Petroleos Mexicanos is responding to an oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico near the site of a deadly explosion at one of the state-owned company’s natural gas platforms.
Scientist Guillermo Tamburini Beliveau detected the leak on July 4, days before the explosion off the coast of Campeche, Mexico, Greenpeace and others said in a statement. The spill was about 400 square kilometers (154 square miles) earlier this month and may have grown to about two-thirds the size of Mexico City, Tamburini said in a presentation that includes satellite images of the leak.
Pemex confirmed the spill in a statement, but said it was much smaller than the groups had estimated. Most of the oil was immediately recovered and the leak is now under control, the company said.
The oil giant has come under scrutiny for its safety and environmental record after frequent accidents and explosions at its facilities. The company has $107.4 billion in debt, the most of any major oil company, and is facing a liquidity crunch. In the second half of May alone, half of its refineries caught fire, while the company reported a series of accidents in a single day at three different facilities in February.
The spill may not be related to the explosion earlier this month, but it is much larger than a typical rig leak, said Itziar Irakulis-Loitxate, lead researcher on a Polytechnic University of Valencia study that discovered two large methane leaks from a Pemex offshore rig last year.
Because the spill began before the gas rig fire in early July, “I would tend to think that these are two unfortunate incidents that have coincided on similar dates but may not be related,” he said in an interview. “But it is true that this particular leak is by far much larger and lasting much longer than normal, which is certainly very concerning.”
