BP Faces Civil Penalties, Among Other Costs

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.


We’re now on Day 43 of the Gulf oil spill, and it looks increasingly likely that the end won’t come for months, if then. Much attention has been paid to whether Congress will raise the liablity cap to ensure that BP pays those affected by the havoc the company unleashed in the Gulf. But the company will also face civil, and possibly criminal, penalties for the disaster.

This is one major reason it’s important that we know just how big the spill actually is. The government team assembled to figure out the size of the spill gave a likely range of 12,000 to 19,000 barrels per day leaking from the well; one team put the high end at 25,000 barrels. Even the low end is far higher than BP’s first estimated rate of spill, which was 1,000 barrels per day, and more than twice as large as than the government’s initial estimate of 5,000 barrels per day.

While the Oil Pollution Act of 1990 set the liability cap at a paltry $75 million, it also amended the Clean Water Act to set civil penalties per barrel spilled. The base fine for a spill is $1,100 per barrel, but it can go as high as $4,300 a barrel if a federal court determines that the spill was the result of gross negligence by the responsible party. So how do those numbers stack up?

If BP is found to be negligent and we believed their initial 1,000-barrel-per day figure, they’d only owe the American people $184.9 million. If we stuck with the initial government estimate, the company would owe just $924.5 million. If the low end of the updated government estimate is right, they’d owe $2.2 billion. And if the high end is right? They’d owe $4.6 billion at this point.

Looking at the figures, it begins to come more clear why the company tried so hard for so long to downplay the size of the spill. But as we prepare for what looks like an entire summer of this well gushing into the Gulf, it won’t be able to keep up that charade.

If you appreciate our BP coverage, please consider making a tax-deductible donation.

WE'LL BE BLUNT:

We need to start raising significantly more in donations from our online community of readers, especially from those who read Mother Jones regularly but have never decided to pitch in because you figured others always will. We also need long-time and new donors, everyone, to keep showing up for us.

In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

Please learn more about how Mother Jones works and our 47-year history of doing nonprofit journalism that you don't find elsewhere—and help us do it with a donation if you can. We've already cut expenses and hitting our online goal is critical right now.

payment methods

WE'LL BE BLUNT

We need to start raising significantly more in donations from our online community of readers, especially from those who read Mother Jones regularly but have never decided to pitch in because you figured others always will. We also need long-time and new donors, everyone, to keep showing up for us.

In "It's Not a Crisis. This Is the New Normal," we explain, as matter-of-factly as we can, what exactly our finances look like, how brutal it is to sustain quality journalism right now, what makes Mother Jones different than most of the news out there, and why support from readers is the only thing that keeps us going. Despite the challenges, we're optimistic we can increase the share of online readers who decide to donate—starting with hitting an ambitious $300,000 goal in just three weeks to make sure we can finish our fiscal year break-even in the coming months.

Please learn more about how Mother Jones works and our 47-year history of doing nonprofit journalism that you don't find elsewhere—and help us do it with a donation if you can. We've already cut expenses and hitting our online goal is critical right now.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate