Energy Secretary Chris Huhne has confirmed that a full report will be sent to the procurator fiscal after a probe is held into the worst oil spill in the North Sea for more than a decade.
The UK Government minister raised the prospect yesterday of industry giant Shell facing prosecution over last month’s incident 113 miles east of Aberdeen.
About 218 tonnes of oil – equal to 1,300 barrels – spilled into the North Sea from two leaks at a flowline to the company’s Gannet Alpha platform between August 10 and 19.
Investigations were launched by the Health and Safety Executive and the Westminster government’s Department of Energy and Climate Change, but Mr Huhne revealed yesterday that the inquiries were likely to take “some months” to complete.
He added, in a parliamentary statement, that the spill was in “no way comparable with major pollution incidents” such as in the Gulf of Mexico, where 4.9million barrels leaked during BP’s Deepwater Horizon blowout last year.
“The oil dispersed naturally well away from the shore and the UK-Norway median line and there has been no evidence of any significant environmental impact to date resulting from this release,” Mr Huhne told MPs.
But the Liberal Democrat acknowledged that it was the largest spill in UK waters for more than 10 years.
“A full report will be sent to the procurator fiscal to consider whether a prosecution is appropriate,” he added.
Shell, which declined to comment last night, previously faced criticism for being too slow to disclose details of the spill, and after it emerged that the HSE had censured the oil giant 25 times in the last six years for breaking safety rules.
The Gannet Alpha platform is about 20 years old and Vicky Wyatt, a climate campaigner with Greenpeace, raised concerns that safety assessments were not identifying problems.
“They are doing a risk assessment and these types of details are slipping through the net,” she said.
“This isn’t the first time that an oil company in the North Sea has fallen short of the standards required.”
Mike Weir, Angus MP and SNP energy spokesman at Westminster, said: “Obviously any such spills must be fully investigated.
“The main thing is to ensure that there is no repetition if possible of such spills because any spill is potentially disastrous for the marine environment.”
Sir Robert Smith, MP for West Aberdeenshire and Kincardine, and member of the Commons energy and climate change committee, said: “On the positive side, at least the leak seems to have not caused any long-term damage, but it’s a warning about the importance of establishing good maintenance and inspection of equipment.
“The risk in the North Sea is that a lot of platforms and pipelines continue to produce way beyond their original design life and that is why any lessons need to be learned.”
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