After several weeks of intense study into the Deepwater Horizon accident, two industry task forces released their recommendations today.

These task forces, which have focused on subsea well design and oil spill response, are two of the four task forces formed by the oil and natural gas industry to examine deepwater drilling, identify any gaps that might exist affecting safety, seek solutions, and improve industry operations. The two other task forces delivered their reports to the government in May.

Today the Subsea task force announced 29 recommendations, including 15 immediate action items, that could be helpful in controlling the release of oil from its source. Many of the action items involved equipment changes and a new Containment Company (CC) formed to build and deploy a rapid respo... more »

High seas have forced BP to postpone efforts to remove the containment cap on the Macondo well. The company says engineers are standing by, waiting to remove the cap and the battered blowout preventer (BOP) before replacing the BOP with one from the Deepwater Driller II. No oil is expected to be spilled during the operation.

In related news today:

• Bloomberg reports that BP engineers misread pressure data on the Macondo well before the explosion and fire. Their positive interpretation of the data led to the decision to replace the heavy drilling fluids with lighter seawater, which could not prevent natural gas from rising from the well leading to the explosion and fire.
• Platts reports that two more sessions of hearings are likely to be held before the national commission investigating the... more »

Where did the oil go?

That's the question being asked in the Gulf of Mexico these days. It appears the oil has dissipated much faster than expected.

As The New York Times says today, reporters flying over the Gulf are spotting "only a few patches of sheen and an occasional streak of thicker oil" while others are seeing only a few tar balls and emulsified oil "here and there."

Is the oil hiding? Or as Peter at OPNTALK facetiously asks, has it been stolen, or is it simply "lounging" below the surface? No.

It's likely that much of the Macondo's sweet crude evaporated on the water's surface, was weathered and broken down by Gulf storms, or was consumed by the oil-eating bacteria that have been living on oil from naturally-occurring seeps since the beginning of time.

The successful deployment o... more »

The apparent success of BP's cap on the Deepwater Horizon well is an important accomplishment, and we welcome news that the oil spill has been stopped.

We applaud the dedicated men and women who have worked tirelessly over the past 85 days, even as BP continues to work on a relief well, which will permanently cap the leak.

The oil and natural gas industry remains committed to safe and environmentally responsible operations, and we will continue to support BP and the crews who are working to clean up the oil in the Gulf of Mexico and along the Gulf Coast.

We hope the administration can move forward quickly to resume deepwater offshore drilling activity, which would bolster economic development and reduce unemployment in the already hard-hit Gulf Coast communities.

For the first time in more than two months, the Macondo well is not leaking oil and gas into the Gulf.

The well has been shut in temporarily as part of the well integrity test. According to reports, engineers will huddle around 8:00 p.m. this evening to discuss whether the new cap, which was lowered on to the blowout preventer earlier this week, will effectively stop the flow over a period of time.

Kent Wells of BP is sending out updates on the well testing via Twitter. You can follow his announcements here.

Under the testing process, engineers planned to slowly close the cap, called a three ram capping stack, and to monitor the pressure in the well. A pressure of 6,000 pounds-per-square-inch (psi) or higher would signal that the well below the seabed had not been damaged. A lower pressure... more »