The Obama administration’s response to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill five years ago will be more regulation.
Brian Salerno, the director of the Department of Interior’s lead safety and environment bureau, outlined a broad regulatory agenda as the agency’s principal response tool at a House Natural Resources Committee hearing Wednesday.
The agency has been criticized by environmentalists and lawmakers alike for slow walking new regulations in response to the Deepwater Horizon disaster. A regulation issued by the agency just seven days ahead of the April 20 anniversary took five years to develop.
The latest regulation proposes a number of strict safety measures for blow-out preventers, the device that was at the center of the disastrous explosion and spill that killed 11 workers in 2010. In addition, the agency proposed a production and safety systems rule nearly two years ago, which Salerno said the agency is “currently working to finalize soon.”
“The production safety rule is taking a little longer than hoped,” Salerno said, adding the agency is seeking to finish the rule, which will address new technology to enhance safety, this summer. The rules will be the first significant revision of safety standards for protecting personnel on offshore oil rigs since 1988.
The agency also recently proposed first-of-a-kind regulations for drilling in the Arctic, which it just extended the comment period for industry to review and respond to the rule. The oil industry said it needed additional time to understand the regulations.
Other regulations are planned, he noted. Salerno said the agency plans to begin soliciting comment on ways to improve the safety bureau’s “cornerstone” regulatory framework, called the Safety and Environmental Management Systems, or SEMS. The bureau will seek to improve the safety regulations that encourage the industry to go beyond baseline compliance to do more to improve safety and environmental management.
It also is looking at regulations for aviation safety related to drilling. It published an advanced notice of its intention to do these regulations in 2014. The agency also plans “to publish a proposed rule that will incorporate updated industry safety standards for cranes on fixed platforms.”
Meanwhile, the Department of Interior’s Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, in coordination with Salerno’s safety and environment bureau, “has taken action to better ensure responsible parties are held accountable for … pollution incidents in the future.” The limit on liability coverage for oil-spill damages would be raised from $75 to $134 million for offshore oil and gas facilities, which he said is the maximum under the law.
Industry officials told the committee they will be evaluating the rules’ cost effectiveness, as well as the benefits to safety.
