90L heads for North Carolina, drenches Bermuda; oil spill changing little
An extratropical low pressure system (90L) between the Bahamas and Bermuda is moving north-northwest towards North Carolina and is close to tropical storm strength. Last night's ASCAT pass saw a large area of 35 mph winds to the north and east of the center, and buoy 41048 to northeast of 90L's center was seeing sustained ENE winds of 36 mph, gusting to 43 mph this morning. Bermuda is seeing some heavy weather from this storm, with winds blowing at 35 mph on the west end of the island, and the Bermuda radar showing an area of moderate to heavy rain moving over the island. Seas are running 5 - 10 feet in the outer waters of Bermuda today, and are expected to increase to 10 - 14 feet tonight before diminishing on Tuesday.
Figure 1. Visible satellite image of 90L this morning.
Strong upper-levels winds out of the west are creating about 25 knots of wind shear over 90L, but the shear has been gradually decreasing over the past day. Visible satellite loops show that 90L does not have a well-defined surface circulation. The main thunderstorm activity is in a large curved band to the north and northeast of the center. This band is several hundred miles removed from the center, which is characteristic of subtropical storms. I expect that 90L will continue to grow more subtropical in nature today through Wednesday as the shear continues to fall. Sea surface temperatures are near 25°C today and will fall to 23 - 24°C on Tuesday. This is warm enough to support a subtropical storm, but probably not a tropical storm. On Wednesday, 90L will be nearing the warm waters of the Gulf Stream, and SSTs will warm again, to the 24 - 25°C range. This is still pretty cool for a tropical storm, and I expect 90L will never become fully tropical. To understand the difference between a tropical and subtropical storm and why we care, see my subtropical storm tutorial.
The SHIPS model predicts that shear will fall to the medium 10 - 20 knot range by Tuesday. A large amount of dry air to 90L's southwest associated with the upper-level trough of low pressure on top of the storm, as seen on water vapor satellite loops , will hamper transition of 90L to a subtropical or tropical storm. The system will move slowly towards the Southeast U.S. coast over the next two days, making its closest approach to the coast on Wednesday, when most of the models indicate the center will be 200 - 400 miles southeast of Cape Hatteras, North Carolina. All of the major models currently predict that 90L will not make landfall, but will move slowly eastward out to sea on Thursday, when a trough of low pressure moving across the Eastern U.S. picks up the storm. There presently isn't much to be concerned with about this storm, as it appears that it will remain offshore and will become, at worst, a 40 - 50 mph subtropical storm. The National Hurricane Center (NHC) is giving 90L a medium (30% chance) of developing into a depression or tropical/subtropical storm. Wunderbloggers Weather456 and StormW have more on 90L.
Western Caribbean disturbance
A small region of disturbed weather has developed in the Western Caribbean, off the east coast of Nicaragua. Moisture is expected to increase across in this area in the coming days, and by Saturday, the GFS and NOGAPS models predict that shear will drop low enough to permit the possible development of a strong tropical disturbance or tropical depression. This storm would then move northeastward over eastern Cuba early next week. The other models keep the shear high in the Caribbean all week, and do not show anything developing. Thus, the Western Caribbean bears watching later this week, but the conditions appear marginal for development.
Moderate risk of severe weather today in northern Plains
The Storm Prediction Center has placed western Nebraska and portions of South and North Dakota under their "Moderate" risk for severe weather today. They warn that "a couple of strong and possibly long-track tornadoes appear possible given the forecast scenario." Keep an eye on the activity today with our Severe Weather Page.
Major oil threat continues for the coast of Louisiana
Light winds are expected to prevail across the northern Gulf of Mexico all week, resulting in continued oiling threats to the Louisiana shoreline from the mouth of the Mississippi River westward 150 miles, according to the latest trajectory forecasts from NOAA. There is no longer a flow of oil moving southwards towards the Loop Current, and the oil that did move southwards last week was mostly entrained into a counter-clockwise rotating eddy attached to the northern boundary of the Loop Current. Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) imagery over the weekend showed that most of this oil has dispersed, and very little of this oil is now visible from space (Figure 2.) Imagery from NASA's MODIS instrument and from NOAA aircraft did not show any oil in the Loop Current headed towards the Florida Keys over the weekend, so that is good news. NOAA comments that there may be some "scattered tar balls" in the Loop Current headed towards the Florida Keys. I expect these scattered tar balls have completed the full loop of the Loop Current and are now headed east towards the Keys, and will pass the Dry Tortugas and Key West sometime Wednesday - Saturday. My guess is that the oil and its accompanying plume of toxic dispersants will be too thin and scattered to cause significant problems in the Keys.
