WASHINGTON — BP Plc. on Friday said it will keep the western half of its Prudhoe Bay oil field online, enabling the company to get the field up to half its prior output despite pipeline corrosion.
BP plans to raise production from 150,000 barrels per day to an expected 200,000, half the field's previous capacity, by the end of August, the company said in a statement.
U.S. lawmakers had castigated the London-based company for letting pipeline corrosion get out of hand.
BP's decision last Sunday to shut down the entire Prudhoe Bay field sent U.S. crude oil futures above $77 a barrel earlier this week – nearing the all-time record of $78.40 in July.
BP officials now say they will continue operating the western segment of the field, allowing the 400,000 bpd field to continue pumping oil to hungry West Coast refiners.
Republican and Democratic lawmakers called for hearings and federal probes into BP's decision to shut down the field, which normally produces 8 percent of U.S. oil output.
U.S. lawmakers are on break until September. But many reached out from their home districts to register their dismay with BP, with one eye on upcoming November elections where $3 U.S. gasoline pump prices will be a prominent issue.
Rep. Joe Barton, a Texas Republican and head of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, has called a Sept. 7 hearing which is expected to feature tough questions for BP.
In the Senate, the top members of the Energy Committee this week urged federal pipeline regulators to probe the corrosion and hinted at more hearings or legislative action.
In a heated letter to BP Group Chief Executive John Browne, Barton said the field shutdown contradicted earlier assurances BP gave the committee that corrosion found in March was under control.
Barton told Browne there is "substantial evidence that BP's chronic neglect directly contributed to the shutdown."
He referred to a raft of other incidents that have spurred regulatory scrutiny of BP, including a fire at a Texas refinery that killed 15 people in 2005 and allegations by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission that BP improperly cornered the U.S. market for propane in 2004.
BP "has tried to demonstrate what we thought was a good program for controlling pipeline corrosion," said BP spokesman Neil Chapman.
"What we learned last weekend was that it wasn't good enough. Now we will spare no expense to fix it," Chapman said.
The discovery of fresh corrosion at Prudhoe Bay this week came five months after another transit line ruptured on the western side of the field, spilling at least 200,000 gallons of crude in the worst onshore spill on the Alaska North Slope.
The oil major has announced plans to replace all 16 miles (26-km) of oil transit lines at Prudhoe Bay.
Output at Prudhoe Bay was stable at 155,000 bpd earlier on Friday, said BP spokesman Scott Dean. The figure includes 17,000 bpd of production from the nearby Lisburne field as well as natural gas liquids that are injected into the Prudhoe Bay as well as the 120,000 bpd the company said the field was producing on Thursday.
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