SOA urges ConocoPhillips to halt oil leakage at Penglai 19-3
Shanghai. August 3. INTERFAX-CHINA - China's State Oceanic Administration (SOA) has urged ConocoPhillips China, operator of the Penglai 19-3 Oilfield in the Bohai Gulf, to contain an ongoing oil leak that began two months ago, the SOA announced Aug. 1.
The announcement is the SOA's second request in four days to halt the oil leaks, which began June 4. On July 29, the administration's North China Sea branch directed ConocoPhillips China to plug the leaks, clean up any polluted areas, and investigate the cause of the leakages.
ConocoPhillips China must also submit a report on its cleanup efforts by Aug. 10, according to the announcement.
The SOA said in its July 29 announcement that oil continued to escape from platforms B and C, with platform C losing roughly 2.52 liters of oil on July 17.
The oil spill has caused two separate slicks to form. The first measured approximately 840 square kilometers (sq km) as of July 4, Interfax reported July 5. The SOA discovered an additional slick on July 17 measuring 4.6 sq km to the east of the Penglai 19-3 oilfield, according to the announcement.
As of July 31, roughly 1,200 sq km of surface water had been polluted by the spill.
Meanwhile, oil from Penglai 19-3 washed up on the shores of Liaoning Province's Suizhong County and at Hebei Province's Jingtang Port, the SOA's North China Sea Branch said July 19.
The effects were also evident about 40 km from Jingtang in Hebei's Leting County, according to Shao Wenjie from Beijing-based environmental non-governmental organization Green Beagle, which is investigating damage to the marine environment.
Oil was visible on Leting's shore and about 70 percent of scallops caught by local fisherman the past month have perished, Shao told Interfax July 28. The mortality rate for scallop catches is typically between two and five percent, said Shao.
Shandong Province's Changdao County, the closest area to the Penglai 19-3 oilfield, was not as seriously affected as Leting, according to Shao. "Local citizens spotted oil floating on the water after a typhoon hit Shandong Province on June 26," said Shao, "but the SOA did not specify where the oil had come from."
The SOA's North China Branch had earlier said the oil found on the shores of Changdao did not come from Penglai 19-3.
The extent of the spill remains contested. ConocoPhillips China, a wholly-owned subsidiary of U.S.-based ConocoPhillips Co. Ltd., said July 13 that 1,500 barrels of oil had spilled from platforms B and C from June 4 to July 5.
These figures fall far short of reality, however, according to Zhao Zhangyuan, a retired offshore environmental researcher with the Chinese Research Academy of Environmental Sciences (CARES). An 840 sq km slick would suggest a spill of at least 10,000 tons of oil, equivalent to 73,000 barrels, Zhou told Interfax.
Zhao called for China to reduce oil production in the gulf to better preserve its marine environment.
-TW/JB