Ms Pickard also made an offhand comment that Shell was not preparing to take over LNG-focused Woodside Petroleum Ltd, which is 34 per cent held by the Dutch company.

LONDON, Sept 6 (Reuters) – Royal Dutch Shell (RDSa.L: Quote) has been in exclusive talks with Finnish fuel distributor St1 to sell its downstream business in Finland and Sweden, the oil major said on Monday.

LATEST: There was no evidence anyone was actually misled when Shell claimed its petrol was “designed to take you further” despite only increasing efficiency by less than 1 percent, the judge who dismissed the case against the oil company said.

The eurozone debt crisis is about to enter a critical phase as governments prepare to step up borrowing in the capital markets to fund their faltering economies.

UPDATED 8 SEPT & 14 SEPT 2010 (NEW INFORMATION IN RED TEXT)

Threats, including death threats, have allegedly been made against conscience driven Shell whistleblowers leaking information and/or Shell internal documents to John Donovan

By John Donovan

Andy Coulson resigned as editor of the News of the World in January 2007 over a phone hacking scandal at the newspaper. He is now media adviser to UK Prime Minister David Cameron.

Journalists hacked into mobile-phones to hear voice mail messages left for UK royalty, government ministers and celebrities.

An investigation by Scotland Yard focused almost exclusively on the hacking targeting Prince William and Prince Harry. It resulted in the imprisonment of a News of the World reporter and a private investigator.

Further allegations have now been made and there are calls for a judicial inquiry…

News of the World faces fresh phone hacking charge

In Britain, Labour Politicians Call for New Look at Scandal

Major corporations naturally prefer to keep secret the use of “the dark arts“ to steal confidential information.

Royal Dutch Shell is probably the business worlds leading practitioner in the use of commercial espionage, sometimes on an industrial scale.

I speak from experience as Shell has stolen confidential intellectual property from me on several occasions. It tried to keep the associated court settlements secret after I was forced to repeatedly issue High Court proceedings against the company. (See pdf of magazine feature – High Court papers unveil ‘secret’ Shell writ losses – spread over several pages, so it takes a little time to load).

After issuing SEVEN separate related court cases against Shell in all, the oil giant decided to use undercover agents to investigate my father and me. One agent was caught at our offices examining private mail. When challenged, he presented fake credentials. In conjunction with our lawyers, we  cornered the then Legal Director of Shell, Mr Richard Wiseman, into admitting in writing that the agent in question (“Christopher Phillips”) was working for Shell. A retained lawyer acting for Shell – Colin Joseph of DJ Freeman now known as Kendall Freeman – informed us in writing at the time of the incident that other agents were also investigating us, but declined to reveal what they were doing.

We were in fact besieged by undercover operatives and bombarded by threats. Our house was burgled and Shell discovery papers, including one that Shell had been unable to obtain through court proceedings, was tampered with and no doubt copied. Our key witness’s residence was also burgled. Again, Shell discovery documents were tampered with. Even my solicitor’s house was burgled. All of the burglaries across Southern England took place within a matter of weeks leading up to a High Court trial in which Shell had brought counter-claims against us, which it later abandoned. Mr. Wiseman denied that Shell had any connection with the above sinister activity, other than in relation to “Christopher Phillips”.

Some of these events were set out at the time in a letter we sent to Colin Joseph. It included reference to threats made “against my son, his family and against his witnesses.” It also mentions a related meeting at Shell-Mex House between Simon Rines, a journalist representing The Guardian newspaper, and Colin Joseph, Richard Wiseman and a person from Shell media department, all representing Shell.  Both sides tape recorded the entire interview.

During the discovery process we found Shell internal documents providing irrefutable evidence of a scheme by Shell executives to deliberately obtain confidential information from several companies under false pretenses.

The companies were lured into a rigged contract tender process. They were then enticed into confidentiality agreements, again under false pretenses. The whole exercise was designed to steal information from them, when in reality they had no prospect of winning the contract, which was awarded to a company which did not even participate in the tender. (This was analogous to a horse winning a race in which it did not run.) It was a company with whom the Shell executive masterminding the rigged process had a very close connection and an offshore bank account. Senior Shell executives, including Malcolm Brinded, gave their full backing to the unscrupulous executive responsible for the corrupted tender process.

