API’s response to five-year plan for offshore access
The Department of the Interior’s Minerals Management Service recently proposed a new Five-Year Plan for Offshore Access. The plan, which covers 2010 through 2015, overlaps the current plan running from 2007 to 2012. It involves offshore access and leasing for the Outer Continental Shelf (OCS).
Doug Morris, Group Director for Upstream and Industry Operations for the American Petroleum Institute, recently published an industry opinion of the plan in an op-ed for the San Francisco Sentinel. Morris says the OCS plays a key role in supplying the U.S. with energy, and a large majority of the production comes from the Gulf of Mexico. The recent run of hurricanes in the gulf has proven these fields vulnerable to disruption and now is a good time to diversify production to the resources beneath the rest of the OCS.
There are some concerns for the impact this development could have on nature, but Morris points out the MMS has cited the oil and gas industry for an excellent environmental record. He goes on to point out that technological and scientific innovations have helped the petroleum industry improve both its operations and efficiency. These innovations allow petroleum companies to find more oil with fewer wells and in more remote locations, and can drill with great precision.
Morris concluded his editorial with an urge to move forward in OCS development. “In summary, the U.S. oil and natural gas industry has an outstanding offshore environmental record and has clearly demonstrated that offshore development can coexist with clean oceans and clean coasts. The U.S. Outer Continental Shelf produces more than one million barrels of oil per day. Since 1980, less than one thousandth of a percent of that oil has been spilled. America cannot wait. We need to move forward with a Five- Year Plan that includes all areas of the OCS for oil and gas development,” he wrote.
In other API news, oil and gas drilling is currently down to 2004 levels, down 22 percent from the first quarter 2008 and down 35 percent from the most recent three-month period.
Sources for this post include the San Francisco Sentinel, a press release from MMS and Upstreamonline.
Published Monday, April 20th, 2009 at 8:37 am and filed under Industry News.