Category Archives: Gulf restoration

BP Spill, gulf of mexico clean-up, Gulf restoration

Pensacola News Journal: BP’s cleanup promise broken; oil visible on beache

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The costs and energies of supervising the cleanup of a mess that we did not make should not rest entirely on our shoulders.

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A promise was broken.

Maybe it’s all BP’s fault. Maybe the Coast Guard shares the blame. Maybe we’re all suckers for not getting it in writing. But we thought we had a deal.

The deal was that the Coast Guard-led and BP-funded oil spill cleanup would not leave our beaches until there was no more visible oil. But the Coast Guard declared the mission accomplished in 2013. And as we all know too well by now — the oil is still visible.

Pensacola News-Journal reporter Kim Blair spoke with Escambia County’s director of community and environment, Keith Wilkins, an official who has been on the front lines battling the oil spill since the day in 2010 when it began gushing wildly into the Gulf of Mexico. Wilkins summed up the broken promise like this: “At the very beginning of the oil spill, we were all talking about end points for monitoring and cleaning so we’d know when we were done with the whole thing … At the onset of the oil spill, we had an agreement with BP and the Coast Guard that the end point would be no observable oil on the beaches. We still have not reached that point.”

And that’s the bottom line. We have not reached the point of no visible oil. We still see tarballs. We still see tar mats. And under the gaze of a microscope, we can still see traces of the toxic dispersant chemicals that were futilely pumped into the Gulf.

For residents who take pride in leaving only footprints on our unique and beautiful shoreline, the disgusting stain of man-made folly is far from fading. And now, it’s clear that the heavy obligation to monitor the lingering results of BP’s mess has been shoved onto all of us.

BP initially paid Florida $50 million for oil monitoring and cleanup. Blair reported that the money dried up in June. The continued work is now financed by state taxpayers and it is unclear whether reimbursement will come from BP.

DEP workers Joey Whibbs and David Perkinson, the last two-man team left scouting for lingering oil from the 2010 spill, still find oil every day, five days a week. It was Perkinson who discovered the tar mat earlier this year on Fort Pickens beach. But even when they find it, time is of the essence. Rapidly changing surf and beach conditions require quick action before the oil is covered or washed elsewhere. And when the Coast Guard has not been immediately prepared to respond when alerted to discovery of oil, with the cleanup clock ticking, the exhausting work has fallen on the DEP’s two sentinels.

It is a Sisyphean task for just two men, the search for oil like a never ending push of a boulder down the beach. It should not be this way.

— Pensacola News Journal

gulf of mexico clean-up, Gulf restoration

E&E: Advocates press for restoration beyond the shoreline

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Annie Snider, E&E reporter
Published: Monday, August 25, 2014

The 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill happened, as its name suggests, in
the deep water of the Gulf of Mexico. But even though the bluewater
ecosystem bore the brunt of the damage, projects to restore habitat and
species there have not done well in the competition for funding so far.

To be sure, only a fraction of the restoration dollars related to the
spill that experts anticipate will eventually be available have been
put up for grabs so far, and the bluewater is likely to be a major
recipient of funding under the Oil Pollution Act to restore damage
directly related to the spill.

Still, hundreds of millions of dollars stemming from the gusher has
already been awarded, but just one project dealing with the deepwater
environment has received funding, according to Libby Fetherston, an
Ocean Conservancy staffer who strategizes about restoration funding.

“There’s a lot we’re working with in the terrestrial environment and
estuaries along the shoreline of the five affected Gulf Coast states,
but there’s not a lot of discussion about what happens once you get
beyond the shore,” Fetherston said. “The Gulf of Mexico is a whole
entity, and looking only at the coastline where you can put your hands
in the dirt and physically restore things is really only looking at
half of the puzzle.”

Fetherston’s group released a slick booklet Friday to explain what
restoration could look like in the bluewater and why it matters.

For instance, bluefin tuna, which have been shown to be sensitive to
the hydrocarbons found in crude oil, are often accidentally caught by
commercial fishermen aiming to snag yellowfin tuna or swordfish
(Greenwire, March 24).

Ocean Conservancy estimates that 423 bluefin are thrown back dead each
year after being snagged from pelagic long-line fishery boats in the
Gulf. All those fish could be saved, the group argues, if those lines
were switched out for new, experimental gear.