It is relevant to note that two years after we were besieged by sinister activity, The Sunday Times run a front page lead story on Shell espionage operations conducted on an international basis against its perceived enemies. Shell used a private intelligence firm Hakluyt & Co Ltd in which titled Shell directors were major shareholders, directors and the ultimate spymasters. (pdf of original Sunday Times article)

We do not know whether at the time of Mr. Wiseman’s denial of Shell’s connection with the additional skulduggery, he was aware of Shell’s close connection with Hakluyt, which was engaged on Shell’s behalf in the same type of operations against other parties such as Greenpeace, The Body Shop and Nigerian activists, that had been directed against us.

Shell’s hostile activities targeting us and our website have continued in subsequent years.

In 2005, Shell secretly set up a counter-measures team as confirmed in a confidential Shell internal email.

A Shell internal confidential email dated 21 March 2007 revealed that Shell had undertaken a global spying operation against its own employees in an effort to find out who has been supplying us with Shell “internal laundry” (as it is sensitively described).

In June 2007, Shell secretly threatened legal proceedings against our website server hosting companies in Canada and the USA. The threats resulted in our royaldutchshellplc.com website being deactivated on 25 June 2007.  Although initially unwilling to disclose who had made the threats that frightened our hosting companies into immediate submission, when we pressed the matter, each hosting company reluctantly confirmed that it was, as we rightly suspected, Shell. Keith Ruddock, a Royal Dutch Shell General Counsel, later confirmed to me in an email dated 26 June 2007, that Shell was responsible for the machinations which briefly shut down our website.

In 2008, the website came under sustained attack, the precise details of which I will not reveal for security reasons. By March of that year, the attacks had become so disruptive that I sent an email to Michiel Brandjes, Company Secretary & General Counsel Corporate, Royal Dutch Shell Plc, officially notifying Shell of what was going on and providing detailed information. I thought it possible that a counter-measures team would be concerned at senior management being brought into the matter. Mr Brandjes knew nothing about the attacks, but as if by magic, by coincidence of otherwise, the attacks ceased.

A confidential Shell internal email dated June 2009 involving (CAS) Shell Corporate Affairs Security and NCFTA, a U.S. cybercrime agency, partly funded and staffed by the FBI, discussed “investigations” relating to us and our website and said: “There will be no attempt to do anything visible to Donovan”. The implication being that the “investigations” would be “invisible”.

Shell’s spying against us and its own employees was reported in a Reuters article published in December 2009.

Allegation of death threats surrounding leaked Shell emails

We have received a large number of Shell internal emails over several years. Some have been leaked to us by our network of Shell insiders while countless others, spanning several years, have been obtained from Shell after we made applications to the company as provided under the UK Data Protection Act.

I would now reveal for the first time that threats, including death threats, have allegedly been made against conscience driven whistleblowers leaking information and/or Shell internal documents to the author of this article. Royal Dutch Shell also took draconian legal action against the Malaysian whistleblower Dr John Huong, a Shell production geologist. He was buried for several years in Shell defamation lawsuits for information allegedly leaked to this website. Shell also sought his imprisonment for alleged contempt of court.

I have evidence from our sources confirming alleged threats. One such threat for example relates to the Sakhalin2 project. Evidence I provided to the Russian government supplied to me by an insider, cost Shell billions of dollars and also resulted in the resignation of a Shell Managing Director David Greer, who was Project Director of Sakhalin2 and Deputy Chairman of Sakhalin Energy Investment Company Limited. The last message received from the source informed me that they had received a credible serious threat. The source disappeared without trace.

The track record of intimidation should heighten concern about the dark side of Shell.

Two former spooks are currently employed by Shell. A retired senior FBI official, Richard T. Garcia, is Global Security Manager for Shell Americas. A former senior MI6 officer of the British Secret Intelligence Service (SIS), Ian Forbes McCredie OBE is head of Shell Corporate Affairs Security (CAS).

The above provides overwhelming evidence of Shell’s track record of IP theft, fraud, and industrial espionage. (Speaking of fraud, only a few years ago, Royal Dutch Shell was responsible for one of the biggest securities frauds in corporate history)

Many other parties have been the victims of such activity by Shell.

