BOEMRE approves 5th deepwater drilling permit in Gulf this month despite defective safety measures

This is insane.

MSNBC Rachel Maddow show
In a TRMS Investigates exclusive, Rachel Maddow shows that the Department of the Interior is issuing deepwater drilling permits despite a report finding that blow-out preventer design is flawed and despite drilling companies submitting emergency response plans that pre-date the Deepwater Horizon spill and therefore reflect none of the lessons of that disaster.

Here's the general points of the show:
Oil "blow out preventer" not working. The design doesn't work. Government knows all about it. Norwegian firm that investigated the BP accident, says the blow out preventers don't work in the event of a accident.

"New" safety regulations were from Sept 2009. BEFORE the BP oil spill. Five new drilling permits were issued in the last 25 days. 1st permit was issued to BP- working under Noble Energy (don't have a link connecting BP to Noble Energy yet-working on it)

www.offshore-mag.com... ort.html

DNV issues final report on Macondo blow-out

Published: Mar 24, 2011
Offshore staff

NEW ORLEANS – Failure of the blind shear rams (BSRs) to close and seal the well because of drill pipe trapped between the blocks has been given by Det Norske Veritas (DNV) as the primary cause of the Macondo oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.


The findings were included in the report “Forensic Examination of Deepwater Horizon Blowout Preventer,” a 551-page document which DNV recently released to the US Department of the Interior.


DNV says that the failure cause analysis was organized and conducted around a single top event. For the purposes of this investigation, the top event was defined as the failure of the BSRs to close and seal the well.


According to the report, the primary cause of failure was identified as the BSRs failing to fully close and seal due to a portion of drill pipe trapped between the blocks.


The report also ascribed contributing causes to the primary cause. These included:

• The BSRs were not able to move the entire pipe cross section into the shearing surfaces of the blades

• Drill pipe in process of shearing was deformed outside the shearing blade surfaces

• The drill pipe elastically buckled within the wellbore due to forces induced on the drill pipe during loss of well control

• The position of the tool joint at or below the closed upper annular prevented upward movement of the drill pipe

• The upper variable bore rams (VBRs) were closed and sealed on the drill pipe

• The flow of well fluids was uncontrolled from downhole of the upper VBRs.


From examining the recovered subsea equipment, DNV found a drill pipe tool joint between the upper annular and the upper VBRs. With both the upper annular and upper VBRs closed on the drill pipe, flow forces from the well pushed the tool joint into the upper annual element which prevented further upward movement of the drill pipe, according to DNV.


Because it could not move, the report states, the drill pipe buckled between the upper annual and upper VBRs. The drill pipe deflected until it contacted the wellbore just above the BSRs, DNV said.


Further, DNV found that the drill pipe between the shearing surfaces of the BSR was off center, so a portion of that pipe was outside the BSR blocks. When the rams closed, that part of the pipe was trapped between the ram block faces to prevent them from closing fully.


In this partially open condition, flow continued through the drill pipe trapped between the ram block faces and then through the gap between the ram blocks.


The first part of the two-volume study can be found online at www.deepwaterinvestigation.com...


03/24/2011

www.boemre.gov...

NEW ORLEANS – The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement (BOEMRE) today approved the first deepwater drilling permit since the Deepwater Horizon explosion and resulting oil spill. Noble Energy’s application for a permit to bypass is for Well #2 in Mississippi Canyon Block 519, approximately 70 miles south east of Venice, La.

BOEMRE press release March 24

NEW ORLEANS–The Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement (BOEMRE) today approved a fifth deepwater drilling permit that complies with rigorous new safety standards implemented in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon explosion and resulting oil spill. This includes satisfying the requirement to demonstrate the capacity to contain a subsea blowout. The approved permit is a revised permit to drill a new well for Chevron USA Inc.’s Well #1 in Keathley Canyon Block 736 in 6,750 ft. water depth, approximately 216 miles off the Louisiana coastline, south of Lafayette, La. Today’s is the first deepwater permit approved for completely new exploration since the deepwater drilling moratorium was lifted; this means
that this is the first exploratory well drilled into this reservoir or field, which has never produced.

US drilling permits keep coming

Exxon Mobil to spud well at Gulf Hadrian Prospect within a few weeks
gcaptain.com...

I wish I could say the government cared. The value put on human life is about 20k from some reports of the BP payouts. This means about 200 barrels of oil, $$$$ happens. The sea life does not even factor into the equations. Go take your capitalist accounting and review it.

This includes satisfying the requirement to demonstrate the capacity to contain a subsea blowout. The approved permit is a revised permit to drill a new well for Chevron USA Inc.’s Well #1 in Keathley Canyon Block 736 in 6,750 ft. water depth, approximately 216 miles off the Louisiana coastline, south of Lafayette, La. Today’s is the first deepwater permit approved for completely new exploration since the deepwater drilling moratorium was lifted; this means that this is the first exploratory well drilled into this reservoir or field, which has never produced.

Almost 7000 feet deep. That's very scary. I wish more people were aware about this.

Plus the Rachel Maddow show is the only place I've heard about this, and I don't think enough people watch her. She is very good at releasing these reports, I wonder what she knows about that she isn't allowed to release.