BSEE, USCG floating facility regulation

The Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement and the U.S. Coast Guard have signed a memorandum of agreement for shared jurisdiction over the regulation of floating oil and gas facilities on the outer continental shelf. The idea is to ensure a coordinated approach to the regulation of the facilities by clarifying each agency’s responsibility for facility inspection and oversight, the agencies said in a Feb. 4 announcement.

The signing came on Jan. 29 during a quarterly meeting of senior officials from both organizations. The meeting also included operations updates and discussions about oil spill preparedness, discussions over the conducting of joint exercises and discussions over opportunities for joint training. The agency officials expressed their continuing commitment to sharing and applying risk data for the promotion of offshore safety and environmental protection, BSEE says.

BSEE says that, while senior leaders from the Department of the Interior and the Coast Guard have been conducting routine meetings since the late 1990s, since Oct. 1, 2011, the meetings have taken on greater significance and become more frequent as part of a commitment to interagency coordination. The agencies established the new quarterly meeting schedule in early 2014 to improve the exchange of information on offshore activities. Separate quarterly meetings now also take place of a spill response workgroup and a spill prevention workgroup, in addition to a meeting between senior BSEE and Coast Guard leaders for the Gulf of Mexico region, BSEE says.

- ALAN BAILEY