The BP Well Blowout - My Perspective

This is an accident of historical proportions from many different perspectives.  A human disaster with the substantial loss of life and property.  An ecological disaster that will require years and decades to be restored  - naturally and with our assistance.  As a regulatory and environmental professional for decades, much of it in the oil and gas exploration and production business including the offshore, these types of accidents are a worst case, full blown nightmare (pun intended).  From reservoir engineers, to financial accountants, to rig workers, to the local communities, they all work very hard to make sure events like this do not occur.  The reasons of how-why this event occurred might be determined and confirmed.  More likely not though.  In simplest terms, a well kick was not successfully managed and resulted in a blowout.  A very spectacular blowout.  I worked on the Lodgepole blowout of 1982 and the ferocity of that beast on land is still staggering to me almost 30 years later.  You can't imagine the "energy" and "power" unleashed as you stare at a 200 foot Bic lighter flame exiting the ground.  The noise.  The heat.  The spray.  


Speculation is dangerous without facts, and the facts are going to be hard to come by.  The single most important fact is that there are probabilities and percentages for everything.  There is no such thing as no risk - anywhere.  There are events that we contemplate and then there are those that we very possibly may NOT have contemplated.  Our lives are made up of managing the risks associated with both situations.

The point is, everything we do in our lives is a risk based decision.  Everything.  Every action is made with some mental process, conscious or subconscious, of identifying the hazards, and taking action to minimize the risk of that hazard occurring.  Each choice and subsequent action has a consequence (positive, negative, neutral), the probability or likelihood of which we have likely tried to identify, measure, and mitigate for, to an extent considered appropriate for the circumstances.  So this becomes the discussion.  What are the circumstances, what is the hazard, and what are the consequences?

Having been in these exact discussions numerous times, I believe I can say with reasonable certainty that BP and its offshore team went through the process of assessing a well blowout as part of their risk management discussions.  And the mitigation put in place was deemed reasonable - by ALL parties.  This does NOT mean that there was NO risk.  Risk is in our lives each and every day, everywhere we go, in everything we do.  It is part of our responsibility to manage our individual risks to stay alive and thrive.  Each party involved in the process to drill this well, the proponent, the government agencies, and the general public involved in commenting on regulatory submissions - all hold a level of responsibility and accountability for this accident.

And what about that perspective of the circumstances?  There have been over 30,000 wells drilled in the Gulf.  The combination of a multiple series of expected and unexpected shortcomings led to this particular event.  Certainly in my view, and by many measures, this an outlier event, more than 2 S.D. from the norm so to speak.  Yes it is a catastrophe.  But if anyone wishes to blame anyone, they need to look long and hard at their own life as well as the obvious culprits.  In all likelihood they too are contributing in some direct or indirect manner.

Another perspective - taken from the 2003 National Academy of Sciences publication, Oil in the Sea III:  Inputs, Fates, and Effects:

• Chronic release from natural and anthropogenic sources (e.g., natural seeps and run-off from land-based sources) are responsible for the majority of petroleum hydrocarbon input to both North American waters and the world’s oceans (Table 3.2 below).
• Spillage from vessels in U.S. waters during the 1990s declined significantly as compared to the prior decade, and now represents less than 2 percent of the petroleum discharges into U.S. waters.
• Only 1 percent of the oil discharges in North American waters is related to the extraction of petroleum.
• Older two-stroke engines utilized in a significant number of recreational marine vessels have high operational discharges due to inherent design inefficiencies, and are responsible for about 2 percent of the petroleum hydrocarbons introduced into North American waters each year.

TABLE 3-2 Average, Annual Releases (1990-1999) of Petroleum by Source (in thousands of tonnes)

