Coast Guard has tentatively identified a well damaged by Hurricane Katrina in 2005 as the source of the oil spill last weekend that came ashore in Louisiana. Located in West Delta Block 117, and operated by Anglo-Suisse, the spill reportedly occurred for a few hours last Saturday afternoon during operations to permanently plug and abandon the well.

Polluters are required to report any oil spills to the National Response Center, including the amount spilled. So what do the official pollution reports say? We checked the NRC database this morning and found only three reports that list Anglo-Suisse as the responsible party since last Wednesday (March 16). These reports show amounts spilled of 1.89 gallons, 1.33 gallons, and 0.5 gallons – a whopping total of 3.72 gallons spilled.

Can a 4-gallon spill of oil travel across 20 miles of the Gulf, come ashore across a 30-mile stretch of coast, and oil 1300 to 2700 feet of beach? Call us skeptical, but we don’t think so. If the Anglo-Suisse well in West Delta 117 really is the source of this pollution then they have significantly underreported the amount spilled. (And why shouldn’t they lowball it, if nobody is going to check up on their reports?) We’ve seen this before, at the continuing spill from the Taylor Energy site where a platform was taken out by Hurricane Ivan in 2004. This calls into question repeated claims of industry and politicians that oil pollution related to offshore production is minimal, because they’re using these same highly questionable reports to make this claim.

Or, Anglo-Suisse has reported their spill accurately. Then there must be another source of the oil that came ashore, and some say is still coming ashore.

We’ll keep looking.