By Kristen Hays
HOUSTON, June 23 (Reuters) – Oil and gas producers
increasingly shut down production and evacuated workers in the
Gulf of Mexico on Saturday as the first weather system of the
2012 Atlantic hurricane season disrupted some operations in the
prolific basin.
Anadarko Petroleum Corp shut in production at four
of its eight Gulf platforms, including the Independence Hub,
which can produce up to a billion cubic feet per day of natural
gas.
“Once these facilities are securely shut in, we expect to
remove all personnel from these facilities today,” the company
said.
The U.S. Bureau of Safety and Environmental Enforcement,
which oversees oil and gas activity in the Gulf, said a fraction
of the basin’s output was shut in: 7.8 percent of daily oil and
8.16 percent of daily natural gas output.
The Gulf accounts for about 20 percent of U.S. oil
production and 6 percent of natural gas output.
The U.S. National Hurricane Center said Saturday afternoon
that preliminary data indicated that a tropical storm may be
forming about 250 miles (402 km) south-southeast of the mouth of
the Mississippi River.
The system had a 90 percent chance of developing into a
tropical cyclone in a day or two, the hurricane center said.
“Tropical-storm force winds are already occurring in the
eastern Gulf of Mexico,” the hurricane center said.
Tropical cyclones become tropical storms when their winds
exceed 39 mph(63 kph) and become hurricanes when their winds top
74 mph (119 kph). The Gulf system was expected to develop into
Tropical Storm Debby.
BHP Billiton fully evacuated workers and shut in
production at its pair of Gulf platforms on Friday.
On Saturday, other producers monitored the system and
maintained production while non-essential workers, or those not
directly involved in production, such as cooks and cleaning
staff, were evacuated.
The Louisiana Offshore Oil Port, the only U.S. port capable
of offloading foreign crude from giant tankers, said operations
were normal on Saturday.
“We continue to offload tankers and are making deliveries to
shippers from our onshore storage facilities,” spokeswoman Barb
Hesterman said.
Anadarko’s four affected platforms – Independence Hub, Marco
Polo, Constitution and Neptune – have a combined capacity to
produce up to 204,000 bpd of oil and 1.5 billion cubic feet per
day of gas.
BHP’s Shenzi and Neptune platforms can produce up to 170,000
bpd of oil and 100 million cubic feet per day of gas.
The producers that maintained output included BP Plc,
Chevron Corp, Apache Corp and ConocoPhillips
.
BP, the largest oil producer in the Gulf, operates seven
platforms, including the world’s largest, Thunder Horse, which
is designed to produce up to 250,000 barrels per day of oil and
200 million cubic feet per day of natural gas.
Anadarko is the largest gas producer in the basin, according
to BSSE’s sister agency, the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy
Management.
Energy markets traditionally keep a close eye on storms
passing through the region for output disruptions and possible
supply squeezes.
The risk to markets because of Gulf storms has diminished
slightly in recent years as the increased development of shale
deposits fueled a boom in onshore oil and gas production.
