Oil spills: changing landscape, changing response

Abstract

The Montara and Macondo oil spills—being unexpected and close in time—have significantly changed the understanding about how oil spills occur and impact society and environment. While spills from maritime transport have a fixed volume, upstream spills can continue unabated until relief efforts are successful. Transport oil spills have been subject to major scrutiny and initiatives during the past 25 years, yet little attention has been given to the specific preparedness and response issues of an upstream incident.

The global industry faces increasing regulatory oversight due to environmental concerns as the search for new reserves moves into deeper water in more sensitive and often remote environments. The onus is on the industry to show a preparedness and response capability that is sufficiently robust and adequate to deal with a well-control incident—this capability must exceed government and community expectations.

Exploration and production operators are now preparing and responding to upstream well-control incidents in a different way. For preparedness, this includes greater engagement with regulators through the planning life cycle and exercises that better integrate national and international resources, as well as ongoing strengthening of internal capability of incident command structure (ICS). For response, the activation of resources is occurring more quickly, is more extensive, and the resources are being maintained on location for a longer period. Technology is being used to better monitor the status and fate of a spill, as well as providing frequent updates to regulators and media.

This extended abstract provides an overview of the oil industry’s response to Macondo and Montara; additionally, case studies are used to show how changes are occurring in practice.