Figure 2. Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) image of the oil spill taken at 11:41am EDT Saturday May 22, 2010, by the European Envisat-1 satellite. Only scattered patches of oil are evident in the counter-clockwise rotating eddy on the northern boundary of the Loop Current. A small amount of oil appears to be in the Loop Current, and is moving southward. Image credit: Center for Southeastern Tropical Advanced Remote Sensing, University of Miami Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science. SAR images have a resolution of 8 - 50 meters, and can be taken through clouds and precipitation.
Future threats to the Keys
Mostly offshore winds are expected this week over the northern Gulf of Mexico, thanks to the approach of the 90L storm along the Southeast U.S. coast. It is uncertain if these winds will be strong enough to push oil southward into the Loop Current, though at least one ocean trajectory model does show this occurring. As I discussed in my post Wednesday, the Loop Current is very unstable right now, and is ready to cut off into a giant clockwise-rotating eddy, an event that occurs every 6 - 11 months. At least one ocean model (the Global HYCOM model from the HYCOM consortium) is predicting that such an eddy will form this week. In the event a Loop Current Eddy does break off, it would create a rotating ring of water 250 miles in diameter to the south of the oil spill. Oil moving southwards would tend to enter the giant eddy and circulate around it, not threatening any land areas. Roffer's Ocean Fishing Forecast Service has a nice discussion on the possibility of the Loop Current cutting off into a Loop Current Eddy. Keep in mind, though, that during the first month that a Loop Current Eddy forms, it exchanges a considerable amount of water with the Loop Current. Thus we can expect that a portion of any oil moving southwards into a Loop Current Eddy will find its way into the Loop Current and move past the Florida Keys.
Oil spill resources
My post Wednesday with answers to some of the common questions I get about the spill
My post on the Southwest Florida "Forbidden Zone" where surface oil will rarely go
My post on what oil might do to a hurricane
NOAA trajectory forecasts
Deepwater Horizon Unified Command web site
Oil Spill Academic Task Force
University of South Florida Ocean Circulation Group oil spill forecasts
ROFFS Deepwater Horizon page
Surface current forecasts from NOAA's HYCOM model
Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) imagery from the University of Miami
I'll be back with a new post Tuesday morning.
Jeff Masters
Reader Comments
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The ExxonValdiz wreck spilled ~11million gallons. At 5,000barrels/210,000gallons per day, the DeepwaterHorizon spill will reach that level by June11th.
In 2005, TropicalStorm Arlene reached near-hurricane strength in the Gulf of Mexico on June10th. And passed near what is now the DeepHorizon spill area before making landfall at the extreme western end of the Florida panhandle on June11th.
Comparisons with the day before TropicalStorm Arlene began spinning on 8June2005
23May2010
7Jun2005
23May2010
7Jun2005
23May2010
AOI
AOI
AOI
AOI
Humor in Comments
Good news!
2245. TampaSpin 2:56 PM GMT on May 24, 2010
At this bouy there has been a 5mb fall in pressure the last 24hours.....
Conditions at 41048 as of
(9:50 am EDT)
1350 GMT on 05/24/2010
Currently:
Atmospheric Pressure (PRES): 1014.7 mb
05 23 9:50am 1019.7 mb
by Greg Bluestein and Matthew Brown / The Associated Press
wwltv.com
Posted on May 24, 2010 at 6:38 AM
BARATARIA BAY, La. -- The Gulf of Mexico oil spill seeped miles deeper into Louisiana's fragile marshes, making it tougher to clean up or to rescue wildlife like the brown pelican, as the federal government questioned whether BP will be able plug its blown-out well on the seabed.
With frustration mounting at the global oil giant and at the government, the Obama administration pressured BP PLC to fix the gusher finally after several failed ventures in the weeks since an April 20 oil rig explosion.
Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar said Sunday he was "not completely" confident that BP knows what it's doing.
"If we find they're not doing what they're supposed to be doing, we'll push them out of the way appropriately," Salazar said.
The White House said the Justice Department has been gathering information about the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
Press secretary Robert Gibbs didn't say whether the department has opened a criminal investigation. He would only tell CBS' "Face the Nation" on Sunday that department representatives have been to the Gulf as part of the response to the BP oil leak.
