According to media reports, the National Commission on the BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill and Offshore Drilling withdrew a revealing slide originally intended for a scheduled presentation in November.  The National Commission has conducted a number of public hearings; the November proceeding was a chance for the panel to present tentative findings as part of its ongoing investigation into the causes of the Deepwater Horizon calamity.  The National Commission is expected to issue a final report to the President in January 2011.

The withdrawn slide, obtained by Greenwire, indicated that the companies BP, Halliburton, and Transocean made a series of decisions that enhanced risks associated with the Deepwater Horizon‘s drilling operations, and that the decisions were made in order to save time.  The rig’s drilling effort reportedly was behind schedule at the time and was costing some $1.5 million per day.

The findings reflected on the slide were inconsistent with earlier statements by chief counsel to the Commission, Fred Bartlit.  In a prior presentation, Bartlit stated that workers involved in the drilling project, both onshore and on the Deepwater Horizon platform, did not take shortcuts on safety as a means to save money on the expensive oil exploration effort.  Bartlit’s comments followed the release of preliminary results from other investigations of the Deepwater Horizon catastrophe, some of which were critical of BP’s poor decisions and its overly aggressive efforts to reduce costs associated with the project.  Those included interim findings by the National Academy of Engineering pursuant to its disaster analysis, and also BP’s internal accident investigation.  Among other things, the NAE noted in its interim report that available evidence suggests there were insufficient checks and balances for decisions by BP and its contractors involving both the schedule to complete well abandonment procedures and considerations for well safety.

A representative of the National Commission stated that the withdrawn slide was removed from Bartlit’s presentation at the last moment because it was still subject to review by the commissioners.  Apparently the item was uploaded to the National Commission’s website for a time, but later was removed.

The slide, entitled “Various Decisions That May Have Increased Risk,” notes that ten of eleven identified decisions were riskier than proceeding in an alternative way, while the other decision “possibly” was riskier.  The slide notes, too, that nine of the risky decisions “saved time” versus the alternative.  All of the decisions, according to the slide, were unnecessary.

One concern targeted early in the accident investigation, and duly noted on the withdrawn National Commission slide, was BP’s decision not to use additional centralizers on the Macondo well.  Centralizers establish space around an oil well pipe casing as cement is added.  In this instance, sophisticated cement modeling software used by BP’s cement contractor, Halliburton, suggested that the Deepwater Horizon‘s well would suffer stability problems absent additional centralizers.  BP ultimately elected to proceed without the added centralizers, however, with one of its engineers quoted as later saying in an email, “Who cares, it’s done, end of story, we’ll probably be fine.”

The risky and unnecessary decisions, as cited on the National Commission’s slide, include:

1. Not waiting for more centralizers
2. Not reevaluating cement slurry design
3. Not waiting for foam stability results
4. Not running diagnostics on float equipment to ensure conversion or seal
5. Using combined spacer and not flushing from system
6. Displacing mud from riser before setting plug
7. Setting cement plug 3000 feet deep in seawater
8. Not running cement evaluation log
9. Not installing additional plugs or barriers
10. Undertaking simultaneous operations could confound kick detection
11. Bypassing pits and flow out meter during displacement

In the aftermath of the April disaster, the various companies implicated in the Deepwater Horizon tragedy have sought to shift blame amongst themselves for the bad decisions that preceded the oil platform’s horrific destruction, with the attendant loss of life and injury to many workers.

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