A year and a day after the Deepwater Horizon accident, BP has signed an agreement with federal and state agencies to provide up to $1 billion (£600 million) to speed up the implementation of projects to restore affected areas in the Gulf of Mexico.
The agreement will allow projects important to the Gulf’s recovery to begin now, rather than waiting for the Trustees to complete all of the Natural Resource Damage Assessment (NRDA) studies that are underway. The projects will undergo public review before they are funded, and priority will be assigned to projects aimed at improving areas that offer the greatest benefits to wildlife, habitat, and recreational use.
“BP believes early restoration will result in identified improvements to wildlife, habitat and related recreational uses in the Gulf, and our voluntary commitment to that process is the best way to get restoration projects moving as soon as possible,” said Lamar McKay, chairman and president, BP America Inc.
The Oil Pollution Act (OPA) directs the federal and state Trustees to study potential injuries, complete a report on them, then develop restoration plans to address the identified injuries—a process that could take years to complete.
Under the expedited restoration framework made possible by this agreement, and to allow restoration to begin as quickly as possible, the Trustees will use the study data they have collected to date to identify injuries that are evident now and propose plans to restore those resources at the earliest opportunity, focusing on projects that can start in 2011 and 2012. According to the agreement, “the parties intend to work cooperatively to seek to achieve significant, meaningful restoration of natural resources in the Gulf of Mexico.”
The US Justice Department has announced that funds will be allocated to the states of Alabama, Florida, Louisiana, Mississippi and Texas, as well as the Department of the Interior and the National Oceanic and Atmosphere Administration.
The Justice Department said the release of the money was the largest restoration agreement of its kind ever reached and was "a first step towards fulfilling BP's obligations to fund the complete restoration of injured public resources".
Secretary of the Interior, Ken Salazar, said in a statement: "This milestone agreement will allow us to jump-start restoration projects that will bring Gulf Coast marshes, wetlands and wildlife habitat back to health after the damage they suffered as a result of the Deepwater Horizon spill."
BP said on Wednesday it was suing Transocean, the owner of the oil rig that exploded in the Gulf of Mexico last year, for $40 billion (£24.37 billion) in damages.
