"[116] Altogether, 1.8410^6USgal (7,000m3) of dispersants were used; of this 771,000USgal (2,920m3) were released at the wellhead. Microbial biosurfactants help in bioremediation of hydrophobic compounds by two main mechanisms. [149], In late 2012, a study from Georgia Tech and Universidad Autonoma de Aguascalientes in Environmental Pollution journal reported that Corexit used during the BP oil spill had increased the toxicity of the oil by 52 times. This was described as a "sick joke" and "a very serious error of judgement" by Friends of the Earth Scotland. [230][231], On 12 April 2016, a research team reported that 88 percent of about 360 baby or stillborn dolphins within the spill area "had abnormal or under-developed lungs", compared to 15 percent in other areas. Pelican eggs contained "petroleum compounds and Corexit". MOEX Offshore 2007 agreed to pay $45million to the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund, $25million to five Gulf state and $20million to supplemental environmental projects. Deepwater Horizon oil spill. Researchers concluded that deep plumes of dissolved oil and gas would likely remain confined to the northern Gulf of Mexico and that the peak impact on dissolved oxygen would be delayed and long lasting. We will make BP pay for the damage their company has caused. ASM Connect. How can we best prepare to respond to such an event in this challenging environment? 951 bacterial subfamilies, which, possibly about 16 types contributed to the degradation. [353], In September 2014, Halliburton agreed to settle a large percentage of legal claims against it by paying $1.1billion into a trust by way of three installments over two years. [201] In October 2013, Al Jazeera reported that the gulf ecosystem was "in crisis", citing a decline in seafood catches, as well as deformities and lesions found in fish. Corexit EC9500A and Corexit EC9527A were the principal variants. 164 27 . On August 3 BP conducted a static kill, a procedure in which drilling mud was pumped into the well through the BOP. On October 5, 2015, we proposed a comprehensive, integrated, ecosystem restoration plan to address impacts from the spill to the Gulf of Mexico. Deepwater Horizon oil spill, also called Gulf of Mexico oil spill, largest marine oil spill in history, caused by an April 20, 2010, explosion on the Deepwater Horizon oil riglocated in the Gulf of Mexico, approximately 41 miles (66 km) off the coast of Louisianaand its subsequent sinking on April 22. The Macondo well is found roughly 41mi (66km) off the Louisiana coast. Although BP attempted to activate the rigs blowout preventer (BOP), a fail-safe mechanism designed to close the channel through which oil was drawn, the device malfunctioned. BP and the Department of Justice agreed to a record-setting $4.525billion in fines and other payments. The organization Smithsonians National Zoological Park also helped to rescue the remaining marine life. Executive Summary, "Gulf residents to get extra $64M for 2010 oil spill claims", "Judge hears details of Gulf oil spill settlement", "BP Class-Action Settlement Exceeds $1 Billion in Payments Over Gulf Oil Spill", http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/10/21/2465881/following-complaints-from-gulf.html, "Judge Rules Against BP Over Settlement Payout Request", "Lloyd's syndicates launch legal action over BP insurance claim", "BP, Transocean Lawsuits Surge as Oil Spill Spreads in Gulf", "BP 24bn lawsuits claim contractors failed to use modelling software properly", "BP begins to put spill behind it with settlement", "Accord Reached Settling Lawsuit Over BP Oil Spill", "Federal judge approves BP Gulf oil spill medical settlement", "BP, plaintiffs reach billion dollar deal in Gulf oil spill", "BP appeal to stop 'fictitious' U.S. oil spill claims fails", "DOJ accuses BP of 'gross negligence' in Gulf oil spill", "UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT EASTERN DISTRICT OF LOUISIANA IN RE: OIL SPILL BY THE OIL RIG: MDL NO. [59] The reported 3.19 million barrels of spilled oil was not the only effect of this disaster. We will now begin implementing restoration as laid out in the Trustees final comprehensive restoration plan. On 15 July, the device was secured and time was taken closing the valves to ensure the attachment under increasing pressure until the valves were closed completing the temporary measures. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Deepwater Horizon Trustee Council, a joint federal, state and tribal body which oversaw the overall Natural Resource Damage Assessment. One year after the notorious BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and two decades after the Exxon Valdez spill in Prince William Sound off the coast of Alaska the scientific lesson is clear - microbes matter! [266][267], On 30 April 2010, President Barack Obama ordered the federal government to hold the issuing of new offshore drilling leases and authorized the investigation of 29oil rigs in the Gulf in an effort to determine the cause of the disaster. May 4, 2010. Bioremediation. Phylogenetic [116] The fires released small amounts of toxins, including cancer-causing dioxins. Many low-wage workers in the fishing and service industries, for example, have been seeking compensation for lost wages and jobs for three years. [350], In January 2014, a panel of the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals rejected an effort by BP to curb payment of what it described as "fictitious" and "absurd" claims to a settlement fund for businesses and persons affected by the oil spill. On 2 March 2012, BP and plaintiffs agreed to settle their lawsuits. [181], On 15 April 2014, BP