Seattle firm softened warnings about BP's pipeline monitoring

Warnings by a Seattle-based engineering firm about problems with BP's monitoring of its Alaska oil pipelines were significantly toned down after the company complained that the report was "extremely negative," according to documents now under review by a federal grand jury.

The draft report by Coffman Engineers, published in November 2001, raised concerns about the way BP was tracking and reporting Prudhoe Bay pipeline corrosion, which this year resulted in oil spills and forced a partial shutdown of those fields.

But the final Coffman document, in its summary, had a strikingly different tone: It praised BP for a "comprehensive program of monitoring and inspections" and "steadily improving" trends in internal pipeline corrosion.

Coffman's 2001 draft report, as well as BP's critique, were made public Friday on the Project on Government Oversight Web site by Charles Hamel, a former oil broker who is a watchdog of Alaska's oil industry.

Both final and draft documents have been submitted to a federal grand jury in Anchorage, which is investigating the circumstances leading to a March oil spill of more than 200,000 gallons of oil from a west Prudhoe field pipe — known as a transit line — that carries processed crude to the start of the trans-Alaska pipeline.

The grand jury is looking into possible criminal violations of the federal Clean Water Act, which carries penalties for negligent conduct that leads to an oil spill.

Resources

Coffman documents

BP corrosion Web site

The company also has cited corrosion problems as the cause of small leaks and other damage that triggered a partial shutdown of BP's Prudhoe Bay operations earlier this month. The field is currently producing less than half its normal output.

Coffman's work was done under contract with the state of Alaska, which requires the monitoring effort.

The November 2001 report — covering information from the year 2000 — was the first in a series of annual reports.

Coffman officials, in interviews earlier this week, said there were numerous initial discussions about what should be included in the reports. But they said they never felt any pressure to censor their report.

"I am not aware of any coercion or otherwise that took place to get us to change that report," said Harold Hollis, a Coffman vice president in Anchorage, who declined to discuss report details because of the grand-jury investigation.

On Friday, the company said the initial Coffman report contained errors that BP pointed out in its response. "We were all working together to provide [information] that would be of value. ... We feel this kind of give-and-take is important," said Steve Rinehart, a BP Alaska (Exploration) spokesman.

Hamel, in a letter sent Aug. 22 to the federal Office of Pipeline Safety, accused BP of "whitewashing" away criticism.

The 2001 Coffman report questioned whether BP was making enough use of remote-operated devices that check for corrosion and other wear. The report described the so-called "smart pigs" as "the only inspection technique capable of looking at the whole internal and external corrosion picture."

Most of the Coffman comments about "pigging" were eliminated from the final report, published early in 2002.

In the aftermath of last March's spill, BP acknowledged that the transit lines in western Prudhoe Bay had gone without a smart-pig inspection since 1998, and it has been scrambling to make those inspections.

BP officials say workers have frequently pigged many other lines at Prudhoe Bay. But the transit lines appeared to be at low risk of corrosion compared with other lines that handled saltwater, gas and oil, and they say they thought monitoring efforts without pigging were adequate.

In the draft's summary, Coffman offered little praise to BP. Instead, it chastised the oil company for a "reporting style" that makes it difficult to understand the company's corrosion-monitoring strategy.

The draft also said BP's data were insufficient to compare the company's program to industry peers.

"No discussion of the underlying program strategy is included, other than to say, 'Our corporate goals are no accidents, no harm to people and no damage to the environment,' " Coffman reported.

That and other concerns were dropped from the final report.

The draft report triggered a sharply worded response from BP. In a memo sent to Coffman and the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation, BP said the reviewers lacked balance and stressed problems rather than accomplishments.

"The Coffman report presents many negative findings and characterizations, and very few positive references" to information provided by BP, the company said.

Lynda Giguere, spokeswoman for the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation, said Friday that Alaska's attorney general is also looking into why the document was revised.

Giguere said it would not be surprising if the report was changed between drafts, noting that "meetings, clarification and question-and-answer sessions" normally take place before reports are final.

Steve Miletich: 206-464-3302 or smiletich@seattletimes.com

Hal Bernton: 206-464-2581 or hbernton@seattletimes.com