BP (ARCO) more than doubles estimate of Lake Michigan oil spill
BP today more than doubled its maximum estimate of
how much crude oil spilled into Lake Michigan earlier this week from its
Whiting refinery in Northwest Indiana.
BP today more
than doubled its maximum estimate of how much crude oil spilled into
Lake Michigan earlier this week from its Whiting refinery in Northwest
Indiana.
In a statement, the company said a malfunction in a new
distillation unit forced up to 39 barrels or 1,638 gallons of oil into
the lake just across the Illinois border. A day earlier, the company had
estimated that 18 barrels at most had been spilled.
BP said it based its latest estimate on the amount of
oil collected by vacuum trucks and absorbent booms, along with an
inventory of the waxy balls of oil that cleanup crews scoured from a
beach on BP’s property. Strong winds appear to have pushed most of the
oil toward a shallow cove between the refinery and an ArcelorMittal
steel mill.
Officials from
the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency have said the spill likely
poses no long-term risks to Lake Michigan, the source of drinking water
for 7 million people in Chicago and the suburbs. The 68th Street water
intake crib is about 8 miles northwest of the spill site, but there have
been no signs of oil drifting in that direction.
At a minimum, 15 barrels of oil ended up in the lake
after crude leaked into a sealed cooling system, BP said. The low
estimate the previous day was 9 barrels.
The EPA declined to comment on BP’s updated spill
estimates. The agency is conducting its own investigation into possible
violations of the federal Clean Water Act.
Workers at the refinery reported an oil sheen on the
water about 4:30 p.m. Monday, and the EPA said the leak was plugged by 9
p.m. The distillation unit, which came online in July 2013, is the
centerpiece of a nearly $4 billion overhaul that enabled the nation’s
seventh-largest refinery to process more heavy Canadian oil from the tar
sands region of Alberta.
The unit performs one of the first steps in the refining
of crude oil into gasoline and other fuels. It has since resumed normal
operations, BP said.
Indiana officials have been silent about the spill. But a
bipartisan group of politicians from Illinois and Michigan, including
Mayor Rahm Emanuel and U.S. Sens. Dick Durbin and Mark Kirk, are
demanding more aggressive action from BP to prevent additional spills.
“This spill raises questions about the long-term safety
and reliability of BP’s new, expanded production at Whiting,” Durbin and
Kirk wrote in a letter asking for a meeting with John Minge, the top
U.S. official for the London-based oil company. “It is in all of our
best interests … to ensure that this greater processing capacity will do
no harm to Lake Michigan.”
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