Shell Denies Spilling 45,000 Barrels of Crude Oil in Bayelsa

The Shell Petroleum Development Company of Nigeria Limited (SPDC) has
dismissed a report that it spilled 45,000 barrels of oil from an
incident at its facility in Nun River in Angiama area of Bayelsa State
in March 2020.

“The outcome of the government regulator-led Joint Investigation Visit
into the spill incident of March 27, 2020 was published in a report
that is available on the publicly accessible SPDC spill website and
the volume of oil spilled from the regrettable operational incident
was 43 barrels,” SPDC’s Media Relations Manager, Bamidele Odugbesan,
said in a statement issued yesterday

Odugbesan said the spill JIV report was signed off by the regulator,
National Oil Spill Detection and Response Agency, representatives of
the community, representatives of the Bayelsa State Government and the
SPDC.

“Responding to an enquiry on its Twitter handle, NOSDRA had
erroneously said 45,000 barrels of oil were spilled from the wellhead
leak, but the agency admitted the error in a subsequent tweet where it
claimed that the actual volume of oil spilled should be 45 barrels,
even though the official report of the investigation into the incident
stated that 43 barrels were spilled,” the statement said.

According to Odugbesan, no spill is acceptable to the SPDC and it
works hard to prevent spills from occurring in its operations.

“Immediately the incident was reported on March 27, 2020, we took
prompt steps to stop the spill and contain the spread within the SPDC
JV wellhead slot right of way. The recovery of the spilled oil was
completed on April 5, 2020,” he added.