Environmental groups pushing the federal government to take over enforcement of Clean Water Act regulations in Iowa said Tuesday that Gov. Terry Branstad is lobbying on behalf of agriculture groups, ignoring the environmental damage being done to rivers and streams by manure spills and farm runoff.
Tag Archives: Clean Water Act
Transocean CEO: Rig workers should have done more
Transocean employees should have done more to detect signs of trouble before the company’s drilling rig exploded in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010, killing 11 workers and triggering the nation’s worst offshore oil spill, the company’s chief executive testified Tuesday.
Transocean Ltd. president and CEO Steven Newman said the Swiss-based drilling company agreed in January to plead guilty to a criminal charge of violating the Clean Water Act because its employees on the Deepwater Horizon played a role in botching a crucial safety test before the blowout of BP‘s Macondo well.
“Do you blame the crew that night?” Transocean attorney Brad Brian asked Newman on the 14th day of a trial designed to determine the causes of BP‘s well blowout and to assign fault to the companies involved.
“Do I blame the crew? Do I wish the crew would have done more? Absolutely. I am not sure that that’s the same emotional content as blame,” Newman said.
Newman, however, said BP ultimately was responsible for deciding how to perform the safety test and for determining whether it was successful.
“The responsibility that our crew has in a situation like that is to line the test up, to make sure that the lines and the valves and the gauges are the way they’re supposed to be,” Newman said.
Two BP rig supervisors, Robert Kaluza and Donald Vidrine, are charged with manslaughter in the 11 rig workers’ deaths and await a separate trial. An indictment last year accused Kaluza and Vidrine of disregarding abnormally high pressure readings during the safety test.
No Transocean employees have been charged with crimes, but the company pleaded guilty to the misdemeanor charge in February and agreed to pay $1.4 billion in criminal and civil penalties as part of a settlement with the Justice Department.
Newman was in Geneva, Switzerland, when the rig exploded April 20, 2010. When another company executive called to tell him the rig was on fire and was being evacuated, Newman could tell from the man’s voice that “something was terribly wrong.”
“I kept telling myself that the first phone call associated with an incident is always as full of misinformation as it is of information, and so I just kept telling myself it couldn’t be that bad,” he recalled.
Approaching 3 Years Since Macondo, Should Investors Look Into BP?
By David Lee Smith, The Motley Fool
Filed under: Investing
London-based BP is nearing the third anniversary of its Macondo Gulf of Mexico well disaster, almost certainly the most horrendous incident in U.S. oil and gas history. Increasingly, the key question surrounding the company involves the extent to which it’s recovered from the tragedy and recaptured a role among the desirable additions to energy investment portfolios.
You’ll recall that on the night of April 20, 2010, Transocean‘s Deepwater Horizon rig exploded, burned, and sank, snuffing out the lives of 11 hands who’d been working aboard the deepwater unit. During the next four months, while the world watched in horror, the damaged well spewed a whopping 4.9 million barrels of crude oil into Gulf waters.
The first of a big chunk
While the oil was still gushing uncontrollably from the well, BP established a $20 billion trust fund for victims of the incident. Thus far, however, the company’s payments and commitments have rocketed to about $40 billion.
But that may be far from the ultimate tab. A now six-weeks-long non-jury trial is being conducted in the New Orleans court of U.S. District Judge Carl Barbier to determine the degree of fault attributable to BP and its contractors. That group includes Transocean and Halliburton , which was in charge of cementing the well.
Should Barbier find BP to have been guilty of “gross negligence” in precipitating the disaster, the company could be required to ante up another $18 billion in penalties related to the Clean Water Act. Further, affected Gulf states, led by Louisiana, are awaiting their turn in court to press what they believe could amount to a combined $34 billion for damages and lost tax revenue. The company’s assessment of the validity of the latter claims is, however, best indicated by an absence of reserves against charges for missed tax revenues.
Steady progress
Much of the public’s exposure to BP has been negative for most of the past decade, beginning with a 2005 refinery explosion at its Texas City, Texas, refinery that killed 15 and injured dozens. Nevertheless, the company continues to make operating strides in a variety of locations. Included was the sale of the snake-bitten Texas refinery last quarter to Marathon Petroleum .
