." While the decision chafed some in the industry, it led to the issuance of violations last month to Halliburton Co. and Transocean Ltd. for their roles in the Deepwater Horizon disaster.

"It's just something that people in this agency took for granted," he said. "Somebody who has been a part of the industry might not have asked those questions, might have taken more time to overturn that policy."

Bromwich, who was charged with reforming an agency long accused of being too cozy with industry, did not indicate what he would do after leaving Interior, but he said he is imposing a voluntary lifetime ban on "direct dealings" with BSEE or the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, which oversees leasing and exploration.

"That doesn't mean I can't work on the issues. But I will never be in this room dealing with a future director of one of these agencies," he said. "There has been too much of the revolving door in the past, too much effort to influence the agency's policy and regulatory judgments by former top executives and senior people in this agency and it has got to stop, and it is going to stop with me."

Bromwich, whose work at the private practice Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson included high-profile turnaround efforts at troubled agencies like the Houston and Washington, D.C., police departments, said he would like to return to law enforcement issues.

"How all that shakes out, in terms of whether I go to a law firm or whether I open up my own firm of some sort and figure out a way to stay involved in some of these issues, I don't know at this point," he said.

Reactions

His departure from Interior has drawn mixed feelings both from industry heads and some environmentalists.

Jim Noe, senior vice president of Hercules Offshore Inc., a large shallow-water contractor, said Bromwich has made strides in improving the safety of offshore drilling, but often failed to provide a clear set of expectations for industry that led to slower permitting.

"Director Bromwich was given a very tough job, made tougher by his lack of industry experience," Noe said earlier this fall. "He has made progress. Everyone in the industry agrees with that."

"The biggest missing piece is the lack of predictability in the system," Noe added. "It's simply not as transparent as it used to be."

While Bromwich's regulatory efforts often drew praise from congressional Democrats and environmentalists, some have criticized his involvement in Interior's conditional approval of Arctic exploration and a new five-year leasing plan that includes some Arctic waters.

Peter Van Tuyn, an Anchorage-based attorney who represents conservation groups, said Bromwich's approval system for drilling allows critical decisions over whether a company's oil spill plan is adequate to be made as late as the drilling permit stage -- the last possible time before drilling can start.

The policy could put undue pressure on Interior as it reviews Royal Dutch Shell PLC's permits to drill in the Arctic, since the company's exploration plans have already been approved, he said.

"'Are you saying that BSEE, which was not involved in the exploration plan approval process, will have the info and backbone to hold Shell's feet to the regulatory fire right up to the time when Shell could start drilling?'" Van Tuyn said, recalling a recent meeting he and an Alaska Native leader had with Bromwich. "'Are you saying that your agency will have the strength to make an objective decision about whether Shell has met legal requirements, even while Shell's entire drilling armada is in the Arctic staring down at your BSEE folks? All that money and effort that Shell put into it will not influence you one bit?' I vividly remember that he looked [us] in the eye and said 'Yes.'"

Environmental groups continue to fight plans to drill in the Arctic, arguing, among other things, that the area lacks the infrastructure necessary to respond to a spill and that efforts could be hampered by inclement weather.

"In my opinion, his offshore drilling approval approach is naive," Van Tuyn said. "History has shown that regulators are heavily influenced by industry momentum and arguments of inequity such as 'You are making me wait too long to give me the approval.'"