On the evening of April 20, an explosion shook the Deepwater Horizon, an oil rig leased by BP to drill for oil in the Mexican Gulf. After burning for two days, the rig sank to the bottom of the sea.
Since then, an estimated 276 million to 477 million liters (as of June 16) has gushed out of the damaged well, causing the greatest environmental disaster in US history.
On Jan. 14, 2001, the Greek-owned merchant vessel Amorgos, fully laden with 35,000 tonnes of iron ore, ran aground off the coast of Kenting. Fuel oil that escaped from the ship’s broken hull polluted the coast at Longkeng, to the east of Kenting.
A year later, the Environmental Protection Administration (EPA) designated Jan. 14 as Maritime Disaster Day in commemoration of the disaster. How many people today remember the devastating oil slicks that ruined the Longkeng coastline and the sea off Kenting nine years ago?
The ongoing oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is a reminder of the ever-present danger of another accident, and forces us to think about whether our government is capable of responding quickly should another big oil spill occur in the seas around Taiwan.
In Taiwan, the EPA is the agency in charge of environmental protection, but in the event of an oil spill it would depend on the Coast Guard Administration (CGA) to provide the ships needed for a cleanup, and on CPC Corp, Taiwan, for specialist know-how.
The coast guard was hastily set up 10 years ago to dispel controversy over the remnants of the Taiwan Garrison Command, which had played an oppressive role during the martial law period. As can be imagined, the CGA, cobbled together from military, police and customs agencies, is not as soundly structured as it could be.
CPC, Taiwan, for its part, is the only body in Taiwan with the expertise required to handle pollution from oil spills, but it is a profit-oriented company, not an executive department.
Under this three-headed setup, oil cleanup operations following the Amorgos wreck did not start in earnest until Jan. 15, 11 days after the ship ran aground.
This delay exposed the fact that the structures in Taiwan for coping with oil spills were feeble and poorly integrated. In the wake of the Amorgos accident, the government faced public criticism for its failure to handle the oil leak promptly, which compounded the disaster.
EPA head Edgar Lin (林俊義) took responsibility for the failure and resigned. His replacement was Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌), who is now mayor of Taipei.
BP engineers in the Gulf of Mexico have tried several ways to collect or stop the millions of liters of crude oil gushing from the well each day and limit the associated environmental damage.
First, on May 7, they tried to install a containment dome over the leaking well which allowed them to pipe the oil to a storage ship, but this was not successful.
The salvage team then attempted to shut down the well using a “top kill” operation, but this was declared a failure on May 29.
They then moved to the next choice — fixing a cap onto the leaking pipe and channeling the oil to surface ships.
The final option, but one that cannot be done quickly, is to drill relief wells close to the leaking one, so as to draw off some of the crude oil and reduce the pressure driving the blowout.
BP’s disaster management efforts and compensation payments are going to cost the company billions of US dollars. Its stock has lost more than 40 percent of its value and may decline further, making the corporation vulnerable to a takeover.
Taiwan is a typical maritime nation. Although there are no oil rigs nearby that could leak vast quantities of oil, all kinds of international ships, including oil tankers, use shipping lanes around Taiwan.
Despite being under immense pressure from the US government and the public, and being backed by highly advanced and integrated British and US technical resources and personnel, BP has still failed to stem the flow of oil from the leaking well, despite repeated attempts.
Here in Taiwan, we have good reason to be worried. If our coastline were again to be threatened by oil slicks, would our government’s disaster response be up to the challenge?
Chien Jen-chieh is a chief engineer with the merchant marine and retired section chief of the Coast Guard Administration.
TRANSLATED BY JULIAN CLEGG
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