Gulf of Mexico Oil Production Rises After Tropical Storm Fades
Oil and gas companies in the Gulf of Mexico are restoring production after Tropical Storm Don dissipated over Texas, the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement said.
About 6 percent of oil production and 3.5 percent of gas pumping in the Gulf was shut in as of 11:30 a.m. Central time, down from 11.9 percent and 6.2 percent, respectively, at the height of the storm, according to the bureau.
Personnel were evacuated from a total of 7 production platforms, equivalent to 1.1 percent of the 617 manned platforms in the Gulf, the bureau said in a release. All of the 62 rigs in the Gulf are manned, the bureau said.
The bureau said its hurricane response team “is monitoring the operators’ activities and continues to work with offshore operators and other state and federal agencies until operations return to normal.”
Workers were evacuated from 56 oil and gas platforms and four rigs in the Gulf when the storm was strongest, according to the bureau.
In its last advisory on the disturbance, issued yesterday morning, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said Dan was rapidly weakening to a “remnant low” after crossing the coastline near Baffin Bay on the night of July 29. At 4 a.m. local time yesterday it had sustained winds of 30 miles (45 kilometers) per hour.
Storms are watched closely because they are a threat to oil and natural gas interests in the Gulf, home to 31 percent of U.S. oil output and 7 percent of natural gas production. Coastal refineries account for 7.6 million barrels a day, or 42 percent of U.S. capacity.
Forecasters also are tracking Tropical Storm Eugene, which is about 400 miles south (640 kilometers) south of Acapulco, Mexico, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.
The storm has maximum sustained winds of 40 miles per hour (64 kph) and was moving west-northwest at 10 mph as of earlier today, the Miami-based center said.
To contact the reporter on this story: Colin McClelland in Toronto at cmcclelland1@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Dan Stets at dstets@bloomberg.net
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