announced that cleanup along the coast was substantially complete, while the United States Coast Guard work continued using physical barriers such as floating booms, the cleanup workers' objective was to keep the oil from spreading any further. The ever-growing increase in deep-sea oil explorations in the Gulf of Mexico (GoM) has been raising concerns with regard to future oil spills. "Big price tag for recovery of Gulf Coast", "Potential Impact of the Gulf Oil Spill on Tourism", "New Offshore Oil Drilling Must Have Safeguards, Obama Says", "Back to Work Coalition Established to Address Federal Permitting Issues", "Obama Ends Ban On East Coast Offshore Drilling", "Citing BP oil spill, Schwarzenegger drops offshore drilling plan", "California's Schwarzenegger turns against oil drilling", "Fla. governor calls special oil drilling session", "Party-line vote ends Florida's oil drilling ban special session", "Statement by the President on the Economy and the Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico", "Full text of President Obama's BP Oil Spill speech", "Rand Paul: Obama BP criticism 'un-American', "Barack Obama's attacks on BP hurting British pensioners", "Memorial Day protest of BP held at Clearwater station", "Protest held near BP gas station in Bloomington", "More than a thousand people attend rally against BP and the government", "APNewsBreak: Trade group says BP to give cash to gas stations due to lost sales from boycotts", "Oil spill commission, lobbying group at odds over industry's credibility", "API response to commission report: "We've made progress to improve safety", "Oil and gas industry creates offshore safety institute", "British companies' reputation in the US is under threat, warns Washington overseas investment group", "Executive Order 13547 --Stewardship of the Ocean, Our Coasts, and the Great Lakes", "Deepwater Horizon disaster altered building blocks of ocean life", "BP Boss Admits Job on the Line over Gulf oil spill", "Another Torrent BP Works to Stem: Its C.E.O. Although that method did not remove the oil completely, chemicals called dispersants were used to hasten the oil's degradation to prevent the oil from doing further damage to the marine habitats below the surface water. It was largely settled when a Federal District judge approved the, That 80 percent resulted in $5.3 billion going to the, The remaining 20 percent, or $1.33 billion, went to, The National Academy of Sciences received $500 million to create the, The National Fish and Wildlife Foundations received $2.544 billion for its, NOAA led development of the preliminary restoration planning, along with the U.S. [23][59] Oil sector analysts at London-based investment bank Canaccord Genuity noted that a settlement along the lines disclosed would only be a partial resolution of the many claims against BP. BP pled guilty in 2012 to 14 felony counts and was fined a record $4 billionand half directly benefits the Gulf. Construction of two such wells had begun in May. [286], The petroleum industry claimed that disasters are infrequent and that this spill was an isolated incident and rejected claims of a loss of industry credibility. A study showed that up to 800,000 birds were thought to have died. [113] On the most demanding day, 47,849 people were assigned on the response works and over 6,000 Marine vessels, 82 helicopters, and 20 fixed-wing aircraft were involved. [193], A 2014 study of the effects of the oil spill on bluefin tuna funded by National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Stanford University, and the Monterey Bay Aquarium and published in the journal Science, found that the toxins from oil spills can cause irregular heartbeats leading to cardiac arrest. The rig capsized and sank on the morning of April 22, rupturing the riser, through which drilling mud had been injected in order to counteract the upward pressure of oil and natural gas. [139][140] On 20 May, BP determined that none of the alternative products met all three criteria of availability, non-toxicity and effectiveness. [54][55] In September a new wave of oil suddenly coated 16mi (26km) of Louisiana coastline and marshes west of the Mississippi River in Plaquemines Parish. Damage Assessment, Remediation, and Restoration Program. Below is a summary of areas in which more research needs to be done. [85][86][87] On 3 August 2010, first test oil and then drilling mud was pumped at a slow rate of approximately 2bbl (320L) per minute into the well-head. ", EPA slams Jindal's sand berm plan | wwltv.com New Orleans, "How can human hair mop up the oil spill? [322] The report concluded that the primary cause of failure was that the blind shear rams failed to fully close and seal due to a portion of drill pipe buckling between the shearing blocks. [20][21] Earlier in 2011, a White House commission likewise blamed BP and its partners for a series of cost cutting decisions and an inadequate safety system, but also concluded that the spill resulted from "systemic" root causes and "absent significant reform in both industry practices and government policies, might well recur". The CBS crew was told by the authorities: "this is BP's rules, not ours," when trying to film the area. Corrections? [354], BP and its partners in the oil well, Transocean and Halliburton, went on trial on 25 February 2013 in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana in New Orleans to determine payouts and fines under the Clean Water Act and the Natural Resources Damage Assessment. [313] The report found that on 20 April 2010, managers misread pressure data and gave their approval for rig workers to replace drilling fluid in the well with seawater, which was not