And despite the lingering negatives from Macondo, the company expects to spend about $40 billion during the next decade in the Gulf of Mexico, where it remains a leading producer. Indeed, it operates seven facilities in the Gulf, including the giant Mad Dog and Thunder Horse fields. It also has equity interests in another five plays. It operates the Mardi Gras transportation system of five major oil and gas pipelines that serve fields in the prolific Mississippi Canyon and Southern Green Canyon areas.
Created as the Anglo-Persian Oil Company in 1909, BP continues to be active in the Middle East. It’s overseeing the successful remediation of Iraq‘s massive Rumaila field, is involved in joint ventures with …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at DailyFinance
Gulf spill trial: Contractor finds cement samples
BP‘s cement contractor on the Deepwater Horizon rig has discovered cement samples possibly tied to the ill-fated drilling project that weren’t turned over to the Justice Department after the 2010 oil spill, a lawyer for the contractor said Thursday.
Halliburton lawyer Donald Godwin told U.S. District Judge Carl Barbier that the company believes the material found Wednesday at its laboratory in Lafayette has no bearing on the ongoing trial to assign responsibility for the nation’s worst offshore oil spill.
But a plaintiffs’ attorney, Jeffrey Breit, countered that the samples are cement a Halliburton employee used for testing of BP PLC’s Macondo well before the disaster.
The blowout and explosion on April 20, 2010, killed 11 workers and led to the enormous spill in the Gulf of Mexico. The failure of the cement job to seal the well was part of a complex web of mistakes that led to the April 20, 2010, blowout, according to a series of government probes.
In an email to the court late Wednesday, Godwin says Halliburton is investigating whether the cement samples should have been turned over in response to subpoenas.
“The lab was immediately instructed to photograph the materials and to continue to hold them,” Godwin wrote.
Godwin’s email said the newly discovered samples appear to be associated with the Kodiak well, which the London-based energy giant BP and its contractor Transocean were drilling in the Gulf.
The non-jury trial began Feb. 25 and could last months. Barring a settlement, Barbier could decide how much more money that BP and its contractors owe for their roles in the catastrophe. BP could be on the hook for nearly $18 billion in penalties under the Clean Water Act if the judge finds that it acted with “gross negligence.”
During the trial’s opening statements, plaintiffs’ attorney Jim Roy said Halliburton used a cement blend from the Kodiak well in designing the Macondo well. The Kodiak cement contained an additive, a defoamer that “destabilizes and is incompatible with foam cement,” Roy said.
“So why would Halliburton risk using this leftover Kodiak cement on the Macondo well and try to convert it to a foam cement when it had defoamer in it? The evidence will show Halliburton was able to save time and save money by doing so,” Roy said.
Rig owner cites BP's low flow estimates
The owner of the oil rig that exploded in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010 says BP hampered efforts to stop the resulting gusher of oil by misleading government officials about how many barrels of oil were flowing each day from the damaged well on the Gulf floor.
The Transocean corporation’s assertions were filed Friday in federal court in New Orleans, where a civil began last week to determine percentages of blame and how much BP, Transocean and others will pay for the April 2010 catastrophe that killed 11 workers and sent millions of gallons of oil spewing into the Gulf for 87 days.
“In short, beginning in late April and continuing throughout May 2010, BP repeatedly represented to source control decision-makers, Congress, the press and the public that 5,000 bpd was its best estimate of the flow rate,” the Transocean filing said. “It withheld numerous documents, analysis and estimates that would have allowed those outside BP to realize that BP‘s flow rate claims were misleading and fraudulent.”
Transocean, which leased the Deepwater Horizon rig to BP, says the leak could have been stopped two months earlier. The motion filed Friday seeks to limit or eliminate Transocean’s liability for damages, and outlines a case for collecting damages from BP itself.
Transocean’s filing says federal officials attempted a method of stopping the flow that was destined to fail because oil was spewing at a greater rate than BP was publicly acknowledging. That method, known as “top kill,” involved plugging the well by injecting drilling mud and solid material.
The attempt failed. Transocean, citing various documents and evidence including BP‘s recent guilty plea to criminal charges, said BP was well aware of estimates that much more oil was flowing, varying from 70,000 to 100,000 barrels per day.
Ultimately, a device known as a “capping stack” stopped the flow.
Transocean said that, but for BP‘s actions, the oil flow could have been stopped sometime in May. BP has already pleaded guilty to manslaughter and other criminal charges and has racked up more than $24 billion in spill-related expenses, including $4 billion in criminal penalties.