Salazar and Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano were to lead a Senate delegation to the region Monday to fly over affected areas.
BP is getting barges and other equipment ready to prepare for a risky procedure midweek that the company hopes will finally halt the gusher.
But the "top kill" maneuver, which shoots heavy mud and then cement into the blown well, has never been tried at 5,000 feet underwater and BP officials caution they are working on a range of backup plans.
Even if it works, the damage has been done.
On Sunday, some brown pelicans coated in oil couldn't fly away on Barataria Bay of the Louisiana coast. All they could do was hobble. Their usually brown and white feathers were jet black, and eggs were glazed with rust-colored gunk.
When wildlife officials tried to rescue one of the pelicans, the birds became spooked. Officials weren't sure whether they would try again, and U.S. Fish and Wildlife spokeswoman Stacy Shelton said it is sometimes better to leave the animals alone than to disturb their colony.
Pelicans are especially vulnerable to oil because they dive through the water's surface to feed. They could eat tainted fish and feed it to their young, and they could die of hypothermia or drown if their feathers become soaked in oil. Just six months ago, the birds had been removed from the federal endangered species list.
With oil pushing at least 12 miles into Louisiana's marshes and two major pelican rookeries now coated in crude, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal said the state has begun work on a chain of berms, reinforced with containment booms, that would skirt the state's coastline.
"As we talk, a total of more than 65 miles of our shoreline now has been oiled," Jindal said.
Jindal, who visited one of the affected pelican nesting grounds Sunday, said the berms would close the door on oil still pouring from a mile-deep gusher about 50 miles out in the Gulf. The berms would be made with sandbags; the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is considering a broader plan that would use dredging to build sand berms across more of the barrier islands.
At least 6 million gallons of crude have spewed into the Gulf, though some scientists have said they believe the spill already surpasses the 11 million-gallon 1989 Exxon Valdez oil spill off Alaska as the worst in U.S. history.
A mile-long tube operating for about a week has siphoned off more than half a million gallons in the past week, but it began sucking up oil at a slower rate over the weekend. Even at its best, the effort did not capture all the oil leaking.
The spill's impact now stretches across 150 miles, from Dauphin Island, Ala. to Grand Isle, La.
At Barataria Bay, globs of oil soaked through containment booms set up in the area. Plaquemines Parish President Billy Nungesser said BP needed to send more booms. He said it would be up to federal wildlife authorities to decide whether to try to clean the oil that has already washed ashore.
"The question is, will it do more damage because this island is covered with the mess?" Nungesser said.
Officials have considered some drastic solutions for cleaning the oil -- like burning or flooding the marshes -- but they may have to sit back and let nature take care of it.
Plants and pelican eggs could wind up trampled by well-meaning humans. If the marshes are too dry, setting them ablaze could burn plants to the roots and obliterate the wetlands.
Flooding might help by floating out the oil, but it also could wash away the natural barriers to flooding from hurricanes and other disasters -- much like hurricanes Katrina and Rita washed away marshlands in 2005. State and federal officials spent millions rebuilding the much-needed buffer against tropical storms.
On Sunday, oil reached an 1,150-acre oyster ground leased by Belle Chasse, La., fisherman Dave Cvitanovich. He said cleanup crews were stringing lines of absorbent boom along the surrounding marshes, but that still left large clumps of rust-colored oil floating over his oyster beds. Mature oysters might eventually filter out the crude and become fit for sale, but this year's crop of spate, or young oysters, will perish.
"Those will die in the oil," Cvitanovich said. "It's inevitable."
------
Greg Bluestein reported from Covington, La. Associated Press writers Mary Foster in Barataria Bay, Matthew Daly in Washington, Kevin McGill in New Orleans and Associated Press photographer Gerald Herbert in Louisiana contributed to this report.
------
Online: http://globalwarming.house.gov/spillcam
(Copyright 2010 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
2km Storm Relative IR Imagery with BD Enhancement Curve
Excellent source of information :)
Link
Me thinks 90l get a name, but has never makes it to US and it will be sub-tropical thanks to lowish sst when it sets up. Some decent swells, yes, but that is about it. When the shear relaxes in the West Carib, this will be our next chance.
Anyone see any waves off of Africa of significance yet? Or, is the convergence zone still to far South?
