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BOEMRE tightens operations oversight
In the ever-widening wake from the Gulf of Mexico Macondo well blowout, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement is taking further steps to tighten its oversight of oil and gas operation on the outer continental shelf. Having already said that it will station personnel on offshore rigs to directly observe offshore oil and gas drilling, on June 13 the agency announced that it will begin to use multiple-person teams, rather than individual inspectors, for the inspection of offshore oil and gas operations. The new teams will be able to simultaneously carry out thorough inspections of multiple operations, BOEMRE said.
“We are bolstering our inspection program with additional resources and new approaches,” said BOEMRE Director Michael Bromwich. “As more inspectors are hired, we will be deploying multi-disciplinary inspection teams instead of individual inspectors, providing broader oversight to ensure that offshore operators are complying with federal regulations and conducting their operations in a safe and environmentally responsible manner.”
The National Offshore Training Center, recently established by BOEMRE, has developed a formal training curriculum for the agency’s offshore inspectors, with one course already in operation and 24 additional courses to be developed in the coming months, BOEMRE said.
“We are extremely proud of the steps we have taken to bolster our inspections program,” Bromwich said. “We believe that establishing a formal curriculum for inspector training is central to developing a more rigorous and consistent inspections program across the agency.”
Chief Environmental Officer And in a separate initiative, BOEMRE is creating a new position of Chief Environmental Officer to provide assurance that resource development decisions pay adequate attention to environmental considerations, BOEMRE Deputy Director Walter Cruickshank announced June 9 during a talk on future OCS oil and gas regulation, as part of Capitol Hill Oceans Week in Washington, D.C. On Oct. 1 BOEMRE will split into two new agencies, the Bureau of Ocean Management (or BOEM) and the Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (or BSEE), Cruickshank said.
BOEMRE is looking for an environmental scientist of national standing to fill the chief environmental officer position, which will be located within BOEM, he said.
—Alan Bailey
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