Court orders Anadarko to pay $159.5M penalty for 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill

