|
MMS: Production off to next storm season Agency says at least one-sixth of Gulf of Mexico oil production will still be off when 2006 hurricanes begin; future repairs slow Alan Sayre Associated Press Business Writer
The Gulf of Mexico’s offshore petroleum industry is far from recovering from hurricanes Katrina and Rita, and at least one-sixth of the region’s normal daily oil production will still be off line at the start of next storm season, a federal agency says.
Katrina and Rita destroyed 115 of the Gulf’s 4,000 production platforms and damaged another 52, according to a report released Jan. 19 by the Minerals Management Service, which manages federal offshore leases.
The storms’ combined fury was much stronger when they swept across the Gulf than when they hit shore, and they also damaged 183 pipelines, including 64 classified as major. As of Jan. 19, only 22 had been returned to service, the MSS said.
There are about 33,000 miles of petroleum pipelines in the Gulf of Mexico, 22,000 miles of which were exposed to the two storms.
As of the week of Jan. 16, MMS said 396,000 barrels per day of the Gulf’s normal production of 1.5 million bpd of oil were being kept from market because of storm damage, along with 1.8 billion cubic feet of the region’s normal daily production of 10 bcf of natural gas. MMS: future repair work slow Future repair work will be slow, the MMS projected.
“For a long-term projection, approximately 255,000 barrels a day and 400 million cubic feet of gas a day will probably not be restored to production prior to the start of the 2006 hurricane season,” the report said.
Hurricane season begins June 1.
The report indicates the Gulf will not be able to provide any immediate relief to consumers from high oil and natural gas prices. Oil prices have been around $67 per barrel and gas has hovered — after a huge jump in the fall — around $9 per thousand cubic feet.
To quantify the damage caused by the two storms, the MMS said Hurricane Ivan in 2004 destroyed only seven production platforms.
“The overall damage caused by hurricanes Katrina and Rita has shown them to be the greatest natural disasters to oil and gas development in this history of the Gulf of Mexico,” said MMS regional director Chris Oynes.
The MMS said Katrina, which was a Category 5 storm as it moved through the petroleum regions of the Gulf, destroyed 46 platforms and damaged 20 others. Rita, a Category 4 storm in the Gulf, destroyed 69 platforms and damaged 32 others on a course much closer to Texas.
There were 418 minor pollution incidents and no major incidents reported, the MMS said. The agency defined a minor incident as one involving a spill of less than 500 barrels of oil that does not reach the coastline.
| 