Another idea hunting for funding: mapping habitat on the Gulf’s
seafloor.

“Knowing about the different habitats, how productive they are, what is
living on them, is really an important first step toward understanding
how to do restoration,” Fetherston said. “Maybe we can’t go down and
clean the corals around the Macondo wellhead, but maybe we can protect
similar corals from damage, from drilling, but we don’t know where
those are.”

Ocean Conservancy’s booklet was issued one day after the federal-state
panel charged with overseeing Clean Water Act fines being delivered to
the Gulf put out its first call for project proposals (E&ENews PM, Aug.
21).

Part of the challenge for restoration advocates is determining which
funding stream to propose which projects for in order to get the most
bang for the buck and avoid duplication. The Gulf Coast Ecosystem
Restoration Council, made up of Gulf State and federal government
officials, is responsible for managing the 30 percent of Clean Water
Act civil fines sent back to the Gulf for comprehensive restoration.
The National Fish and Wildlife Foundation, meanwhile, is charged with
granting $2.5 billion in criminal fines related to the spill for
restoration, with slightly different goals and processes. And then
there’s the yet-to-be-determined funding to restore direct damage under
the Oil Pollution Act.

The lack of a settlement in the government’s case against BP PLC poses
some major challenges for restoration advocates. The fact that the case
is ongoing means not only that the total amount of money available for
restoration under the Clean Water Act and the Oil Pollution Act remains
unknown, but also that scientific information about the spill’s impacts
is kept under wraps.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration “has been
impressively mum,” Fetherston said. “So it’s tricky for me to say we
know this was damaged and this is how you should replace it.”

BP Spill, gulf of mexico clean-up, Gulf restoration

E&E: Council issues long-awaited call for restoration projects

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Annie Snider, E&E reporter
Published: Thursday, August 21, 2014
The federal-state panel tasked with spending fines linked to the 2010
Gulf of Mexico oil spill put out a call this afternoon for ecosystem
restoration projects — a critical step in what has been a
frustratingly slow process for many involved.

The guidelines released today by the Gulf Coast Ecosystem Restoration
Council will be used to select projects for a “Funded Priorities List”
that will be eligible for money from the first tranche of civil fines
related to the spill — roughly $150 million from Transocean Deepwater
Inc. The total amount of money available to the council remains up in
the air as the federal government’s case against BP PLC over Clean
Water Act liability remains ongoing.

The initial selection round will focus on projects targeting habitat
and water quality improvements. It will also emphasize projects that
are aimed at addressing significant ecosystem issues, that are
sustainable over time, that are likely to succeed and that will benefit
the human community, the council said in its guidelines.

“We are excited to announce the start of the project selection process
and look forward to receiving excellent proposals from our Council
members in the coming months,” Justin Ehrenwerth, the council’s
executive director, said in a statement. “The Council adopted a merit-
based process to evaluate and select projects which will put the
Council members in a strong position to move forward with project
implementation.”

The RESTORE Act, passed by Congress more than two years ago, sends 80
percent of civil fines related to the 2010 spill back to the five Gulf
states — Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas. That
money is divided into three main pots, one of which, holding 30 percent
of the total funds, is to be managed by the council for Gulfwide
ecosystem restoration.

The initial comprehensive plan approved by the council last year was
supposed to include the Funded Priorities List and a 10-year spending
plan, but the council said it was hamstrung without a long-stalled
regulation from the Treasury Department laying out how the spill money
could be spent.

Treasury last week broke the logjam, approving an interim rule (E&ENews
PM, Aug. 13).

The submission guidelines released today add detail to a fact sheet on
submission released by the council ahead of a Senate hearing last month
(E&E Daily, July 30). Language from the fact sheet that had raised
eyebrows from environmentalists about projects benefiting human
communities at the point of implementation does not appear in the new
guidelines.

Project submissions must also include a list of all applicable
environmental compliance requirements such as permits, an issue that
restoration advocates are keeping a close eye on.

“Getting the project selection process right is so important to
comprehensive Gulf restoration. If we do it correctly, we can create
jobs, conserve fish and wildlife habitat, and save the way of life
we’re privileged to enjoy on the coast,” Bob Bendick, director of the
Nature Conservancy’s Gulf of Mexico program, said in a statement.
“While this is just the beginning of the process, we hope the
procedures announced today will enable the implementation of projects
that allow the Gulf to remain the special place it is and something
we’ll be proud to hand down to our children.”

