Drilling to resume near site of Gulf oil spill

Offshore oil and natural gas drilling is set to resume in June in the area of the Gulf of Mexico where the 2010 Deepwater Horizon explosion and oil spill occurred.

LLOG Exploration Offshore, an oil company based in Louisiana, obtained approval last month from the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement to drill in the Macondo prospect, The Associated Press reported.

{mosads}While the oil reservoir is the same, the company says there is little connection to the BP disaster that killed 11 workers and spilled oil into the Gulf for 87 days in the worst environmental catastrophe in recent United States history.

“Our commitment is to not allow such an event to occur again,” Rick Fowler, the vice president for deep-water projects at LLOG, told AP. “LLOG staff keeps the memory of what happened … fresh in our minds throughout our operations, both planning and execution.”

It would be the first drilling in the Macondo prospect since the BP spill, according to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, which also approved LLOG’s plans.

Richard Charter, senior fellow with the Ocean Foundation, told the AP that he is worried a small company like LLOG might not have the resources available to respond to a disaster.

But Eric Smith, a professor at Tulane University, defended LLOG, calling it a well-established company.

“If I were to pick anyone to go into that field after so many problems, I would pick LLOG,” he told the AP. “They have demonstrated their ability to drill in the area.”