I wouldnt say the window is closing, we all expected that this system would have until Wednesday to become sub-tropical and wouldnt do so until the earliest Monday night or Tuesday. Id say the window is right on schedule
Reality check... just read your post and went.. darn... it is almost June. I am lost as per normal.
BDAwx
I find it interesting to see that while the Caribbean, Tropical Atlantic, Gulf of Mexico and south-eastern US have below average pressures, that the southeastern US is excluded from the above average precipitation, except for the southern tip of Florida.
I would think that with lower pressures you would see more precipitation either with low pressure systems causing this lower pressure, or it being a weakness in a typical high pressure system directing storm systems, or just Gulf of Mexico moisture that way...
I don't know the specifics in 2005 but I do know TX/LA was dry as a bone until September 24 and Rita. From what I've learned so far maybe there is no above average for precip because there's a ridge over the SE? And no rain comes unless from a storm. Just my opinion. My brain doesn't want to work this early in the day. Think I'll go eat breakfast. :)
Thanks for the update and links.
Has anyone tried culturing the efficient oil eating bacteria for spraying on the slick? With warm water and plenty of food, couldn't they expand to meet the size of the problem then die and take the oil with them in a less toxic form?
It might be easier on the thin warm GOM oil as compared to the frozen clumped oil up in Alaska from Exxon.
Hope the Invest curves out to sea before the long holiday weekend.
OIL SPILL VIDEO
This is truly sickening to watch! Hope this helps for those that keep asking.
Live video link from the ROV monitoring the damaged riser
Wednesday is when it will be near the Gulf Stream
Morning 456.. I see more then just the weather is picking up in the Caribbean.... did you read the news about Jamaica?
To contact BP with TECH/SUGGESTIONS (281) 366-5511
I know it is bad...keep in mind Oil is a Natural resource from Mother Earth and things will come back naturally in time....but the Toxic crap that BP was allowed to place upon this spill, we have no idea of the short and long term affects......THAT IS REALLY SAD!
Statistical/Simple Models (CLIPER,BAMs,LBAR,other Statistical Models)
Dynamic Models (More sophisticated models)
Actually I was just discussing it. I know gangs and they will support their members at any cost and its no surprise it happened in Jamaica. It was avoidable though.
I just hope they fix it before it reaches the point of FUBAR :(
This is not oil, it is an oil in water emulsion which (I guess) is about 70 % water.
Starting to run out of vacation spots... between events like that...and the oil spill...and what looks like a very active season approaching... I might have to change the vacation plans to something like Victoria :(
Just wait until a high pressure heat dome stays over the GOM for a week or 2 this summer.
I don't smell it here...inland Florida panhandle. I'm sorry for what everyone is going through over this disaster.
Yeah...it pisses me off.
That's pathetic. Killing innocent people.
oil spill gulf of mexico 2010
Added by Matthew Hinton, The Times-Picayune on May 23, 2010 at 6:48 PM
MATTHEW HINTON / THE TIMES-PICAYUNE A nesting pelican in Barataria Bay near Cat Island is covered in brown oil from the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill in the Gulf of Mexico Sunday May 23 2010.
pelican eggs
Added by Bob Marshall, The Times-Picayune on May 23, 2010 at 6:53 PM
BOB MARSHALL/THE TIMES-PICAYUNE Oil from the BP blowout in the Gulf of Mexico seeps into a brown pelican nesting area in Barataria Bay. Thousands of pelicans, along with some terns, roseate spoonbills and herons, are nesting on a series of small mangrove and grass islands on the eastern side of the bay. Oil absorbing booms were placed around the rookeries sometime after Wednesday, but oil still managed to soak about the first six inches of the shorelines and seep into the nesting areas through gaps in the booms. May 23, 2010.
Only parts of Jamaica are like that. The tourist resorts and recreational spots are secluded away from the capital.
Also you can always come to Saint Kitts :)
Bro, i don't know that i have not already passed FUBAR. Dang i love my waters in the GOM for all the fun i do.....this truly is making me sick to my tummy each passing second as this soga continues with what seems BP and our Government seems its no really big deal not just my opinion but, to many.....I don't have any idea what the poeple of New Orleans felt with there ordeal but, this is approaching the pocket book to many that depend on the GOM as a source of many the same harm on the pocket book.
Is it just my eyesight, or has the flow rate increased?