Only council members — representatives of the five states and the
federal agencies — can submit a project to be considered by the

council.
gulf of mexico clean-up, Gulf restoration

E&E: Interior to update decades-old bonding regs

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Phil Taylor, E&E reporter
Published: Monday, August 18, 2014

The Interior Department late last week announced plans to update 20-
year-old regulations that ensure taxpayers are not left on the hook for
the cost of tearing down abandoned offshore oil and gas facilities.

Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management said its existing bonding
regulations for oil and gas development have not kept pace with new
facilities designed to drill in deeper waters and the growing cost to
decommission them.

The agency is giving the public until Oct. 20 to comment on best
practices for mitigating financial risks and whether current bonding
requirements are adequate.

“We would like to work with industry and others to determine how to
improve our regulatory regime to better align with the realities of
aging offshore infrastructure, hazard risks and increasing costs of
decommissioning,” BOEM acting Director Walter Cruickshank said in a
statement.

BOEM said the costs of decommissioning offshore rigs have “dramatically
increased” since the last bonding regulations were developed nearly a
quarter-century ago.

At that time, the biggest financial risk the government faced in
selling oil and gas leases was nonpayment of rents and royalties,
noncompliance with laws and regulations, and potential problems due to
bankruptcy, BOEM said.

Currently, operators must pay a base bond of $50,000 per lease prior to
development. Bonds rise to $200,000 per lease for exploration and
$500,000 for production. Operators also can post bonds for an area of
leases, which start at $1 million for exploration and $3 million for
production.

While BOEM may require additional financial assurances for
decommissioning, the agency exercises this authority about 10 percent
of the time.

Reducing financial risks is complicated by the 40- to 50-year life span
of many offshore drilling projects, BOEM said. New and unexpected
technological or financial challenges may necessitate new financial
assurances as projects evolve, it said.

“BOEM is specifically interested in comments regarding the financial
risks and liabilities associated with aging offshore infrastructure,
deepwater decommissioning, subsea decommissioning, pipeline
abandonment, Arctic operations, and new technologies designed to
address deepwater development or exploration and/or development of
energy or mineral resources in locations with unusually adverse
conditions,” the agency said in a Federal Register notice today.

The new rulemaking will not address the costs and damages associated
with oil spill financial responsibility, which are covered elsewhere in
BOEM’s regulations.

As of the beginning of this year, Interior’s Bureau of Safety and
Environmental Enforcement counted 1,583 abandoned wells and 374 idle
platforms waiting for decommissioning, a major drop from the 3,233
abandoned wells and 617 unused structures BOEM found in need of removal
in late 2010 (EnergyWire, March 12).

Federal regulations require offshore energy companies to remove all
material used for oil and gas extraction in the Gulf as soon as their
activities are completed at lease sites.

Interior last summer announced a new policy that will make it easier
for oil and gas companies to allow obsolete rigs in the Gulf of Mexico
to be used as habitat for fish. It drew support from operators that
stand to save on the cost of decommissioning the hulking steel
structures as well as recreational fishing groups that argue the rigs
provide important hiding and hunting grounds for fish in the Gulf,
whose muddy bottom is generally inhospitable to reefs (Greenwire, June
27, 2013).

But some environmentalists and scientists argue companies have abused
Interior’s “rigs to reefs” program to avoid the cost of
decommissioning, threatening to turn the Gulf into an oil and gas

“junkyard” (Greenwire, July 31).
energy policy, gulf of mexico clean-up, Gulf restoration

DECOM WORLD: Group launches campaign to scrap Rigs to Reefs programs in Gulf of Mexico

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By Rod Sweet on Aug 6, 2014

Operators hoping to cut decommissioning costs by reefing rigs in the Gulf of Mexico may have a fight on their hands now that a campaign has been launched by a diverse group including shrimp fishermen and conservationists to have the Rigs to Reefs program scrapped.

Twenty-three individuals, among them university professors and people representing conservation groups, fishermen and tribal organizations, are signatories to a 23 July letter to US Interior Secretary Sally Jewell asking her department to require operators to remove rigs instead of converting them to reefs.

