Six months since an explosion ripped apart the Transocean Deepwater Horizon rig in the Gulf of Mexico, and it seems the US and the world are still dealing with the repercussions – financial, legislatory, environmental, economic. Pipeline asked a random selection of commentators for their opinion of the current situation
Alan Herbst of US-based strategic energy advisors, Utilis Advisiory Group, commented on the shifting face of energy companies, following the disaster: “In this environment, bigger will be better and I would expect to see consolidation amongst GoM players. There will be new Federal regulations enacted now that the MMS has been broken up. Corporate Governance should change. Energy firms will need to have sympathetic public figures, Board members who understand safety and increased use of "whistle blower" lines to change the operating culture to one where safety comes first.”
Mario Almonte, PR specialist and renowned political blogger for the Huffington Post said that for BP, the Gulf of Mexico disaster was not just a huge blow from a public relations perspective, but also from a financial one.
“Yet, none of these are insurmountable obstacles, and in several years BP should have regained its balance and re-emerged as strong as ever. The unfortunate truth of the PR nightmare for BP was that its CEO, Tony Hayward, continuously stumbled in responding to media queries - and therefore exacerbated a situation that already had Gulf Coast residents, and the country, raw with emotion.
“Ironically, in becoming the lightning rod for criticism of BP, Hayward also helped greatly contain public and media criticism - everyone was focused on Hayward, seeing him as the source of BP's problems - rather than blaming the entire company for its response and handling of the disaster. Now, with Hayward out of the public eye, the public and the media seem less motivated to go after the corporation, allowing BP to quickly begin rebuilding its brand and resuming its position in the industry.
“What is also helping BP regain its footing is the fact that, from an environmental perspective, the damage the spill did to the Gulf is inconclusive. For every scientist who calls it the biggest environmental disaster of our time, there is another, equally respectable scientist who says that most of the oil has evaporated, bacteria are eating what remains, and nature is returning to normal.
Save US Energy Jobs, a project of the American Energy Alliance (AEA) is specifically addressing the effects of the spill on employment, energy affordability, and safety in the development of offshore resources across the country.
President Tom Pyle outlines the political implications of the Obama Administration’s policies regarding the Gulf: “When we learned the Administration would halt all deepwater exploration in a misguided attempt to respond to the oil spill, we had to assume they just didn’t understand the importance of the industry and the thousands of jobs it provides to the communities along the Gulf Coast. After all, what government would knowingly and purposely put thousands of its citizens out of work? But now we learn that it wasn’t a lack of knowledge about the consequences that led to the unwarranted policy, it was an outright lack of concern for the livelihoods of these hardworking Americans.”
Monitor Instruments, US-based developer and leader in miniature mass analyser technologies, along with scientists from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) recently detected a plume of hydrocarbons that is at least 22 miles long and more than 3,000 feet below the surface of the Gulf of Mexico, a residue of the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
Anthony Duryea, President of Monitor Instruments said: "Our Tethys (Mass Spectrometer) unit's size and sample specificity gave the scientists the ability to make their determinations. The small size and weight of the system allowed it to be integrated into an autonomous underwater vehicle (AUV) for rapid and comprehensive analysis of the underwater plume. In conjunction with scientists from WHOI we are now in a position to track this plume and to seek out other underwater petroleum leaks, both naturally occurring and leaks from other well sites.
Duryea said the company is currently in a holding pattern in the Gulf area for monitoring the subsurface slick. “We are awaiting our next assignment to deploy Tethys for updated data. We are also preparing our mud logging measurement instruments for future deployments."
In a sweeping response to the oil spill, the US House of Representatives passed the Consolidated Land, Energy, and Aquatic Resources (CLEAR) Act. Despite being caught in legislative limbo, it is anticipated that some form of offshore drilling safety regulation bill will pass the Senate due to mounting pressure from the President and the public.
Contract Lifecycle Management firm, CLM Matrix, sees the regulatory changes as a chance to highlight the importance of managing compliance and oil safety reform via an effective and efficient contract lifecycle management process.
Spokesman Darrin Poole said: “While many energy corporations are taking a ‘wait and see’ attitude, the impending oil spill reform debate clearly illustrates one thing - in an ever changing regulatory environment, it is imperative to have transparency and visibility built into your contract management process.
“The multitude of players in both upstream and downstream operations require energy companies to have full visibility into the governing terms and conditions that manage the entire operational value chain and the associated rights and obligations afforded to each participant in the process. When laws change, a company must be able to quickly access all its contracts and have a process in place for consistently updating contract language to ensure compliance.
“No one knows what the final outcome will be in Washington, but having a defined and automated process for initiating, creating, negotiating, executing and monitoring all types of contracts will be key to a lot less red tape and a lot more profit.”
James Walsh, author of “Libertarian Nation: The Call for a New Agenda” (Silverlake Publishing) was keen to voice his opinion on the spill from his perspective: “The BP oil spill will have effects on how Americans and others look at government advocacy and regulatory schemes for years to come.
“A lot of people in Washington thought the spill would mean cheap and easy points against Corporate America. But they didn't anticipate that the government's actions would be perceived as bumbling and incompetent. For "green" activists, it was a matter of snatching defeat from the jaws of certain political victory. That, combined with the UEA/IPCC data-manipulation story, has set the US environment movement back. And the combination may have killed it as an influential political front.”
Subscribe to this comment's feed
