Seep near oil well prompts demand for BP monitors

[July 19, 2010]  NEW ORLEANS (AP) -- A seep near the oil well that had been spewing into the Gulf of Mexico is adding a new twist to a disagreement between BP and the government over what to do next now that the oil has been capped.

The government's point man for the spill, retired Coast Guard Adm. Thad Allen, said late Sunday the seep had been detected a distance from the busted oil well and demanded in a sharply worded letter that BP step up monitoring of the seabed. Allen didn't say what was coming from the seep.

The concern all along -- since pressure readings on the cap weren't as high as expected -- was a leak elsewhere in the wellbore, meaning the cap may have to be reopened to prevent the environmental disaster from becoming even worse and harder to fix.

"When seeps are detected, you are directed to marshal resources, quickly investigate, and report findings to the government in no more than four hours. I direct you to provide me a written procedure for opening the choke valve as quickly as possible without damaging the well should hydrocarbon seepage near the well head be confirmed," Allen said in a letter to BP Managing Director Bob Dudley.

When asked about the seep and the monitoring, BP spokesman Mark Salt would only say that "we continue to work very closely with all government scientists on this."

BP said Monday that the cost of dealing with the oil spill has now reached nearly $4 billion. The company said it has made payments totaling $207 million to settle individual claims for damages from the spill along the southern coast of the United States. To date, almost 116,000 claims have been submitted and more than 67,500 payments have been made, totaling $207 million.

With the newly installed cap keeping oil from BP's busted well out of the Gulf during a trial run, this weekend offered a chance for the oil company and government to gloat over their shared success -- the first real victory in fighting the spill. Instead, the two groups have spent the past two days disagreeing over what to with the undersea machinery holding back the gusher.

The apparent disagreement began to sprout Saturday when Allen said the cap bottling up the oil would eventually be hooked up to a mile-long pipe to pump the crude to ships on the surface. But early the next day, BP chief operating officer Doug Suttles said the cap should shut the oil in until relief wells are finished.

After nearly three months of harsh criticism as it tried repeatedly to stop the leak, BP PLC capped the nearly mile-deep well Thursday and wants to keep it that way. The government's plan, however, is to eventually pipe oil to the surface, which would ease pressure on the fragile well but require up to three more days of oil spilling into the Gulf.

Both sides played down the apparent contradiction Sunday. Allen, ultimately the decision-maker, later said the containment plan he described Saturday hadn't changed, and that he and BP executives were on the same page.

The company very much wants to avoid a repeat of the live underwater video that showed millions of gallons of oil spewing from the blown well for weeks.

"I can see why they're pushing for keeping the cap on and shut in until the relief well is in place," said Daniel Keeney, president of a Dallas-based public relations firm.

The government wants to eliminate any chance of making matters worse, while BP is loath to lose the momentum it gained the moment it finally halted the leak, Keeney said.

"They want to project being on the same team, but they have different end results that benefit each," he said.

Oil would have to be released under Allen's plan, which would ease concerns that the capped reservoir might force its way out through another route. Those concerns stem from pressure readings in the cap that have been lower than expected.

Scientists still aren't sure whether the pressure readings mean a leak elsewhere in the well bore, possibly deep down in bedrock, which could make the seabed unstable. Oil would have to be released into the water to relieve pressure and allow crews to hook up the ships, BP and Allen have said.

Allen said testing on the cap would continue. Engineers are looking to determine whether low pressure readings mean that more oil than expected poured into the Gulf of Mexico since the BP-leased Deepwater Horizon rig exploded April 20, killing 11 people and touching off one of America's worst environment crises.

"While we are pleased that no oil is currently being released into the Gulf of Mexico and want to take all appropriate action to keep it that way, it is important that all decisions are driven by the science," Allen said in a news release.

Both Allen and BP have said they don't know how long the trial run will continue. It was set to end Sunday afternoon, but the deadline came and went with no word on what's next.

To plug the busted well, BP is drilling two relief wells, one of them as a backup. The company said work on the first one was far enough along that officials expect to reach the broken well's casing, or pipes, deep underground by late this month. The subsequent job of jamming the well with mud and cement could take days or a few weeks.

It will take months, or possibly years for the Gulf to recover, though cleanup efforts continued and improvements in the water could be seen in the days since the oil stopped flowing. Somewhere between 94 million and 184 million gallons have spilled into the Gulf, according to government estimates.

[Associated Press; By COLLEEN LONG and HARRY R. WEBER]

Weber reported from Houston. Associated Press writer Jay Reeves in Orange Beach, Ala., Tom Strong in Washington, AP video journalist Haven Daley in Biloxi, Miss., and Robert Barr in London contributed to this report.

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