heavy enough to prevent gas that had been leaking into the well from firing up the pipe to the rig, causing the explosion. The attorney is said to have received portions of settlement claims for clients he referred to the firm. The first one is increasing the surface area through emulsification. In October 2011, the United States Department of the Interior's Minerals Management Service was dissolved after it was determined it had exercised poor oversight over the drilling industry. [23] Transocean pled guilty to a misdemeanor charge as part of its $1.4billion fine. Lauren C. Peres, Edward Trapido, Ariane L. Rung, Daniel J. Harrington, Evrim Oral, Zhide Fang, Elizabeth Fontham, and Edward S. Peters. [336][337] On 13 August, BP asked US District Judge Carl Barbier to approve the settlement, saying its actions "did not constitute gross negligence or willful misconduct". [290][291], In July 2010, President Obama issued an executive order, specifically citing the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, that adopted recommendations from the Interagency Ocean Policy Task Force and established the National Ocean Council. "[331], In July 2013, BP made a motion in court to freeze payments on tens of thousands of claims, arguing inter alia that a staff attorney from the Deepwater Horizon Court-Supervised Settlement Program, the program responsible for evaluating compensation claims, had improperly profited from claims filed by a New Orleans law firm. 1) The use of dispersants can be harmful to the environment but it is necessary to increase the rate of crude oil degradation by microbes. Including one-time use sorbent booms, a total of 13,300,000ft (4,100km) of booms were deployed. Repeated or excessive exposure may cause injury to red blood cells (hemolysis), kidney or the liver. The manual adds: Excessive exposure may cause central nervous system effects, nausea, vomiting, anesthetic or narcotic effects. It advises, Do not get in eyes, on skin, on clothing, and Wear suitable protective clothing. For Corexit 9500 the manual advised, Do not get in eyes, on skin, on clothing, Avoid breathing vapor, and Wear suitable protective clothing. According to FOIA requests obtained by GAP, neither the protective gear nor the manual were distributed to Gulf oil spill cleanup workers. On April 4, 2016, the court approved a settlement with BP for natural resource injuries stemming from the spill. The second had been intended to serve as a backup and was not completed. Connect With ASM. Directive of Rarely", "In Standoff With Environmental Officials, BP Stays With an Oil Spill Dispersant", "Statement by EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson from Press Conference on Dispersant Use in the Gulf of Mexico with U.S. Coast Guard Rear Admiral Landry", "Dispersants flow into Gulf in 'science experiment', "BP oil spill: Obama administration's scientists admit alarm over chemicals", "Gulf oil spill: Effects of dispersants remain a mystery", "22-mile-long oily plume mapped near BP site Disaster in the Gulf", "Chemical Dispersant Made BP Oilspill 52 Times More Toxic", "Dispersant makes oil from spills 52 times more toxic", "Burning off oil from BP spill in Gulf posed little health risk, feds say in new report (video)", "Giant oil skimmer 'A Whale' deemed a bust for Gulf of Mexico spill", BP oil spill: Kevin Costner's oil-water separation machines help with clean-up, "Advances in Oil Spill Cleanup Lag Since Valdez", "BP 'Excited' Over Kevin Costner's Oil Cleanup Machine, Purchases 32", "Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill Response: Current Operations as of June 28", "An Audacious Decision in Crisis Gets Cautious Praise", "Dynamic autoinoculation and the microbial ecology of a deep water hydrocarbon irruption", Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, "Bacteria in the gulf mostly digested gas, not oil, study finds", "How Microbes Helped Clean BP's Oil Spill", Oil-eating microbes may not be all they're cracked up to be | The Upshot Yahoo! "But tens of thousands of gulf residents still haven't been fully compensated for their losses, and many are struggling to make ends meet. Based on 16S rRNA gene community analysis, the most prominent group of hydrocarbon degraders detected at contaminated sites were from the genus Pseudomonas [9]. Washington, D.C.: U.S. Environmental Protection . Who owned the rig responsible for the Deepwater Horizon oil spill? BP originally estimated as part of a Federal Court supervised program offsite link, that those private claims would total about $7.8 billion. Brown pelicans and laughing gulls were among the species most affected. Two methods of bioremediation were used: bioaugmentation and biostimulation [11]. [77] The collected gas was flared and oil stored on board the drillship Discoverer Enterprise. On December 15, 2010, the United States filed a complaint in District Court against BP Exploration & Production and several other defendants alleged to be responsible for the spill. BP set up its own private claims program unilaterally in 2010. Since then, the Trustee Council has approved five early restoration plans, encompassing 65 projects at an estimated cost of $866 million. So began an 87-day oil spill that spewed 3.19 million barrels, or nearly 134 million gallons, into the Gulf of Mexico. The fines from the criminal cases administered by the National Academies of Science offsite link and the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation offsite link are used for two programs: After the spill, state and federal agencies undertook an intense scientific study of the impacts of the spill.
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