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The containment system is intended to keep contaminants from
spreading outside the sinkhole, where oil retardant boom is already
installed.
Work related to methane detection and ventilation is intended to limit
the risk that the invisible, explosive gas could accumulate unseen in
residents’ homes and sheds, Conservation Office officials and contract
scientists have said.
Welsh said his office’s goal is to protect the public and the
environment and get evacuated Bayou Corne residents back home as soon
as possible.
“If monetary penalties are what is required to provide Texas Brine
with the same sense of urgency Conservation feels in addressing the
problems caused by the failure of the company’s cavern, then we’ll
continue to make clear to the company the cost of its inaction,” he said in
the statement.
Patrick Courreges, spokesman for the Louisiana Department of
Natural Resources, which includes Conservation, said Texas Brine has not
paid the first round of fines.
The fines are legal debts and the company is obligated to pay them
under the state regulations allowing it operate, Courreges said in an
interview.
Welsh notified the company Monday that it had to pay the new fines,
comply with the directives immediately and could face further fines with
continued failure.
Scientists believe the sidewall of an abandoned Texas Brine salt
cavern failed deep underground. This failure, scientists say, set in motion a
series of events that created the sinkhole, released methane and crude oil
into the sinkhole and cavern, and unleashed methane also in a
underground aquifer and into surface waterways in the area.
The sinkhole is located between the Bayou Corne and Grand Bayou
communities south of La. 70 South on property leased by Texas Brine
from Occidental Petroleum Corp. Texas Brine supplies brine to the Los
Angeles-based company.