	North America				Worldwide
	Best Est.	Regionsa	Min.	Max.	Best Est.	Min.	Max.
Natural Seeps	160	160	80	240	600	200	2000
Extraction of Petroleum	3.0	3.0	2.3	4.3	38	20	62
Platforms	0.16	0.15	0.15	0.18	0.86	0.29	1.4
Atmospheric deposition	0.12	0.12	0.07	0.45	1.3	0.38	2.6
Produced waters	2.7	2.7	2.1	3.7	36	19	58
Transportation of Petroleum	9.1	7.4	7.4	11	150	120	260
Pipeline spills	1.9	1.7	1.7	2.1	12	6.1	37
Tank vessel spills	5.3	4.0	4.0	6.4	100	93	130
Operational discharges (cargo washings)	nab	na	na	na	36	18	72
Coastal Facility Spills	1.9	1.7	1.7	2.2	4.9	2.4	15
Atmospheric deposition	0.01	0.01	tracec	0.02	0.4	0.2	1
Consumption of Petroleum	84	83	19	2000	480	130	6000
Land-based (river and runoff)	54	54	2.6	1900	140	6.8	5000
Recreational marine vessel	5.6	5.6	2.2	9	ndd	nd	nd
Spills (non-tank vessels)	1.2	0.91	1.1	1.4	7.1	6.5	8.8
Operational discharges (vessels ≥100 GT)	0.10	0.10	0.03	0.30	270	90	810
Operational discharges (vessels<100 GT)	0.12	0.12	0.03	0.30	nde	nd	nd
Atmospheric deposition	21	21	9.1	81	52	23	200
Jettisoned aircraft fuel	1.5	1.5	1.0	4.4	7.5	5.0	22
Total	260	250	110	2300	1300	470	8300
a“Regions” refers to 17 zones or regions of North American waters for which estimates were prepared. bCargo washing is not allowed in U.S. waters, but is not restricted in international waters. Thus, it was assumed that this practice does not occur frequently in U.S. waters (see Chapter 3 and Appendix E). cEstimated loads of less than 10 tonnes per year reported as “trace” dWorld-wide populations of recreational vessels were not available (see Chapter 3 and Appendix F). eInsufficient data were available to develop estimates for this class of vessels (see Chapter 3 and Appendix E). NOTES: 1.Totals may not equal sum of components due to independent rounding. 2. Generally assumes an average specific volume of oil at 294 gallons per tonne (7 barrels per tonne). Where the specific commodity is known, the following values are applied when converting from volume to weight: Gasoline: 333 gallons per tonne Light Distillate: 285 gallons per tonne Heavy Distillate: 256 gallons per tonne Crude Oil: 272 gallons per tonne 3. Numbers reported to no more than 2 significant figures using rules:http://web.mit.edu/10.001/Web/Course_Notes/Statistics_Notes/Significant_Figures.html#SignificantFigures

In my view, there is no question that BP will and should be responsible for the cleanup.  That is the risk they took on by proceeding to execute the plan to drill this well.  They knew that a blowout was possible because it is with almost any well anywhere. 

"There will be well control problems and wild wells as long as there are drilling operations anywhere in the world" Blowout and Well Control Handbook (R. D. Grace 2003)

But the decision process to drill this well included many players.  The Regulators can certainly accept some responsibility.  They reviewed and assessed the plan as submitted by BP, and gave their final approval.  They also took on this risk.  It is their responsibility to measure the adequacy of the mitigation for a catastrophic well kick and blowout.  And really, the globe can accept responsibility for continuing to grow its oil thirst.  There is no one that completely escapes culpability in any of these sorts of accidents.

Consider the circumstance when a catastrophic event is an "accident" of "nature".  One simple example is of the completely unanticipated and highly toxic release of gas when a lake in Africa "turned-over" releasing the deep accumulated CO2 and asphyxiating people and livestock alike.  This is technically referred to as "limnic eruption".  In the operations of open pit mines, and creation of endpit lakes, this is an aspect that remains a risk, highly improbable, but potentially deadly if/when they occur and therefore included in the planning, permitting and monitoring process.  That does not mean that the risk is entirely voided by those efforts.

Like the commercial of the financial analysts standing on the beach reciting the probabilities of events, and they both pause as a dinosaur walks up onto the beach.  The probability of that event just became 100, for that moment.  As is with the Gulf accident.  The likelihood of that specific event occurring is now 100.  The offshore industry has had a commendable safety record across the globe for decades.  And in the case of this specific rig, seven accident free years of operation in the Gulf.  The contribution that offshore exploration and production makes to the total volumes of oil that the oceans and water of North America receive is less than 1% - twice that proportion attributed to the use of 2cycle outboard motors for recreational purposes.  Substantially more oil seeps out of the earth naturally into our waters and oceans each and every year albeit not as a single point source.  I do not intend to gloss over the horrific nature of the damage that this event will cause.  I do intend to provide some insight into perspective.  So while this accident is a very strong reminder of the risks associated with oil and gas exploration and production, and provide substantive opportunity to learn and do better, and drive substantial change in how this business is done, it is important to also keep perspective.

"True Nobility is being superior to thy former self"  Old Hindu Proverb