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The following statement was
issued today by Ed Byrne, Minister of Natural Resources. It was also read in
the House of Assembly:
I rise in this House today to
speak to the recent incidents that have occurred offshore Newfoundland and
Labrador.
As members are aware, there was
a significant spill at the Terra Nova FPSO early Sunday morning. It is
estimated that upwards of 1,000 barrels of oil may have been discharged into
the ocean. As soon as the Canada-Newfoundland Offshore Petroleum Board was
made aware of the incident it issued a suspension order for the operations
of the FPSO. There is a procedure in place to respond to such incidents and
an emergency response team was mobilized. Unfortunately, weather conditions
did not co-operate with clean-up activities.
Furthermore, this morning, this
government was notified there was another spill incident offshore - this
time at the semi-submersible Henry Goodrich which is drilling for Petro-Canada
on the Terra Nova site. The immediate estimate is less than six barrels of
oil had been released into the ocean.
Both of these incidents
are now under investigation by the C-NOPB which has a mandate on behalf of
both the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador and the Government of
Canada to regulate the offshore industry. The investigation into the FPSO
has been ongoing since Sunday and this investigation has now been broadened
to include the Henry Goodrich incident. The board investigators will be
flying to the rig as soon as arrangements can be made to determine the
extent of the spill and commence their investigation.
I want to inform this House and
the people of Newfoundland and Labrador that this government is gravely
concerned about these incidents. We are taking both of these incidents very
seriously regardless of how much oil has been released into the environment.
We understand there are risks associated with the offshore petroleum
industry. Our objective is to ensure that every possible safeguard is in
place so that we do not have any incidents. We also have to be realistic and
acknowledge there are risks.
Having said that, when such
incidents do occur, the proper procedures have to be in place to mitigate
the negative impact on the environment.
I know the federal government
shares my concerns and we are making arrangements to meet as soon as
possible. Once the investigation into these incidents is complete, we will
be in a better position to determine whether the procedures that are now in
place are adequate or whether there needs to be any adjustments as to how
the industry operates offshore and how we regulate it.
I want to assure the people of
this province that this government does take very seriously our
responsibility to ensure that the offshore industry operates in an
environmentally-responsible way. We will remain vigilant.
2004 11 25 1:45 p.m. |
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