Published: Saturday, February 11, 2012
Ben Raines, Press-Register
A cluster of leaking wells in the Gulf may have released as much as 1.2 million gallons of oil since 2004, when they were damaged during Hurricane Ivan, according to a report from the Skytruth environmental group.
The group’s estimate is 100 times higher than a U.S. Coast Guard estimate of 12,720 gallons provided by the agency on Thursday.
Coast Guard officials said their calculation was based on “daily reports” filed by the wells’ owner, Taylor Energy Co. LLC.
Though the well has been leaking for 2,662 days, there are only 714 reports in the federal record, said Paul Woods, with Skytruth. For instance, he said, the company apparently filed just three daily reports for the month of July 2011.
Taylor Energy officials did not return calls seeking comment.
Woods said that his organization’s estimates were made by compiling the periodic spill reports filed by Taylor Energy and examining satellite images showing a persistent slick on the surface of the Gulf since 2004.
Skytruth filled in the gaps left by the missing reports by looking at satellite images of the slick and calculating an average daily flow rate for each of the eight years the well has been leaking.
Using those flow rate calculations, Skytruth came up with a range for the amount of oil leaked somewhere between 250,000 and 1.2 million gallons of oil.
Coast Guard officials said the agency had access to data from additional overflights made by Taylor Energy that are not available to the public. When asked, they were unsure how many overflights had been made by the company since the spill began. But officials said they believe flights have been made nearly every day since 2008.
On many days, officials said, Taylor reported “no observable oil.”
When calculating how many gallons of oil had been spilled since 2004, Coast Guard officials said the agency entered a zero for those days rather than an estimate of the average ongoing leak.
In general, Skytruth contends, sheens are only visible when the Gulf is calm. Waves above about 3 feet — a common occurrence in the Gulf — break up the oil before sheens can form.
“We think this points to a systematic underreporting by the Coast Guard of small and medium spills. It also shows the problem with allowing the polluter to report how much they’ve spilled,” Woods said. “Just because the sea is too rough for a sheen to form doesn’t mean the well quit leaking that day. How can the public gauge the risk of drilling if a spill reported as 12,000 gallons is actually many times larger?”
The hundreds of incident reports on the Taylor spill filed with the National Response Center — the federal agency tasked with documenting oil spills — also contain widely divergent estimates of the amount of oil present on the Gulf’s surface from day to day.
For instance, a report from 2004, shortly after the leak began, describes a sheen 4 miles long and a half-mile wide. Federal officials estimated that sheen contained about a quarter of a gallon of oil. Meanwhile, a report from July of 2008 described a sheen of identical size, but here the federal estimate was 336 gallons of oil.
Federal officials said estimates of the amount of oil contained in a sheen are imprecise due to factors including the thickness of the sheen, the size of waves, and the natural weathering of oil exposed to the air.
During the BP oil spill, high-resolution satellite images showed a sheen associated with the Taylor spill that was about 10 miles long. Using a standard method of estimating how much oil is present in a sheen based on work by scientists at the University of Florida, Skytruth reported the slick contained a minimum of 3,157 gallons of oil.
At the time, Coast Guard officials estimated the Taylor wells were collectively leaking 14 gallons a day. At that rate, according to Skytruth, it would have taken about seven months for 3,157 gallons to collect on the Gulf’s surface, an impossibility given that oil sheens typically dissipate in a matter of hours or days due to waves and evaporation.
On Thursday, the Coast Guard estimated that the Taylor wells were now leaking about 3 gallons a day. The agency reports the average sheen at the site now is about 7,000 feet long and 500 feet wide.
The wells were damaged when a mudslide during Hurricane Ivan destroyed the platform they were connected to. The Coast Guard said Taylor has stemmed the flow somewhat by using three containment domes. Oil collects inside the domes and is sucked out by a ship on the surface every few days. In addition, the company has sealed some of the wells by drilling relief wells and killing them with cement.
Woods said the amount of oil coming from the nine broken wells was tiny compared to the BP spill. But, he said the public should take note that Taylor has been unable to stop the leaks seven years after they started.
The national Waterkeeper Alliance filed a federal Clean Water Act suit against Taylor Energy earlier this month.
“This is in shallow water, 11 miles off the coast, and it has taken this long to clean up. Imagine if this happened in deep water. We saw how long it took to shut in the one BP well,” Woods said. “Now imagine if we had a similar problem with a deepwater platform with 28 wells attached to it. We don’t think anyone is planning for that kind of problem.”
