Watching the World U.S. lessons for U.K. platform disposal

Months after Shell U.K. Exploration & Production was forced to abort a move to dump its Brent spar in the Atlantic Ocean off Britain, the U.K. government has decided to commission a study into deepwater disposal.

Shell apparently has written off dumping of the unused oil loading buoy as an option. Now, with somewhat eccentric timing, Tim Eggar, U.K. minister for industry and energy, has called in the Natural Environment Research Council.

Eggar said, "At present, the best practicable environmental option for decommissioning Brent spar is deep sea disposal. Now that we have the Det Norske Veritas report on the contents of the Brent spar we need to assess the validity of this option, which will act as the environmental benchmark against which any other disposal options for the spar can be considered."

So, while Eggar's "independent international expert group of scientists and engineers" is going over ground trod earlier by Shell and Greenpeace with differing results, there is a lesson the U.K. could learn from the U.S.

Rigs to reefs

There are about 4,000 production platforms and 22,000 miles of oil and gas pipelines in the Gulf of Mexico. About 1,300 platforms have been removed so far, and about 100 of those have been dumped without a backlash from environment groups.

About 30 artificial reef sites have been created off Texas and Louisiana. Companies have mainly cut their platform jackets below the seabed and carried them to dump sites in 100-300 ft of water.

Villere Reggio, manager of Louisiana's rigs to reefs program for the U.S. government's Mineral Management Service, explained it is cheaper to take small platforms ashore for disposal but not necessarily large ones.

To encourage companies to provide clean platform components for the reefs, MMS lets them dump rigs on the reefs and split the difference in cost estimates. MMS uses its share of the money to fund the rigs to reefs program.

"For example," Reggio said, "it may cost $1 million for onshore abandonment and $800,000 for reef abandonment. Under our program, the company saves $100,000 and the state (MMS) gets $100,000."

Big attraction

The reefs are used by scuba divers and recreational and commercial fishermen. The reefs attract fish and encourage spawning.

But the big attraction of the rigs to reefs program for oil companies is that the money that goes to MMS pays for maintaining buoys around the reefs and regular surveying of the reefs.

Reggio said, "The real power of our legislation is that government takes on liability for rigs that are dumped in these reefs. The legal position is the key issue to getting rigs to reefs programs in place."

Companies are required to remove unused platforms and clear a 1,300 ft radius around the site within a year of platform shutdown. They have to pay for a trawl of the site to prove it is clear. Then the government takes charge.

In the U.K., however, government has stuck to its line that residual liability for oil and gas platforms lies with the companies--for good.

If Eggar's study shows a rigs to reefs policy will work in the North Sea, experience in the Gulf of Mexico suggests government needs to change its stance. Copyright 1995 Oil & Gas Journal. All Rights Reserved.