Two More Corrosion Leaks in BP's Alaska Pipeline

Greenwire

BP suffered two additional corrosion leaks in its Prudhoe Bay pipeline in Alaska last week that it had not yet reported, said worker advocate Chuck Hamel in a letter to U.S. EPA Administrator Stephen Johnson over the weekend.

"They have yet to reveal the newly discovered existing leak from a hole in the same transit line at another recently excavated caribous crossing ... barely a mile away," he wrote. "It is apparently indeterminate just how long this second internal corrosion leak has existed."

The original leak, first discovered March 2, has spilled as much as 267,000 gallons of crude oil onto two acres of tundra near Prudhoe Bay on Alaska's North Slope, hampering oil production and costing the state almost $1 million per day in state oil revenues (Greenwire, April 17).

BP spokesman Daren Beaudo acknowledged the gas leak but said it was too small to report. He said BP had not yet completed its inspection of the transit line, "but, to date, we've detected no additional holes or leaks on the crude line" (Sheila McNulty, Financial Times [subscription required], April 18).

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