The following is an extract from a statement published on the Internet by John Alfred Dyer:

In 1993, following five years of research, my findings resulted in the commissioning of a television program for ‘Carlton Television’.  Shell quickly responded.  Investigators kept me under surveillance. My telephone was tapped. My mail was intercepted, and destroyed and/or kept. At the same time, Shell filed a seemingly endless line of complaints about my own alleged conduct, to the  Independent Television Commission (UK regulatory authority), Carlton, and others.

In more recent years, Shell has been accused of being responsible for surveillance operations and violence directed at members of the local population in Ireland protesting against the Shell led Corrib Gas Project.

Shell Corrib Gas Controversy: Call for Investigation into boat sinking

Security firm for Shell at Corrib site rejects ‘conclusion on alleged assault’

Focus on sinister events surrounding Shell Corrib Gas project

Corrib link to Irish man’s death

Consequently, be on your guard if, despite the above information, you risk approaching Royal Dutch Shell with confidential commercially value information. The oil giant is predatory in nature and despite its claimed business principles, has no scruples. It also has an army of several hundred lawyers backed up by unlimited financial resources, ready to destroy without mercy any smaller companies or individual who might object to being trampled on.

Related Article: MORE ROYAL DUTCH SHELL IP CHICANERY?

ADVANCE NOTICE: Another incredible but true story about alleged Royal Dutch Shell industrial espionage is in the pipeline.

COMMENT FROM A FORMER EMPLOYEE OF SHELL OIL USA

Everything you do and say at Shell is a loyalty test. Everything. Big Brother is always watching and listening. Always.

royaldutchshellplc.com Wikipedia article Dec 2007 Version

The Irish Times – Thursday, September 2, 2010

ÁINE RYAN

THE CONTROVERSIAL Corrib gas project is arguably the most forensically examined project in the 88-year history of the State, a northwest Mayo parish priest said in support of the project yesterday.

Fr Kevin Hegarty of Kilmore-Erris was the first of two parish priests to address the An Bord Pleanála hearing, in Belmullet, Co Mayo, into Shell’s revised application.

His diocesan colleague, Fr Michael Nallen, the parish priest of Kilcommon, where the project is located, is scheduled to address the hearing today and express the concerns and fears of his parishioners.

Heckled at one stage during his delivery yesterday morning, Fr Hegarty said: “I believe that Shell has sought to fulfil the requirements of Irish, European and international environmental laws in its planning, construction to date and proposed operation of the development.”

Noting the project’s strategic importance for Erris, Mayo, and Ireland, he said: “I also believe that, particularly from late 2005 onwards, the company has shown a willingness to be a good neighbour and contribute positively to the community.”

Fr Hegarty said he believed the vast majority of those in the Erris community supported the development.

“I know there are sincere people among the protesters. I believe, however, their fears about the safety of the pipeline have been grossly inflated by the sulphurous rhetoric of those who wish to prevent the delivery of the gas on ideological grounds.

“I also sense that some of those opposed to the development abhor the extreme tactics of a minority of their group.

“The main thing that gives me confidence about the human and the environmental safety of the Corrib gas development is that there are stringent Irish, European Union and international laws and directives governing planning applications,” Fr Hegarty said.

The resumed planning appeals board hearing is under the remit of the Strategic Infrastructure Act and will deliberate on a revised application by Shell, which involves tunnelling a section of the pipeline route under the Sruwaddacon estuary, a special area of conservation. It will also examine compulsory acquisition orders by Shell for access to lands along this newly modified route – the third proposed by the developer.

Solicitor Paul Brennan made a submission on behalf of local farmer and postman John Barrett, whose home “was almost destroyed” during the devastating 2003 landslide on Dooncarton mountain. “The [Barrett] family is concerned that the pipeline tunnels [proposed under nearby Sruwaddacon Bay] and other works close to their home could cause further landslides during the construction stage and into the future,” Mr Brennan said.

Supporting the project on behalf of Belmullet GAA, John Gallagher, chairman, argued that the stringency applied by Shell in its funding schemes challenged the veracity of any notion that the company had tried to buy the support of local organisations.

The hearing continues today.