They were joined on 30 July by Clint Guidry, president of the Louisiana Shrimp Association, who told New Orleans’ Times-Picayune newspaper that the oil industry should return the Gulf sea floor to “trawlable bottoms”.

The campaign coincides with the publication last month of a new book entitled “Bring Back the Gulf”. Its authors, Richard Charter, senior fellow of the Ocean Foundation, and DeeVon Quirolo, a marine conservation consultant based in Florida, argue that there is no scientific consensus that reefed platforms and jackets contribute to maintaining fish stocks “or otherwise achieve overarching fisheries management goals”.

“Instead,” they write, “these artificial underwater structures aggregate fish, thereby contributing to over-fishing. It also is apparent that they fail to equal or rival natural coral reefs in biological diversity.”

The campaign will put pressure on BSEE, which last July expanded the scope for reefing rigs by removing the requirement for a five-mile buffer zone between designated reefing areas in the Gulf and by easing certain other restrictions on reefing rigs in place.

Around 450 platforms in the Gulf have been converted to reefs through state reefing programs since 1985. More than 300 of these are in Louisiana waters. Some environmental groups have contended that artificial reefs just attract more fish without promoting balanced habitats, thereby doing more harm than good.

The 23 July letter, signed also by authors Charter and Quirolo, urges Interior Secretary Sally Jewell to effect “strong and consistent implementation of the Department of Interior’s Idle Iron policy requiring full decommissioning of spent oil and gas structures at the end of their useful economic life.”

The letter adds: “The permanent seabed placement of obsolete oil and gas extraction infrastructure invites more ecosystem damage rather than restoring it as originally envisioned.”

The Louisiana Shrimp Association’s Clint Guidry also called for the complete removal of platforms, saying it would “help all users who have to navigate the Gulf”. Shrimpers have opposed artificial reefs because they can tangle their nets.

Signing the 23 July letter to Sally Jewell were:

  • Richard Charter, Senior Fellow, The Ocean Foundation, Washington DC
  • DeeVon Quirolo, Marine Conservation Consultant, Brooksville, Florida
  • Athan Manuel, Director, Lands Protection Program Sierra Club, Washington DC
  • Robert W. Hastings, Chair, Alabama Chapter of the Sierra Club
  • Cynthia Sarthou, Executive Director, Gulf Restoration Network, New Orleans
  • Miyoko Sakashita, Oceans Director, Center for Biological Diversity, San Francisco
  • John Hocevar, Oceans Campaign Director, Greenpeace USA
  • Gary Appleson, Policy Coordinator, Sea Turtle Conservancy, Gainesville, Florida
  • Meredith Dowling, Gulf Program Director, Southwings Gulf Office
  • George Barisich, President, United Commercial Fishermen’s Association, Louisiana
  • John W. Day, Jr., Distinguished Professor, Dept. of Oceanography and Coastal Sciences and Coastal Ecology Institute, School of the Coast & Environment Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge
  • Len Bahr, Ph.D. LaCoastPost.com Homer Hitt Alumni Center, New Orleans
  • John McManus, Professor, Department of Marine Biology and Ecology, University of Miami
  • Stephen Bradberry, Executive Director, Alliance Institute, New Orleans
  • Michael Tritico, President, RESTORE Trust, Louisiana
  • Robert G. Bea, Professor Emeritus, Center for Catastrophic Risk Management, University of California Berkeley
  • Luiz Rodrigues, Executive Director, Environmental Coalition of Miami Beach
  • Colette Pichon Battle, Director/Attorney, Gulf Coast Center for Law & Policy, Slidell, Louisiana
  • Dede Shelton, Executive Director, Hands Across the Sand, Meridian, Idaho
  • Michael Stocker, Director, Ocean Conservation Research, Lagunitas, California
  • Kathi Koontz, Ocean Consultant, Berkeley, CA
  • Delice Calcote, Executive Director, Alaska Inter-Tribal Council, Anchorage

The letter to Sally Jewell and the book, “Bring Back the Gulf”, can be downloaded here.

– See more at: http://social.decomworld.com/regulation-and-policy/group-launches-campaign-scrap-rigs-reefs-programs-gulf-mexico