Nothing against the many good one's in Jamaica, but...I wouldn't go there. I'll stay here at my house.
by Mitch Weiss and Jeff Donn / Associated Press
wwltv.com
Posted on May 23, 2010 at 11:00 PM
Updated today at 6:31 PM
The tricky process of sealing an offshore oil well with cement -- suspected as a major contributor to the Gulf of Mexico disaster -- has failed dozens of times in the past, according to an Associated Press investigation.
Yet federal regulators give drillers a free hand in this crucial safety step -- another example of lax regulation regarding events leading up to the April 20 explosion on the Deepwater Horizon oil rig.
Federal regulators don't regulate what type of cement is used, leaving it up to oil and gas companies. The drillers are urged to simply follow guidelines of the American Petroleum Institute, an industry trade group.
Far more stringent federal and state standards and controls exist on cement work for roads, bridges and buildings.
While the chain of failures on Deepwater Horizon is under investigation, rig owner Transocean has singled out cement work as one likely fundamental cause of the blowout.
Even before Transocean pointed to cementing, independent experts suspected it partly because faulty cement work -- either badly mixed or poorly placed against well walls -- is so prevalent at offshore wells.
An AP review of federal accident and incident reports on offshore wells shows that the cementing process has been implicated at least 34 times since 1978. Many of the reports, available from the U.S. Minerals Management Service that regulates offshore wells, identify the cause simply as "poor cement job."
-- In a November 2005 accident where the Deepwater Horizon was positioned above another well in the Gulf, faulty cement work allowed wall-supporting steel casing to come apart. Almost 15,000 gallons of drilling fluid spilled into the Gulf.
-- Just a week later in a nearby well at another platform, cement improperly seeped through drilling fluid. As a result of an additive meant to quicken setting time, the cement then failed to block a gas influx into the well. When the crew finally replaced heavy drilling fluid with lighter seawater, as they also did last month before the blowout at Deepwater Horizon, the well flowed out of control and much of the crew had to be evacuated.
-- Cementing was identified by federal investigators as a glaring cause of an August 2007 blowout, also off Louisiana. They said, "The cement quality is very poor, showing what looks like large areas of no cement."
Reports by MMS, a branch of the Interior Department, also provide evidence of the role bad cement work has played in accidents. One study named cementing as a factor in 18 of 39 well blowouts at Gulf rigs from 1992 to 2006. Another attributed five of nine out-of-control wells in the year 2000 to cementing problems.
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Cementing in the oil rig business is a sensitive, involved process. Well cement constitutes an essential barrier that is difficult to install and control, said Gene Beck, a petroleum engineer at Texas A&M at College Station, Texas.
Deepwater wells pose special challenges: severe pressures and temperatures, as well as the need for specialized equipment and lots of cement. The wellhead of the Deepwater Horizon operation sat on the ocean floor, nearly a mile from the surface. The drill hole itself went another 13,000 feet into rock.
All cement begins as a slurry with cement flakes and water. Contractors then add ingredients to make the cement set at the right time and to keep out gas and oil.
There are three major U.S. cementing companies: Halliburton, Schlumberger and BJ Services. Cementing is typically performed by such rig contractors as part of a broad range of drilling services that they supply.
Halliburton, which had the Deepwater Horizon job, mixes in nitrogen to make its slurry more elastic. The nitrogen also helps create a lightweight cement that resembles a gray foamy mousse and bonds better to the casing.
But the recipe also depends on the job, because cement must respond to varying pressures and temperatures. Cement contractors work closely with oil and gas companies on the formulas for individual wells. The oil and gas companies have the final say on what is used.
Once the consistency of the mix is decided on, it is pumped deep into the well, where it first sinks to the bottom and then oozes upward to fill the narrow spaces between the steel casing pipe and rock walls. When the cement sets, the casing and cement are supposed to form an impenetrable wall to keep gas or oil from pushing into the hole anywhere but the bottom, where its flow up the pipe can be controlled.
But if gas bubbles invade the setting cement, they can form a channel for pressurized gas and oil to surge uncontrollably up the well, usually around the casing. The cement must be strong enough to withstand up to 5,000 pounds of pressure per square inch, to keep the well walls from collapsing.
"Cement is cheap, and it fixes a lot of problems, but it's not a good place to cut corners," Beck said. Many oil and gas companies will scrimp, though, if they don't think they need all the ingredients in the cement, he said. Cement is often squeezed in later to try to fill gaps, but Beck said the success rate of this remedial work is low.