SOURCE ARTICLE

Responding, Esmonde Keane, senior counsel for Shell, said he “absolutely rejected” that it was manipulating the community. He argued the company’s grants and schemes were established to “give back to the community”.

The Irish Times – Friday, September 3, 2010

ÁINE RYAN

A RETIRED Department of Education psychologist has criticised Shell’s public relations strategy of targeting schools with Corrib Natural Gas “baubles and trinkets”.

He also claimed the company “was manipulating the community in a shameless way in order to achieve their own ends”.

Former educational psychologist Tom McAndrew told the resumed planning appeals board hearing on Shell’s revised gas pipeline it was hard to blame schools and boards of management – desperately short of funds – for being tempted by such obvious generosity.

“Principals and boards of management were placed in an invidious position and under pressure from some of their parents to engage with Shell,” he said.

Mr McAndrew added it was clear from Shell’s own documentation they “had handed over significant amounts of money to schools and young people’s groups over the past number of years”.

Responding, Esmonde Keane, senior counsel for Shell, said he “absolutely rejected” that it was manipulating the community. He argued the company’s grants and schemes were established to “give back to the community”.

Afterwards, members of the board of Pullathomas national school made a brief submission about their concerns on the pipeline route, which runs close to the school. They sought a “guarantee for the future health and safety of those using the school and the playing fields”.

Meanwhile, Fr Michael Nallen accused Minister for the Environment John Gormley of using one rule for his own constituency in Dublin and another for Kilcommon parish, where he ministers.

“Just because we are not living in John Gormley’s constituency does not mean we don’t have human rights,” he said.

The hearing under the remit of the Strategic Infrastructure Act will deliberate on a revised application by Shell, which involves tunnelling a section of the pipeline route under the Sruwaddacon estuary, a special area of conservation.

In a submission in favour of the project, regional director of business lobby group Ibec, John Brennan, said there would be 130 permanent jobs when the Corrib gas refinery was operational.

He said towns in the west were already benefiting because of infrastructural development in relation to the project. “We are highly dependent on imported fossil fuels and need to develop our own fields, and hence the requirement to proceed with the delivery of the Corrib gas,” he said.

“This project is several years behind schedule, for a variety of reasons, and this could damage Ireland’s international reputation regarding foreign direct investment, including by energy companies.”

SOURCE ARTICLE

GULF TIMES

Sunday 5 September, 2010

Bloomberg/Amsterdam

Royal Dutch Shell, Europe’s largest oil company, is set to reverse its decline in production after projects in Qatar come on stream, Sanford C Bernstein & Co said.

“After a decade of declining production, Shell is finally entering a sweet spot for production growth,” Oswald Clint, a London-based analyst at Bernstein, said in a note to investors yesterday.

Shell also has “probably the best portfolio” of pre- final-investment-decision projects around, “and a strategy refocused on the exploration and production business, with plenty of interesting exploration options to add to reserves”.

The Anglo-Dutch company is targeting hard-to-reach rock formations in Australia, China and the US, as well as projects in Qatar, to boost production growth. As much as 40% of Shell’s capital spending in the next few years has been earmarked for the Asia-Pacific region.

This year has already seen start-ups in the Gulf of Mexico and Brazil with Perdido and the BC-10 project, while the Sakhalin project in Russia has beaten production goals.

Shell spent $19bn, triple the original estimate, to build the world’s largest gas-to-liquids plant in Qatar. Shell’s Pearl project will churn out 140,000 barrels a day of liquid fuel and 120,000 barrels equivalent of ethane gas and condensate, a by-product that’s like a light crude oil.

The company also has a 30% stake in Qatargas 4, part of the world’s largest LNG complex, due to start exports in 2011.

Peter Voser, in his second year as chief executive officer of Royal Dutch Shell, expects to double cumulative asset sales to as much as $8bn by the end of 2011, he said in July.

Cost savings of $3.5bn beat an earlier target by about 15% and were completed early, resulting in 7,000 job reductions 18 months ahead of schedule. Voser is assessing more than 35 projects that may add 8bn barrels of oil equivalent, boosting production until 2020.

