US offshore safety

April 16, 2019
The US Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement and industry are revising the way each does its work in the Gulf of Mexico, BSEE Director Scott Angelle said during a March visit to Louisiana where he met with BSEE regional staff and others.

Paula Dittrick

Upstream Technology Editor

The US Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement and industry are revising the way each does its work in the Gulf of Mexico, BSEE Director Scott Angelle said during a March visit to Louisiana where he met with BSEE regional staff and others.

“The Gulf of Mexico is changing,” Angelle said. “We are seeing bigger, fewer, deeper, and more-complex platforms replacing shallow-water facilities.” He said the average depth for new gulf platforms now is 1,083 ft of water compared with 225 ft of water a decade ago.

During the last 20 years, the number of gulf deepwater wells increased 73% while oil production from deep water jumped by 198%, he said.

“BSEE’s portfolio is offshore safety, providing leadership in environmental stewardship, and making sure we are doing what we can to help America achieve energy security,” Angelle told the Louisiana Midcontinent Oil & Gas Association.

BSEE history

On Apr. 20, 2010, a blowout at BP PLC’s Macondo well off Louisiana caused an explosion on the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig that killed 11 oil workers and caused a spill of more than 4 million bbl. In addition to changing its administrative structure, US regulators altered their approach to offshore safety.

BSEE was created after numerous post-Macondo reports concluded the US Minerals Management Service had a conflict of interest by being the single agency in charge of offshore leasing, safety regulation, and revenue collection.

Consequently, the former MMS was divided into the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and the BSEE. The transition also involved much discussion about the pros and cons of performance-based regulation compared with prescriptive-based regulation.

“BSEE increased overall inspections, spent more time physically inspecting equipment, implemented more safety and environmental initiatives, and expanded its focus beyond prescriptive regulatory compliance to include managing and mitigating risk,” Angelle said.

Performance-based regulation focuses on desired, measurable outcomes while prescriptive regulation provides specific direction regarding how those outcomes are to be achieved.

“We are not looking at an either-or approach. We can have robust production and it will be safe and responsibly produced,” he said.

Angelle briefly served as Louisiana’s lieutenant governor under Gov. Bobby Jindal during 2010 while then-US President Barack Obama imposed an offshore drilling moratorium following the BP Macondo spill. Angelle also formerly oversaw Louisiana’s Department of Natural Resources.

Two different gulfs

“I see two different Gulfs of Mexico,” Angelle said. One involves deepwater activities where BSEE received an increased number of deepwater drilling permit applications last year.

The other involves the mature shallow-water area. Shallow-water operators are decommissioning more platforms.

“There is a push to remove infrastructure” no longer in use and that has no future use, Angelle said, citing industry’s liability concerns after Hurricanes Rita and Katrina damaged numerous platforms.

As of late March, BSEE had approved plans to remove 33 gulf platforms this year. BSEE statistics show industry installed 46 platforms in the last 5 years while removing 862 platforms.

During sessions with BSEE staff, Angelle discussed the agency’s internal Change Management Initiatives, set up to improve the agency’s own performance in how it ensures compliance with offshore safety and environmental standards.

“We are using metrics and data to drive offshore operators’ performance, and we are using it to drive our own,” Angelle told BSEE staff. “It is vital that we work together to build a safer and stronger offshore energy industry.”