Ben Raines, Press-Register
A cluster of leaking wells in the Gulf may have released as much as 1.2 million gallons of oil since 2004, when they were damaged during Hurricane Ivan, according to a report from the Skytruth environmental group.
The group’s estimate is 100 times higher than a U.S. Coast Guard estimate of 12,720 gallons provided by the agency on Thursday.
Coast Guard officials said their calculation was based on “daily reports” filed by the wells’ owner, Taylor Energy Co. LLC.
Though the well has been leaking for 2,662 days, there are only 714 reports in the federal record, said Paul Woods, with Skytruth. For instance, he said, the company apparently filed just three daily reports for the month of July 2011.
Taylor Energy officials did not return calls seeking comment.
Woods said that his organization’s estimates were made by compiling the periodic spill reports filed by Taylor Energy and examining satellite images showing a persistent slick on the surface of the Gulf since 2004.
Skytruth filled in the gaps left by the missing reports by looking at satellite images of the slick and calculating an average daily flow rate for each of the eight years the well has been leaking.
Using those flow rate calculations, Skytruth came up with a range for the amount of oil leaked somewhere between 250,000 and 1.2 million gallons of oil.
Coast Guard officials said the agency had access to data from additional overflights made by Taylor Energy that are not available to the public. When asked, they were unsure how many overflights had been made by the company since the spill began. But officials said they believe flights have been made nearly every day since 2008.
On many days, officials said, Taylor reported “no observable oil.”
When calculating how many gallons of oil had been spilled since 2004, Coast Guard officials said the agency entered a zero for those days rather than an estimate of the average ongoing leak.
In general, Skytruth contends, sheens are only visible when the Gulf is calm. Waves above about 3 feet — a common occurrence in the Gulf — break up the oil before sheens can form.
“We think this points to a systematic underreporting by the Coast Guard of small and medium spills. It also shows the problem with allowing the polluter to report how much they’ve spilled,” Woods said. “Just because the sea is too rough for a sheen to form doesn’t mean the well quit leaking that day. How can the public gauge the risk of drilling if a spill reported as 12,000 gallons is actually many times larger?”
The hundreds of incident reports on the Taylor spill filed with the National Response Center — the federal agency tasked with documenting oil spills — also contain widely divergent estimates of the amount of oil present on the Gulf’s surface from day to day.
For instance, a report from 2004, shortly after the leak began, describes a sheen 4 miles long and a half-mile wide. Federal officials estimated that sheen contained about a quarter of a gallon of oil. Meanwhile, a report from July of 2008 described a sheen of identical size, but here the federal estimate was 336 gallons of oil.
Federal officials said estimates of the amount of oil contained in a sheen are imprecise due to factors including the thickness of the sheen, the size of waves, and the natural weathering of oil exposed to the air.
During the BP oil spill, high-resolution satellite images showed a sheen associated with the Taylor spill that was about 10 miles long. Using a standard method of estimating how much oil is present in a sheen based on work by scientists at the University of Florida, Skytruth reported the slick contained a minimum of 3,157 gallons of oil.
At the time, Coast Guard officials estimated the Taylor wells were collectively leaking 14 gallons a day. At that rate, according to Skytruth, it would have taken about seven months for 3,157 gallons to collect on the Gulf’s surface, an impossibility given that oil sheens typically dissipate in a matter of hours or days due to waves and evaporation.
On Thursday, the Coast Guard estimated that the Taylor wells were now leaking about 3 gallons a day. The agency reports the average sheen at the site now is about 7,000 feet long and 500 feet wide.
The wells were damaged when a mudslide during Hurricane Ivan destroyed the platform they were connected to. The Coast Guard said Taylor has stemmed the flow somewhat by using three containment domes. Oil collects inside the domes and is sucked out by a ship on the surface every few days. In addition, the company has sealed some of the wells by drilling relief wells and killing them with cement.
Woods said the amount of oil coming from the nine broken wells was tiny compared to the BP spill. But, he said the public should take note that Taylor has been unable to stop the leaks seven years after they started.
The national Waterkeeper Alliance filed a federal Clean Water Act suit against Taylor Energy earlier this month.
“This is in shallow water, 11 miles off the coast, and it has taken this long to clean up. Imagine if this happened in deep water. We saw how long it took to shut in the one BP well,” Woods said. “Now imagine if we had a similar problem with a deepwater platform with 28 wells attached to it. We don’t think anyone is planning for that kind of problem.”
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