BP-Alaska deals with another spill

PRUDHOE BAY, Alaska, Dec. 31 (UPI) -- A spill in Alaska's North Slope region during the inspection of a production site operated by BP-Alaska is worse than expected, environmental regulators said.

The spill occurred Dec. 21 when a 6-inch pipeline carrying a mixture of oil, produced water and natural gas broke from its well housing. The cause for the break is being examined.

Operators prior to the spill had shut the pipeline down in order to inject 135 gallons of corrosive inhibitor into the wellhead. A report from Alaskan environment regulators said the inhibitor and the pipeline mixture left roughly 6 acres of tundra contaminated.

BP had estimated the extent of the spill was around 3 gallons. Alaska's Department of Environmental Conservation, however, said as much as 700 gallons of material spilled from the site, the Anchorage Daily News reports.

DEC regulators said it was difficult to determine volumes from a spill but noted the contamination was much worse than BP estimated originally.

BP last month faced a backlash from a 46,000-gallon spill in the North Slope, one of the largest, that occurred when ice jams contributed to the burst of an 18-inch diameter pipeline.

In 2006 BP was slapped with a $20 million fine when a corroded pipeline at Prudhoe Bay spilled more than 200,000 gallons of product.