A leading local expert in energy says that efforts to drill for oil and gas off the coast of Jamaica are scheduled to resume in 2011, and that adequate systems are in place to prevent any accidents similar to the one in the Gulf of Mexico in April.

Consultant to the Petroleum Corporation of Jamaica Dr Raymond Wright said 12 of 16 blocks have been licensed for drilling for oil offshore Jamaica. He said environmental impact assessments will be done on each drilling site, which involves collection information on Jamaica’s flora and fauna.

However, he refused to be drawn on whether oil would be found in commercial quantities in Jamaican territory.

“There is oil and gas to be found in Jamaica. There are prospects for such (oil and gas) to be found in deep water, essentially the same water depths as those in the Gulf of Mexico,” he said.

Wright was the guest speaker at the annual general meeting of the Jamaica Institute of Environmental Professionals (JIEP), held at the Environmental Division of the Ministry of Land and Environment in Kingston last Wednesday.

He cited human error for the spill at BP’s Deepwater Horizon well in April, which resulted in 3.9 million barrels of oil gushing out into the ocean. Wright said it was “man-made errors in large measure” resulting in the non-maintenance of a blowout preventer which caused the spill. He noted that BP was “caught off guard” by the accident and “did not know what to do and how to respond”.

A blowout preventer is a large, specialised valve used to seal, control and monitor oil and gas wells.

It is the second largest oil spill in history behind a spill of 5.7 million gallons of oil in the Persian gulf in 1991.

He said of the 6,000 wells drilled in the Gulf of Mexico, this was first that resulted in a spill for this reason.

The threat from the Gulf spill to the Caribbean no longer exists as the sea currents took the oil northward and way from the region, Wright confirmed.

He noted that the fourth largest spill in history took place in Caribbean waters in 1979 when two tankers laden with petroleum collided off the coast of Tobago and caught fire, spilling 2.14 million barrels of oil in the sea in the process. He said although no assessment and very little clean-up was done, there was little effect as a result because “apparently a lot (of the oil) evaporated and some fell to the ocean floor in clumps”.

He said 11 wells were drilled onshore and offshore Jamaica between 1966 and 1982, and oil and gas found in nine, but not in commercial amounts.

In the election of officers Marcia Creary was re-elected unopposed as president of the JIEP. Other members of the executive include vice president Eleanor Jones, treasurer Sean Townshend and secretary Danae Vaccianna.