Shell cry over spilt oil

RT -

The Royal Dutch Shell oil spill in the North Sea is the most substantial in the last decade but will disperse naturally, say both the company and the UK government.

The global oil and gas company Shell estimated on Monday that 54,600 gallons of oil have spilled into the North Sea from its oil rig off the Scottish coast.

"This is a significant spill in the context of annual amounts of oil spilled in the North Sea," said Glen Cayley, technical director of Shell's exploration and production activities in Europe.

Cayley added he believed the waves would disperse the oil and the spill was not expected to reach the shore.

The forecast was backed up by the UK Department of Energy and Climate Change.

“It is not anticipated that the oil will reach the shore and indeed it is expected that it will be dispersed naturally,” they were quoted as saying by The Daily Telegraph newspaper.

Nevertheless, the government finds the volume of leaked oil substantial enough for the country's continental shelf, even if the leak is small compared to the BP spill in the Gulf of Mexico last year, which dumped 206 million gallons of oil into the Gulf.

The government has commissioned the Maritime and Coastguard Agency, which monitors the waters around Britain, to make daily flights over the area to monitor the situation in the North Sea. The Scottish authorities also say they are following the incident, but they are pressing Shell for more transparency.

The spill, which began five days ago some 180km in the sea off the city of Aberdeen, was only acknowledged by the oil giant two days later. According to Shell, the leak is still ongoing at the volume of some five barrels a day. The company also says there is some hydraulic fluid in the spill, but all the people on the oil rig are safe and the platform is still operating.

Full story...

Posted via http://batavia08.posterous.com batavia08's posterous