Shell expects an 11% production increase in 2009 to 2012 with a forecast of 3.5mn barrels of oil equivalent a day in 2012. Shell, which has been adding more gas than oil to its resources since 2005, expects the share of gas as a proportion of total output to rise to 52% in 2012.

SOURCE ARTICLE

Expert comment from Bill Campbell (right), retired HSE Group Auditor, Shell International

John

The attachment ( A Can of Worms) is a reaction to the BBC News/Robert Peston article posted on your website. Please publish all or part as you see fit or otherwise file for reference.

Yesterday’s event in context

The explosion yesterday in the Gulf of Mexico again highlights the dangers of having an explosive gas air mixture concurrent with a source of ignition.  It seems a miracle that 13 men apparently blown into the sea survived. Ironically many such accidents happen when facilities are shutdown and vessels are opened up.

A major explosion on Cormorant A in 1989 occurred when gas leaked from the open end of the Western leg pipeline thought to have been purged free of gas.  There were 240 souls on board.  The cellar deck on Cormorant was known to be weak and unable to withstand the explosive overpressure but was protected in this instance by the relief vents on top of the enclosed column opening.  Methane/air explosions contribute to the largest loss of life worldwide due to industrial activity.  This should be no surprise as natural gas, mainly methane is the biggest killer in the industrialised world – for example thousands on miners in the unregulated Chinese coal mining industry have died in recent years.

Deepwater Horizon

Returning to the Gulf of Mexico, the explosion yesterday will again bring focus to that region in the follow up to Deepwater Horizon.  This incident happening in a region of the world which had dominated the blow-out league table.  The historic data (including Shell’s Bay Marchand in 1970) shows in the Gulf of Mexico in the 37 year period 1964 to 2001 that there were 11 blowouts there has been a mean time between blowouts of just 3.4 years and the consequences of these blowouts was often disastrous with 31 associated fatalities and massive environmental pollution.  This represents a quarter of all blowouts worldwide with a third of the associated fatalities. By comparison, with similar levels of drilling activity over the same period, the UK North Sea has had the three blowouts and one fatality, with negligible pollution.

Yet Big Oil, some 85 energy companies including Shell and BP, having forked out $3.5 billion for leases, in its presentation to the US Government to allow it to go into deepwater, stated that blowout are rare events.  Not as rare it seems as they should have been.

Testimony from the inquiry into Deepwater Horizon continues to open up a can of worms.  Why was a modern, technologically advanced, so called fifth generation rig apparently falling apart with defect lists growing by the day and no adequate response to that.  And to answer the Robert Peston question, who was the guilty party that allowed this to happen.

Bill

A Can of Worms

Accountability is inexorably linked to responsibility

Whether it be under the formality of the UK Health and Safety at Work Act or under less formal state or federal law in the US the concept of accountability is clearly set out in statute with precedence set over many years.

In simple terms, it is the person or persons primarily responsible for an activity who will be held accountable in Law for that activity.

So with reference to the Robert Peston article How Guilty is BP published on your web-site today I would argue not guilty because BP did not design, operate or maintain Deepwater Horizon.  That was the sole responsibility of the owner Transocean.

Opening up a Can of Worms

As testimony gathers, page after page, it becomes clearer and clearer that there were so many warnings but so little action ahead of the Disaster such that this disaster was not only foreseeable, it was probably inevitable. This despite the US regulator request to exercise caution.

Transocean, one of the largest drilling contractors in the world

If you visit the web you will read that Transocean were no Mickey Mouse outfit.  They state that they are the world’s largest offshore drilling contractor, providing the most versatile fleet of mobile offshore drilling units to help clients find and develop oil and natural gas reserves. Building on more than 50 years of experience with the highest specification rigs, our 18,000 employees are focused on safety and premier offshore drilling performance.

Deepwater Horizon according to Transocean fleet specifications was a modern, 5th Generation Deepwater exploration rig, technologically advanced and built in South Korea as recently as 2001.  This rig was contracted by BP to drill into their functional asset, the reservoir, but BP had no responsibility whatsoever for the design, construction, operation and maintenance on a day by day basis of the rig.  This belonged solely to Transocean.

