Interior to move against BP on spill

The companies involved in last year’s Gulf of Mexico oil spill will receive federal notices that they violated offshore drilling regulations as soon as next week, the Interior Department’s top offshore drilling official said Thursday.

“We are in the process of developing the proposed notices of violations. They may go out as early as next week,” said Michael Bromwich, director of the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement.

His comment about the plans to seek fines comes a day after a major federal report found that BP, Deepwater Horizon rig owner Transocean Ltd. and Halliburton — which performed the cement work on BP’s ill-fated Macondo well — allegedly violated several rules.

“I don’t see any reason for any significant delay. There is always logistics involved. But they should be out promptly,” Bromwich told reporters after testifying before a House panel about offshore drilling oversight.

The joint Interior-U.S. Coast Guard report (available here) issued Wednesday — which capped a roughly yearlong probe that included dozens of subpoenas — found evidence of seven violations by BP and in some instances the other two companies.

For instance, the report cites evidence that “BP, Transocean, and Halliburton ... failed to take measures to prevent the unauthorized release of hydrocarbons into the Gulf of Mexico and created conditions that posed unreasonable risk to public health, life, property, aquatic life, wildlife, recreation, navigation, commercial fishing or other uses of the ocean.”

The companies face civil penalties of up to $35,000 per incident, per day for the alleged violations.

Bromwich has long said that the maximum civil penalties are far, far too low to serve as a deterrent for offshore drilling companies, and has asked Congress to approve a major increase in fines for companies that violate the rules.

The Justice Department is also conducting a criminal probe of the April 2010 blowout and spill that claimed 11 lives and sent an estimated 4.9 million barrels of oil into the Gulf of Mexico over nearly three months.

In addition, the Justice Department filed a civil lawsuit against BP and a number of other companies late last year.

The spill could lead to billions of dollars in penalties under the Clean Water Act, in addition to the fines for drilling rules.

This post was updated at 11:38 a.m., 11:51 a.m and 3:22 p.m.