re: "I want assurances this will never happen again before drilling...

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The BP OSRP was apparently a paper exercise only.

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What other type of exercise would you suggest. Actually spilling oil to see how it goes? Wait a sec...

we can make it law that they have to have a relief well before they go production.

if that were the case, this would have been over by the morning of the 2nd day.

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we can make it law that they have to have a relief well before they go production.

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Yes by all means let's do this!

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I cannot for anything in the world fathom why you would not want BOP's that work and emergency plans that are implementable.

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from what i have seen, the BOP mods, while significant and by no means quickly executed, can be successfully accomplished on some of the newer 5th and 6th generation type drill ships. however, they may not be feasible for some of the older rigs working in the GOM. i'd suspect these would be the first rigs overseas, as they can pretty well do the work elsewhere in the world and could be contracted for relatively cheap dayrates.

now, let me say that human beings are a big part of the BOP system. a kick has to be recognized, the BOP will not function on it's own (w/ the exception of the deadman). it would appear based on the information available through the investigation that there were 3 or 4 points where recognizing a well control situation could have potentially averted this -- and there's no amount of regulation you're going to approve today that will resolve human error in recognizing a kick.

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there's no amount of regulation you're going to approve today that will resolve human error in recognizing a kick.

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Agree 100%. Removing some of the known failure probabilty from the design of the BOP is the minimum that we can do IMHO. Not sure what is to be done about recognizing kicks. I would assume that for the near term, people will be very aware of feedback from the wells. Ten years from now, the lessons may be forgotten if something is not done to "codify" these lessons learned.

i don't really have any problem w/ that. my concern is what happens after the new regs are published and a company can demonstrate they are fully compliant? will they be allowed to return to work, or does this moratorium turn into a political ploy?

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my concern is what happens after the new regs are published and a company can demonstrate they are fully compliant? will they be allowed to return to work, or does this moratorium turn into a political ploy?

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I got no answers for you. I hope the return to drilling happens ASAP. I still believe the 6 months has a chance to be shortened (maybe considerably).

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I certainly understand the deepwater moratorium.

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what i don't understand is how it's being administered. you want changes to bop systems? fine. so why go so far as to not allow operations that don't require subsea BOP's -- like drilling the top hole sections at the start of wells? you could keep rigs, boats, docks, etc working while the changes BOP mods are completed.

you don't want to allow new drills because they're too risky? fine. but you'll allow workover and intervention operations -- which they teach you on the first day of well control school result in historically far more blowouts than drilling operations?

and finally, how about giving people some assurance that if you can demonstrate you have a bop stack and a well design that is fully compliant, you'll be allowed to return to work? that would do a huge amount of convince people this is truly temporary and not permanently temporary.

ETA: I believe everyone associated w/ subsea operations wants to know exactly what was involved in the failure of the BOP's to shut in the well -- what commands were issued, what commands were rec'd at the stack, what components failed to function, why components failed to hold pressure, etc.

i also can't help but feel the oil industry is being singled out for political reasons. we are ~2 years removed from a financial calamity that nearly brought the total collapse of the global economy and to my knowledge there still hasn't been any meaningful regulatory reform to prevent it from happening again -other than the thought that the people involved should have learned from their mistakes.

yet here, we are still in the midst of the crisis, still without an absolutely clear understanding of what exactly happened, and we're all part of the high political drama.

ETA: i say all this as someone born and raised in south louisiana and employed in the oilfield, so obviously i'm biased.