Moratorium by indecision

摘要

Although the US DOI has issued new safety requirements for shallow-water operations in the GoM, drilling operations may continue to slow due to ambiguity on recertification procedures. "We were out of business and then we were in business, and then we were again out of business in 24 hours," said Tim Duncan, senior vice president of Phoenix Exploration, a small firm operating in the shallow water of the US Gulf of Mexico (GoM). Duncan made this public statement in an interview with CNBC broadcasting from Hart Energy's "Energy Capital Week" on Tuesday, June 15, 2010, in response to a question about President Obama's recent announcement that deepwater operations in the US GoM would be halted for six months while a full investigation of the Deepwater Horizon blowout is conducted.