Thursday 26 July 2012

US receives bids to drill in Gulf of Mexico - BP

The US government has offered up new areas of the central Gulf of Mexico for drilling for the first time since the 2010 BP oil disaster in the area and received $1.7bn in winning bids, officials have said.


"The government is gambling with the Gulf by encouraging even more offshore drilling in the same exceedingly deep waters that have already proven to be treacherous, rather than investing in safer clean energy that creates jobs without risking lives and livelihoods," said Jacqueline Savitz, vice president for North America at Oceana, one of five groups filing the suit.

"This move sets us up for another disastrous oil spill, threatening more human lives, livelihoods, industries and marine life, including endangered species, in the greedy rush to expand offshore drilling."

This is what happened before, see map linked here.

An explosion on the BP operated Deepwater Horizon oil rig killed eleven crew members on April 20, 2010, sparking the greatest environmental disaster in United States history.

In combination with the Texas City Refinery Explosion and the Prudohoe Bay Oil Spill, this marked the third serious incident involving BP in the United States in five years. 

Scientific estimates put the amount of oil that was being discharged from the broken well at above 1,470,000 US gallons per day! 

There are over 400 different species of animals living in the area affected by the spill. 464 sea turtles and 60 dolphins were found dead within the spill area (NOAA). 

BP operated oil skimmers and other cleanup tools to try to remove oil from the water and Louisiana began building oil containment berms to halt the spread of oil.

On July 15, 2010 BP sucesfully stopped the flow of oil from the wellhead, after spilling 190 million gallons of oil into the gulf over a period of 3 months.


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