By Agency Reporter

Wednesday, 10 Nov 2010

NEW YORK: BP Plc remains at risk for billions of dollars in fines and legal costs even after a United States commission said safety was not sacrificed for profit in the weeks and days leading up to the worst US offshore oil spill, Bloomberg said on Tuesday.

The presidential panel said on Monday it found no evidence so far that BP, operator of the Gulf of Mexico well that erupted in April and spewed 4.9 million barrels of crude, intentionally jeopardised safety to cut costs.

The catastrophe stemmed from ”several very human decisions made by competent persons who missed signals,” said, co-chairman of the National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill, Mr. William Reilly.

The panel‘s finding contradicted allegations by environmental groups, lawmakers and a joint US Coast Guard- Interior Department board that BP cut corners to rein in costs and pressured employees to accelerate work on the Macondo project in the Gulf.

The London-based energy producer still may be held liable in civil and criminal courts, said a University of Michigan law professor and the US Justice Department‘s former head of environmental enforcement, David Uhlmann, who has followed the case.

”BP has a broader corporate culture that does put profits ahead of safety, and that message permeates throughout the company and down through the rank and file,” Uhlmann said in a telephone interview. ”BP will still have to pay tens of billions of dollars in natural resources damages and compensation to victims for economic losses.”

A spokesman for BP, Scott Dean, did not immediately return messages left after regular business hours on his office and mobile phones. The company does not believe it will be found grossly negligent or will be found the sole responsible party, BP Chairman, Carl-Henric Svanberg, said in a July interview.

BP‘s Macondo well, about 40 miles (64 kilometers) off the coast of Lousiana, was almost $60m over budget when it exploded April 20. The blowout occurred just hours before workers aboard Transocean Limited‘s Deepwater Horizon vessel were scheduled to complete the well and sail away to a new project. Eleven workers died.

”We have not seen a single instance where a human being made a conscious decision to favour dollars to safety,” chief counsel of the presidential panel, Fred Bartlit said on Monday.

The commission may have stepped outside the bounds of its mission in attempting to assess whether cost controls played a role, said Gregory Evans, a Los Angeles attorney who represents corporations in pollution cases.

An analysis of BP‘s spending priorities would require examining budgets and other financial details the commission wasn‘t provided as part of its mission to examine the root causes of the catastrophe, Evans said in a telephone interview.

”It‘s a bit of a stretch for the commission to make statements regarding the company‘s spending priorities as it relates to safety,” he said.

The Justice Department is conducting its own investigation to determine whether criminal charges are warranted against any of the companies or individuals involved in the well. Congressional committees also are conducting probes.

 

Source: Punch