And if cement was part of the cause of the Deepwater Horizon catastrophe, it also could be part of the remedy. Two relief wells are being drilled to intersect the leaking well and plug it with cement.
------
Halliburton was completing the final cement work on the exploratory well beneath Deepwater Horizon in the wee hours of April 20. It added an initial cement plug to the well to act as a cap until a later production phase.
Workers started running a series of tests to check if the cement and casing could stand up to sufficient pressure. The first tests of outward, positive pressure showed no problems.
In the first sign of trouble, though, the well then failed a negative pressure test, where internal fluid pressure is reduced, according to congressional testimony from a BP PLC executive. It showed different pressures in two areas, indicating an unseen leak somewhere in the well.
Despite the test, managers eventually decided to replace drilling fluid with seawater and set a final cement plug so the well could be mothballed pending a decision to possibly begin production drilling.
And while it is not yet clear what sections of the casing or cement may have failed -- or why -- it is known that the blowout ignited and exploded before the last plug was set.
In the aftermath of the blowout, questions have been raised about the safety of nitrogen-laced cement foam. But several cementing experts told the AP it is a sound technique. Halliburton says it has used such a mix on scores of wells and told a congressional committee that the cementing on the Deepwater Horizon job was successful.
Halliburton did not respond to AP requests for comment.
In the wake of the accident, some experts support mandatory uniform cement standards for underwater wells. "When you change the composition, it should meet a certain standard. Such standards exist for the building construction industry," said Surendra Shah, Northwestern University engineering professor and director of the Center for Advanced Cement-Based Materials at Evanston, Ill.
Elmer Danenberger, a retired chief of offshore regulatory programs for MMS, told a congressional committee this month: "An industry standard should be developed to address cementing problems, how they can be prevented, and the actions that should be taken when they do occur."
Many construction projects use concrete hardened with sand and gravel aggregate, but cement is the glue that holds it together. On federal projects, "just about everything is regulated, from the thickness of the concrete, to the strength of the concrete, to the type of aggregate that's used," said Brian Turmail, spokesman for the Associated General Contractors of America.
Oil companies test the thickness and strength of cement in wells by shooting sound waves into the cement. This kind of test, called a sonic logging test, wasn't run on April 20 at Deepwater Horizon. A Halliburton manager said it's the most realistic way of testing the quality of the cement bond, but a BP manager said pressure tests are better and log tests are used only if there's already sign of a problem.
Either way, these tests are not 100 percent reliable. Sometimes, oil companies don't discover a bad cementing job until it fails.
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There can be early warning signs, though. Federal regulators have known for years that a condition called sustained casing pressure -- usually gas caught between the casing and well wall -- is a major problem that typically signals bad cement work.
In the August 2007 blowout, investigators cited tests showing high casing pressures that could have indicated suspect cement work. The platform owner reported a problem to federal regulators, but nothing was done before the blowout, the report said.
More than 8,000 of the 22,000 offshore wells on federal leases, most of them in the Gulf, show sustained pressure, according to government reports.
This month, in a move in the works long before the Deepwater Horizon explosion, regulators wrote in the Federal Register that the oil and gas industry in the Gulf has "suffered serious accidents as a result of high sustained casing pressure, and the lack of proper control and monitoring of these pressures."
New rules take effect June 3. But they take a conservative watch-and-wait approach and demand only routines already carried out around the industry: a management program with monitoring and diagnostic testing. If operators discover sustained pressure, they must notify MMS of plans to fix it.
There are no new record-keeping or reporting requirements in the new rules, which are backed by industry. In the rule-making documents, regulators -- long accused of being too cozy with the industry -- said the regulations would cost the entire industry only $5 million, compared with the "impracticable and exceedingly costly" $2 billion alternative of fixing the wells outright.
"Unfortunately, this is yet another crisis in a long line of accidents caused by cementing problems in drilling," said U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette, D-Colo., a member of the Energy Committee looking into the cause of the blowout.
MMS refused to answer specific questions about its cementing policies, including why it took so long to craft the pressure regulations and whether MMS has issued any citations for cement problems.
"All of these questions are questions that we are reviewing," said Interior Department spokeswoman Kendra Barkoff.
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The Associated Press National Investigative Team can be reached at investigate(at)ap.org
(Copyright 2010 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
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