In the trial that began Monday, Gulf Coast states and individuals and businesses hope to convince a federal judge that the company and its partners in the drilling project are liable for much more in civil damages under the Clean Water Act and other environmental …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox US News
BP Spill Settlement Reportedly Being Considered By U.S. Justice, Gulf States
By The Huffington Post News Editors
Feb 23 (Reuters) – The U.S. government and Gulf Coast states are considering offering BP Plc a deal under which it pays $16 billion to settle civil suits stemming from the deadly 2010 Deepwater Horizon explosion and oil spill, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.
The deal would cover the company’s potential penalties under the Clean Water Act and payments under the Natural Resources Damage Assessment, the newspaper said, citing sources familiar with the discussions.
It was unclear if the deal has been formally offered to BP. The U.S. Justice Department declined to comment.
A settlement could avert a bruising courtroom battle over the worst ever U.S. offshore oil spill slated to start on Monday in New Orleans, although the trial may begin as the terms of the deal are hammered out.
A settlement would also put a solid number on BP‘s costs under the Clean Water Act, which range from $4.5 billion to $17.5 billion, as well as potential natural resources damage assessments to the states under the Oil Pollution Act.
“BP doesn’t talk about possible offers or negotiations, but I can tell you we are ready for trial and looking forward to the opportunity to present our case starting Monday,” BP spokesman Geoff Morrell said when contacted by Reuters.
BP has spent or committed $37 billion on cleanup, restoration, payouts, settlements and fines. That includes an estimated $8.5 billion deal with most plaintiffs and a record $4.5 billion in penalties, and a guilty plea to 14 criminal counts to resolve criminal charges from the Justice Department and civil claims from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
BP has said it would settle on “reasonable terms,” but was prepared to go to trial if the demands were “excessive and not based on reality.”
U.S. Justice, Gulf states crafting BP oil spill settlement deal: WSJ
(Reuters) – The U.S. government and Gulf Coast states are considering offering BP Plc a deal under which it pays $16 billion to settle civil suits stemming from the deadly 2010 Deepwater Horizon explosion and oil spill, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday. The deal would cover the company's potential penalties under the Clean Water Act and payments under the Natural Resources Damage Assessment, the newspaper said, citing sources familiar with the discussions. It was unclear if the deal has been formally offered to BP, and both the company and the U.S. …
Feds: Ohio man ordered drilling waste dumped
Prosecutors are charging a northeast Ohio man with violating the federal Clean Water Act, saying he told an employee to dump gas-drilling wastewater into a storm sewer.
The U.S. Attorney’s Office announced the charge Thursday against 62-year-old Ben Lupo of Poland, near Youngstown. He pleaded not guilty.
Lupo owns Hardrock Excavating LLC. He faces up to three years in prison, a $250,000 fine and a year of supervised release if convicted.
Authorities allege Lupo on Jan. 31 directed that at least 20,000 gallons of drilling mud and brine be discharged into a sewer that empties into the Mahoning River watershed.
The Ohio Department of Natural Resources revoked the permits of Hardrock, a brine hauler, and D&L Energy after workers at the companies’ Youngstown headquarters reported seeing the material being dumped.
Sewage lagoons remove most—but not all—pharmaceuticals
(Phys.org)—2012 marked the 40th anniversary of the Clean Water Act, which established regulations for the discharge of pollutants to waterways and supported the building of sewage treatment plants. Despite these advances, sewage remains a major source of pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs) and naturally occurring hormones found in the environment. …read more
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Phys.org
Transocean spill settlement heads to court
Transocean Ltd. is scheduled to make an initial court appearance in New Orleans Wednesday for its plea agreement with the Justice Department over the company’s role in the massive 2010 oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
Transocean has agreed to pay $400 million in criminal penalties and plead guilty to a misdemeanor charge of violating the Clean Water Act. The Switzerland-based company also agreed to pay $1 billion in civil penalties.
The company isn’t expected to enter its guilty plea until next month. U.S. District Judge Jane Triche Milazzo has scheduled a Feb. 14 hearing to decide whether to accept the criminal settlement.
Transocean owned the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig, which sank after an explosion killed 11 workers and spawned the spill. London-based oil giant BP PLC leased the rig from Transocean.
Source: FULL ARTICLE at Fox US News