Gulf Of Mexico, Gulf Oil Spill Cleanup | featured news

A newly discovered type of oil-eating microbe is suddenly flourishing in the Gulf of Mexico.

As BP inched closer to permanently sealing the blown-out well in the Gulf of Mexico, congressional investigators railed the company and Coast Guard for part of the cleanup effort, saying too much toxic chemical dispersant was used.

The federal official leading the Gulf oil spill cleanup said Friday a new containment cap and an additional ship collecting oil could effectively contain the spill in the next three days.

Local officials say the government’s plan to build rock dams to capture oil in the Gulf of Mexico is too risky.

In the 77 days since oil from the ruptured Deepwater Horizon began to gush into the Gulf of Mexico, BP has skimmed or burned about 60 percent of the amount it promised regulators it could remove in a single day. The disparity between what BP promised in its March 24 filing with federal regulators and the amount of oil recovered since the April 20 explosion underscores what some officials and environmental groups call a misleading numbers game that has led to widespread confusion about the extent of the spill and the progress of the recovery.

Tests on a supertanker adapted to skim large quantities of oily water from the surface of the Gulf of Mexico are inconclusive because of high seas, ship owner TMT Shipping Offshore said on Monday.

BP says that it has now spent more than $3 billion in attempts to stop an oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico and to settle damage claims.

Washington was preparing a revised offshore oil drilling moratorium and cleanup efforts in the Gulf of Mexico returned to normal on Friday after hurricane Alex passed through the region without doing major damage.

BP denied its embattled chief executive was resigning as the first tropical storm to hit the Gulf of Mexico this year threatened to disrupt cleanup work on its massive oil spill, even from a distance.

The first named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season was on track on Saturday to reach the Gulf of Mexico within days, a potential threat to containment and cleanup of the worst ever US oil spill.