MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Brazil slaps another fine on Chevron for November oil spill off Rio do Janeiro

Vessels at the Frade field try to contain effects of the spill

Brazil's Environment Institute ordered US oil giant Chevron to pay another fine related to the early November oil spill off the coast of Rio de Janeiro.

The agency, known as Ibama, ordered Chevron to pay 5.4 million dollars for failures in the company's emergency plan. Ibama earlier fined Chevron 28 million dollars for environmental damages caused by the spill.

The agency said it discovered an “absence of equipment in the emergency vessels and a delay in the first response to the spill,” the statement read.
Prosecutors previously announced legal action against Chevron, its Brazilian unit and Transocean, seeking 11 billion dollars over the spill last month at a production well at the Frade field, 370 kilometres off Rio de Janeiro state. The well is located 1,200 meters below the ocean surface.

 The state-run National Petroleum Agency calculated that some 3,000 barrels of crude were spilled. Chevron estimates 2,400 barrels of oil spilled into the sea.
Authorities suspended all of Chevron's drilling operations on November 23 and denied it access to huge new offshore fields, which Brazil's national petroleum agency says have reserves that could surpass 100 billion barrels of high-quality recoverable oil.

That action has raised concerns that unpredictable regulatory oversight could deter big oil companies from investing in Brazil just as it starts to tap vast new oil reserves of up to 50 billion barrels discovered in 2007.
 

Vessels at the Frade field try to contain effects of the spill