气候变化领域集成服务门户

The U.S. Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement (BSEE), which regulates the offshore energy industry, has acknowledged gaps in accountability that could be enabling more pollution, such as unverified self-reported emissions numbers and flyover inspections that fail to detect pipeline leaks. The agency has also fallen short in past efforts to enact more stringent methane pollution control measures, even when platform emissions caused helicopter crashes.

For years, federal agencies have known that relatively low levels of methane gas in the air can cause engine failure in most helicopters operating offshore, but they failed to implement regulatory changes that would require methane detection systems to alert helicopter pilots and other workers of the presence of the colorless, odorless gas. (Once on land, utility companies add a chemical that smells like rotten eggs to natural gas to make it easier to detect dangerous gas leaks.)

In June, the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) warned BSEE that its inspection process didn’t detect when a fossil fuel company “may have manipulated or misreported” methane emissions data across four platforms in the Gulf of Mexico over a five year period. The Inspector General’s Office investigated that oil company following a confidential tip that venting and flaring limits were routinely exceeded from its platforms on federal leases. As a result, the company avoided paying royalties on the gas and owed the federal government $712,857.82, which was billed to the company following the report.

During the investigation, the Inspector General’s Office reviewed venting and flaring reports by the fossil fuel company — which was not named in public documents — and found evidence of manipulated emissions numbers. Most energy companies working in the Gulf are drilling for oil, of which methane is a byproduct. Natural gas reserves in the shallow waters of the Gulf have been depleted and drilling for natural gas in deeper water has been uneconomical, according to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management.

Typically, the amount of methane released through venting or burned through flaring fluctuates with the amount of oil produced. But this company reported venting the same amount of pollution every day from one platform for nearly two years, regardless of the amount of oil produced. The company also reported some flaring and venting as routine, despite it being more than allowed by regulatory limits and outside of the company’s permits.

BSEE press secretary Sandy Day told DeSmog, “BSEE has developed and will implement a new training program by April 30, 2023, that will improve BSEE inspectors’ ability to identify violations, as well as suspicious patterns on flare/vent records like those discovered by the OIG.” He added that the training also will better prepare regulators to oversee future flaring and venting requests.

In addition to underreported venting and flaring, Duren and his fellow researchers also observed undetected methane gas leaks in pipelines offshore. In the Gulf of Mexico, regulators require companies to conduct monthly inspections of underwater pipelines via helicopter or boat to look for bubbles on the water surface visible to the naked eye, according to a 2021 U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) report. BSEE officials reported to GAO that those inspections, as well as required pipeline pressure sensors, “are not generally reliable indicators of pipeline leakage.” For comparison, regulators in California require companies to perform underwater inspections of active pipelines.

Curbing methane emissions from the fossil fuel industry is one of the most cost-effective ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, according to the United Nations Global Methane Assessment. But implementing measures to control methane pollution from the fossil fuel industry has proven difficult in the U.S. And in the Gulf of Mexico, regulatory gaps have had deadly consequences.