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As of October 25, 2020, there are 4812 open recommendations, of which 473 are priority recommendations. Recommendations remain open until they are designated as Closed-implemented or Closed-not implemented.
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Recommendation: To improve Interior's oversight of offshore oil and gas activities in the Gulf of Mexico, the Secretary of the Interior should enhance Interior's capacity for identifying and evaluating offshore oil and gas drilling operations according to risk, thereby allowing it to adjust and evaluate its oversight accordingly by (1) identifying and systematically collecting and maintaining reliable data on risk factors associated with drilling operations, (2) providing operators with clear definitions for significant events in the weekly well activity reports and developing a way to characterize and record these events systematically and reliably, and (3) using the risk factors and significant events data to develop a risk-based approach with clear criteria to prospectively evaluate and categorize drilling operations according to risk and retrospectively to evaluate the performance of oversight and risk mitigation activities in avoiding significant events.
Agency: Department of the Interior Status: Open Priority recommendation
Comments: Interior has taken steps to identify and evaluate drilling risks, and its work is ongoing. For example, according to BSEE officials, BSEE's SafeOCS program is one effort through which data is collected on risk factors associated with drilling. BSEE expanded the SafeOCS program in 2016 to include required reporting of well control equipment and barrier failure incidents. Additionally, in 2017, BSEE completed two retrospective analyses of factors associating with risk, however, according to BSEE officials, both analyses were limited by the quality of the data. In December 2019, Interior officials stated that the Gulf of Mexico Region's Office of District Operations Support (DOS) has been developing an approach to apply a secondary review to drilling permits deemed to be "high risk." According to these officials, this secondary review will be performed by pre-selected subject matter experts, identified because of their experience with certain aspects of drilling operations. To determine what drilling permits should receive a secondary review, DOS explored a variety of approaches before settling on a two-prong method. Because efforts remain ongoing, it is too soon to assess the extent to which these efforts will be successful. Until such policies are fully implemented and shown to be effective, Interior may not be able to adjust and evaluate its oversight--including inspections--in a cost-effective manner.