Again with reference to the web in their highest level policy statement on responsibilities they say quote Transocean makes safety a fundamental aspect of what we do — the safety of our people and everyone associated with our operations; the protection of the environment; and the operational integrity of our equipment. We firmly believe that we can conduct our operations in an incident-free environment — all the time, everywhere. We intend to achieve that vision unquote.
However in a relatively short space of time this state of the art vessel was apparently falling apart by 2009?

The large defect list was growing every day, maintenance was needed to return equipment to a functional state.  This maintenance was not getting done, obsolescence was apparently a factor in that spare parts were difficult, if not impossible to obtain, and all this in what was said to be a modern facility.

Jostling for position, we see in testimony, Lawyers for BP, Transocean and Haliburton trying to shift blame bur repeatedly it is reinforced that Transocean staff, who operated and owned the rig, had the authority to stop operations at any time.  Their Installation Manager needed no approval from any party.  It was he who was singularly responsible for the health and safety of all the direct employees on the rig, including indirect employees from BP et al.

So what were Transocean responsible for?

From the testimony of survivors it is apparent that high levels of gas were being released on Deepwater Horizon in the months and weeks prior to the fateful day on the 20th May.  All activities were halted on several occasions with gas being emitted from the drilling cuttings in the mud treatment area.  There was no general platform alarm sounded during these events workers were informed of the situation via PA systems.

There appears to be have been a tolerance by Transocean to the risks of all those on board from the repeated presence of flammable atmospheres on the rig despite the warning from the Regulator to exercise caution.

Testimony from various sources confirms that the gas alarms on the rig had been in inhibited mode for a year prior to the incident to prevent false alarms disturbing the crew.

NB:The Washington Post July 23rd indicates from their research that this inhibition of safety critical systems was not unique to Deepwater Horizon.  In case after case they say that rig operators paid fines for allegedly bypassing safety systems that could impede routine operations.

Testimony also describes that systems designed to prevent combustible gases from reaching potential sources of ignition had also been deliberately disabled.  In the event of a major gas leak the rig was equipped to shutdown ventilation inlets to for example the engine rooms.  But this safety feature was also disabled and according to the testimony of witnesses it appears the seat of the explosion was Engine Room No 3.

Hundreds of pages have been written about concerns that back-up supplies to operate the BOP were known to be unserviceable and the BOP itself may have been functionally impaired.

Testimony describes how safety critical computer control systems to monitor and control drilling operations, including mud flow and balance etc, intermittently froze.  This was collectively referred to on the rig as the blue screen of death where for periods of time at least the driller and the mud engineer would be as they say flying blind.

From previous testimony whether damaged by the explosion or otherwise it is a recorded fact that the emergency disconnect that would allow the vessel to move away from the BOP in the minutes following the explosion did not operate when most needed.

Witnesses told federal panels probing the disaster that the gas and fire alarm system was just one of an array of critical systems that had been functioning unreliably in the run up to the blow-out.

Inspections of the rig in the spring, shortly before the disaster found extensive maintenance problems and the rig would need to be in the shipyard for a lot longer than anticipated because the rig was in very bad condition.

This is supported by testimony from a BP attorney.  He provided evidence that an Audit carried out by BP in September 2009 had a litany of findings including the inhibition of the fire and gas alarm system and it listed 390 other general issues that needed addressing.

My observation and opinion on all of this is that the Transocean maintenance regime for Deepwater Horizon appeared to hinge on what we in the business call batch, or campaign maintenance.

In summary, every 5 years at the time of the vessel class inspection it would plan to return to a shipyard for extensive work to rectify failed equipment or return degraded equipment to as designed functionality.  But clearly the operational life of much of the equipment was less than the period between visits to the yards and it was failing leading to a long defect list that grew over time.

Perhaps in reference to the North Sea all the above would be more understandable if the rig was a first generation installation well past its original design life where equipment obsolescence and the ravishes of the North Sea weather had caused corrosion making maintenance costly and difficult.  But Deepwater Horizon declares Transocean was a modern vessel, technologically advanced, the best that was available for the task in hand.

Despite the warning by the US Regulator to exercise caution the reverse of this appears true.  On the rig operated and owned by Transocean shortcuts were taken, danger signals ignored and employee concerns (like many of the safety systems) were overridden.

Summary

The owner and operator of the Deepwater Horizon who publicly declares they were focussed on safety allowed intolerable risk levels to be attained.

