Oil Slick Near Venice, Louisiana – Operator Identified?
According to SONRIS, the operator of the platform in Breton Sound that appears to be leaking in the photos taken on June 10 is Lobo Operating, Inc based in Covington, Louisiana. But the scientists from National Wildlife Federation who sampled an oil slick about 7 miles to the southeast on June 8 tell us their sample was thick, black crude oil. Lobo’s well is reported to produce natural gas and gas condensate, which can be considered a very “light” oil; and the slick visible in the air photos looks relatively thin.
So although it appears there is a problem at the Lobo platform, it’s still not clear if that is the source of the slick that prompted the news reports and was sampled by NWF on June 8.
Good information, except LOBO is no longer a company. That's the tricky part about SONRIS; deciphering which information is up to date and accurate.
Is the organization working with the Coast Guard?
bdstroid – Thanks for that info. So who owns that well now? Since it was drilled in 2004, it's changed hands 3 times. According to SONRIS, it was drilled by Amerada Hess; bought in September 2009 by The Harvest Group, LLC of Covington, LA; then taken over in 2008 by Lobo Operating, Inc. of Covington (run by the same folks, incidentally, who ran The Harvest Group). Dial their phone number now and you get Saratoga Resources, Inc. (Check out the wall-of-fame photos on their website featuring governor Bobby Jindal and parish president Billy Nungesser – http://www.saratogaresources.net/).
We hope Coast Guard is using the info we publish, but we haven't had any direct contact with them. Gulf Restoration Network has provided info directly to the Coast Guard for this leak, which as far as we can tell has not been officially reported to the NRC by the responsible party as required by law.