Oil, water and law don't mix: Environmental liability for offshore oil and gas operations in the UK: Part I: Liability in the law of tort/delict and under the petroleum licence

The article discusses the law of environmental liability for offshore oil and gas operations in the UK. Transocean, the drilling contractor that owned and operated Deepwater Horizon, has pleaded guilty to a criminal charge brought under the Clean Water Act alleging the negligent discharge of oil into the Gulf of Mexico. It has accepted a criminal fine of $100 million and the payment of $300 million of criminal recoveries in a settlement 'structured to directly benefit the Gulf region.' A judgment on the question of the extent to which parties other than BP were responsible for the disaster is due before the court embarks, in September 2013, upon the process of determining how much oil was spilled. Criminal prosecutions are also ongoing against a number of individual personnel alleged to have made serious errors and oversights which contributed to causing the disaster.