9/4/2015  

There are two types of oil spills in the Arctic that federal agencies have decided would be their worst nightmares and trigger calls for help from the other Arctic nations.

 

 

One would be from a well bursting in the Chukchi Sea, such as where Shell is drilling now, and the other would be from a crude oil ship running aground on Akun Island, through Unimak Pass. These are conceivable scenarios that the U.S. Coast Guard has posed to help it and other federal agencies practice emergency responses with other Arctic nations. The Coast Guard will present them at its headquarters in Washington, D.C., to the Emergency Prevention Preparedness and Response working group of the Arctic Council later this month. The other countries will share their worst-case scenarios too, but since the U.S. chairs the council, it is leading the exercise.

 

 

“We wanted something that was realistic, based on real-world activity and real-world activity has inherent risks,” said Mark Everett, a Coast Guard incident management and preparedness advisor. “The two largest sources of crude petroleum would be an outer continental shelf drilling operation like what’s going on in the Chukchi and crude-oil-laden vessels.”

 

 

Everett said he worked through prospects that were already spelled out by the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation's spill prevention and response division.

 

 

The worst-case scenario for the North Slope Subarea Contingency Plan -- a well spewing in the Chukchi -- describes a blowout releasing crude oil in August at a rate of 61,000 barrels per day, declining to 20,579 barrels by day 74, discharging more than 2 million barrels overall

 

9/4/2015

The Coast Guard said Thursday a 16-mile stretch of the Mississippi River near Columbus Ky., has been closed after the collision of two towboats and the potential spillage of more than a million gallons of oil.

 

The collision Wednesday evening caused caused damage to at least one barge containing clarified slurry oil, rupturing the cargo tank and discharging an unknown amount of oil into the river, according to the Coast Guard.

 

The barge reportedly can carry to to 1.05 million gallons of oil, the Coast Guard said. Its investigators were working with the barge owner and an oil spill response organization to determine how much had already been discharged.

 

A 16-mile stretch of the river north from Hickman, Ky., was closed during the investigation.

 

A team of US regulators investigating contamination at a Colorado goldmine accidentally released a million gallons (3.8 million liters) of orange-hued waste water containing sediment and metals into a local river system, the Environmental Protection Agency said on Thursday.

 

The waste water had been held behind a barrier near the abandoned Gold King Mine, but was accidentally emptied into Cement creek, which flows into the Animas river in San Juan county, said an EPA spokesman, Rich Mylott.

 

Several workers were in the EPA crew that was using heavy equipment to pump and treat the waste water when the breach occurred, Mylott said, adding that none had been injured.