Federal regulators laid out a plan Friday to set new standards for offshore oil and natural gas drilling in the icy, treacherous waters of the Arctic Ocean.
The rules proposed Friday by two Interior Department agencies would, for the first time, codify standards specific to drilling in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas north of Alaska, where there has been almost no drilling in decades.
"We’re taking a broad view in this rule for managing the nation’s energy resources in the Arctic," Brian Salerno, director of the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE), told reporters.
The rule places heavy emphasis in making sure that oil and gas drilling operations are conducted safely and responsibly while at the same time protecting Alaska Native subsistence resources and sensitive marine ecosystems."
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“These proposed regulations issued today extend the administration’s thoughtful approach to balanced oil and gas exploration in the Arctic, and are designed to ensure that offshore exploratory activities will continue to be subject to the highest safety standards," Interior Secretary Sally Jewell said in a statement.
The standards from the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management and the BSEE are aimed at ensuring that oil and gas drillers are properly prepared for the entire drilling process, including exploration, planning and operations.
Specifically, the agencies want drillers to have backup rigs ready nearby to drill relief wells in the case of blowouts or other emergencies.
Drillers would also need response plans specific to the Arctic region, have prompt access to control and containment equipment for spills and be able to contain spills completely through mechanical means, without using dispersants or burning the oil.
Companies would be limited to drilling during the time of year when the sea is not icy.
The rules largely codify existing conditions that officials have put on recent drilling rights leases the agencies have sold, they said.
“In turn, these rules would facilitate exploration planning efforts and provide regulatory certainty, while ensuring that the U.S. maintains its leadership position in overseeing safe exploration operations that protect this unique and sensitive environment,” Janice Schneider, the Interior Department's assistant secretary for minerals management, said in the statement.
The regulations would only apply to exploratory drilling, not large-scale production, which would be years away.
If companies eventually want to drill production wells, the regulators foresee new standards to take that into account.
"We would envision that, as we get further down the road and look towards production, there’d be a follow-up rulemaking specifically to address production safety," Salerno said.
The rules were spurred in part by a failed attempt in late 2012 by Royal Dutch Shell to drill an exploratory well in the Arctic.
The results were disastrous, leading to accusations that both Shell and the federal regulators were completely unprepared to start Arctic drilling. The company’s spill containment dome was damaged before it made it to Alaska, the main drilling rig ran aground and another rig was damaged in a storm after a tug boat cut its towing line.
Salerno said the agency incorporated many lessons from the 2012 incident into its new regulations. Although the rules may not be finalized by the time Shell drills, officials plan to hold Shell to many of the standards anyway.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/233353-feds-crack-down-on-arctic-offshore-drilling