When significant gas levels were occurring, rather than bolstering the reactive defences to mitigate against any undesirable event, gas alarms were inhibited and automatic actions to prevent gas from entering areas where ignition sources were present were purposefully overridden.

I have no doubt that the witness testimony will stand audit in criminal proceedings, and this testimony paints a picture of criminal neglect of maintenance on a significant scale including the operation of equipment whilst it was known to be in a degraded condition with its functionality impaired.

That BP may have contributed to this state of affairs may make them partially culpable but at all times on board they were under the management control of Transocean.  Transocean had a duty of care to stop any operations that they considered unsafe.  This duty could not be overridden.  Not by BP, or for that matter any other member of the Deepwater Horizon alliance team.

In the last analysis it was Transocean stated policy that they were singularly responsible to maintain the operational integrity of their rig, to protect the environment and provide an incident free workplace for all the persons employed on board including BP personnel.  That they did not do that is self evident from the resulting Disaster and the immediate reaction to it for which they will be held accountable in due course.

Comment by Tim Bartram on Sep 5th, 2010 at 9:44 am

AlaskaDispatch

Jill Burke | Sep 3, 2010

Calling his visit a “whirlwind trip through Alaska,” U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar stood before reporters in Anchorage on Friday — dressed in cowboy boots, jeans with notes tucked in a back pocket, a blue collared shirt and a baseball cap  — explaining the mission of his two-day visit to Alaska this week as a chance to see key regions of the state first-hand before making decisions about oil and gas development.

Salazar held a town hall meeting in Barrow and flew over the Beaufort Sea coast for a look at current and proposed oil and gas sites. He also toured the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. He held briefings with the Alyeska Pipeline Services Co. about the trans-Alaska oil pipeline, ConocoPhillips about a proposed drilling project in NPR-A, and with Shell Alaska about proposed offshore exploration projects in the Beaufort and Chukchi seas.

Earlier this year ConocoPhillips was denied a permit by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, which ruled the company had other, less environmentally disruptive options — like directional drilling — to access its target instead of relying on the construction of a new drilling pad. Salazar indicated Friday that he was getting involved to “see if we can resolve” the concerns of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the Environmental Protection Agency with the company’s drilling plan and “move forward.”

He also tried to clear up confusion on whether the drilling moratorium issued in the wake of BP’s oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico applies to Alaska. The moratorium does apply, he said, explaining that while Alaska may not be mentioned in the explicit language, he had simultaneously decided not to authorize new drilling or exploration activity in the Arctic, citing a new level of cautiousness in response to the Gulf spill.

“We will not be allowing that program to move forward” until the Interior Department is confident that drilling can be conducted responsibly in the Chukchi and Beaufort seas, he said.

Nationwide, three main questions are driving whether new offshore oil and gas activity will be allowed, Salazar said. Are the regulations for oil well blowout preventers, cementing and casing strict enough to ensure drilling and workplace safety? Can potential oil spills be adequately contained? And are oil spill response plans thorough and realistic?

Salazar said he hasn’t been comfortable with the level of science gathered about the Arctic’s unique environment or the oil and gas resources it may hold. Of specific concern is the lack of information about the pressure levels that might be encountered while tapping an offshore oil reservoir. He’s also concerned about the apparent inability to mount a large-scale response to a severe spill in the Arctic on the scale seen in the Gulf of Mexico in April.

Shell has said it needs a decision by the end of the year in order to plan for a 2011 exploratory season in the Arctic. Salazar, aware of the company’s need for certainty, said efforts were being made to resolve that question within the next several months, but offered no promises on the timeline.

SOURCE ARTICLE

Comment by a former employee of Shell Oil USA

John,

I have a comment about Shell’s drilling plans in the Alaskan offshore Arctic.

Shell packed it in and walked away from this area 20 years ago. Now, they are suddenly in a ‘big rush’ to get back to drilling what will probably be delineation wells for some of their previously abandoned discoveries. What is the rush? Shell sat back and putzed around for 20 years trying to decide what to do in this area, they can now wait a few more years for the appropriate studies to be conducted.

In the mean time, maybe they could arrange to contract for a modern drilling rig to drill these wells.