From the oil and gas industry, response to the US government's new rule on offshore blowout preventers and well control has been cautious. Well it should be. The rule addresses offshore safety, the priority for the industry, its regulators, and the public. But the industry has secondary yet nevertheless vital interests that deserve attention, too.
Industry groups need time to study the 531-page final rule from the US Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement. The document is not only lengthy but also appropriately technical and complex. As initially proposed, the rule was, according to industry comments, too prescriptive and too disconnected from industry standards that have undergone rigorous upgrades over the past 6 years. The final rule lists accommodations to those concerns. Industry experts will have to decide whether the accommodations go far enough.
Responding carefully
The industry must respond carefully. Regulation of offshore safety traps it between two forces related mainly by their being strongly influenced by politics.
One force is the imperative to prevent another tragedy like the Macondo blowout of 2010, which killed 11 workers and released millions of barrels of crude oil into the Gulf of Mexico. In response to lapses placed on horrifying display by that disaster, a regulatory crackdown was inevitable and appropriate. Just as inevitable but much less appropriate was a hardening of political antagonism against the industry. A question worth pondering is whether "leave it in the ground" activism could have gained traction in the US if Macondo hadn't happened. The industry can't change history. It can, however, draw sharp distinctions between politics and safety and work to keep regulation focused on the latter.
With activities as complex and specialized as offshore drilling and production, regulation can misfire. This is especially so with activities as politically sensitive as offshore oil and gas. BSEE officials received comments from more than 170 sources, some of whose preferred path to offshore safety is the cessation of work.
An official inclination toward that approach represents the other force tugging at the industry. BSEE serves an administration happy to suffocate the oil and gas industry with regulations. The unstated but obvious goal is to raise costs of oil and gas to improve competitive positions of renewable fuels. While success of the effort has been mixed, the regulatory assault continues-lately including new controls on methane and ozone precursors from oil and gas facilities.
Maybe BSEE officials developed their well-control rule with nothing but safety in mind. But they can escape their affiliation with an administration hostile to the oil and gas industry no more readily than the industry can disengage from the Macondo legacy. Suspicion is unavoidable that BSEE, in the manner of companion agencies, let regulation become suppression of work by an unpopular industry with mistakes on its record. History is kind to neither side here.
In its responses to the well-control rule, the industry should be operationally firm and politically precise. Broad complaint about overregulation, however warranted by general behavior of the Executive Branch, can only hurt. To the extent possible, commentary about the new rule should concentrate on safety. Wherever the rule might compromise that priority, comments should be clear and strong.
Addressing politics
If it stays focused on safety and quiet about overregulation, the industry should be able to address politics effectively. It has reason to ask whether regulation confines itself to concern for offshore safety or whether it also reflects official disposition against the production and use of fossil energy. Only by making that distinction can the industry help sharpen an important regulation and at the same time address a subversive prejudice.
The well-control rule challenges the oil and gas industry to demonstrate simultaneously humility with regard to its Macondo mistake and conviction with regard to its vital work. The test is important. Most questions of energy policy now contain toxic motives that neither the industry nor its customers can afford to ignore.
