BP is delaying plans to begin deep sea drilling off the Libyan coast – plans that have caused widespread concern among Mediterranean countries.
BP spokesman David Nicholas said this week that BP expects to begin exploratory drilling in the Gulf of Sirte later this year. The London-based company had said last month that it planned to start drilling within “a few weeks”.
Nicholas said the company is “working through the detailed planning”.
BP has run into opposition to its plans for drilling in both the Gulf of Sirte and off Scotland’s Shetland Islands after the Gulf of Mexico spill.
Both fields could prove lucrative for the scores of companies, including BP, with drilling rights and will likely provide crucial new global gas and oil reserves as supplies of less risky land and shallow-water reserves decline.
But there is concern about the haste in proceeding before a full investigation into what caused the most serious environmental disaster in US waters, particularly given questions about whether Mediterranean states are equipped to deal with a spill of such magnitude.
Nicholas said that BP will be applying any lessons learned from the Gulf of Mexico – where the company is still working on relief wells to permanently plug its Macondo well – in Libya and its other operations around the world.
But there are also political objections: a US Senate committee has been investigating allegations that BP pressured the Scottish government into releasing convicted Lockerbie bomber Abdel Baset al-Megrahi in return for Libyan oil deals.
New Jersey Democrat Robert Menendez said last month that he wanted to send investigators to Britain to interview key witnesses, including Scottish Justice Secretary Kenny MacAskill and former British Justice Secretary Jack Straw.
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee had complained about the unwillingness of British witnesses to attend a Capitol Hill hearing probing the decision to release al-Megrahi, the only person convicted of bombing an American flight over Lockerbie, Scotland in 1988 that killed 290 people.
BP has acknowledged that it had urged the British government to sign a prisoner transfer agreement with Libya, but stressed it did not specifically seek al-Megrahi’s release.
alta stands at particular risk from the deep water drilling project, being the closest EU country to the drill site. In fact, Malta lies just 515 kilometres from the site where drilling, which will be deeper than the Gulf of Mexico well, is expected to begin within weeks.
While Malta is the closest EU country to the drill site, also in direct proximity is Sicily (560 kilometres), Greece (640 kilometres), Crete (644 kilometres) and Lampedusa and Pantelleria (respectively 591 and 750 kilometres).
Moreover, the well in question will be 200 metres deeper than the Gulf of Mexico well, where the Deepwater Horizon rig operated by BP catalysed the biggest offshore oil spill in US history when it exploded.
The well in Libyan waters, in the Gulf of Sirte, will reach 1.7 kilometres below sea level.
BP’s move also comes as the European Commission is considering a moratorium on deep water drilling in the Mediterranean, in a direct reaction to the BP disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. Similarly, the US has already imposed a moratorium on deep water drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, which, it is being speculated, is prompting more new exploration in the Mediterranean.
Malta itself, through a contract with Heritage Oil, plans to drill a high impact deep-water exploration well within its waters in the fourth quarter of the year. The company believes the Malta well could target a structure with a potential of 500 million barrels of oil equivalent and has given the exploratory well a 20 to 25 per cent chance of success.
Additionally, Shell intends to begin exploring waters off the west coast of Sicily, Australia’s APX started drilling last week between Tunisia and Italy and American deep water driller Diamond Offshore is in the process of relocating a rig from the Gulf of Mexico to Egypt. Italy, the paper notes, has granted 21 new exploration permits.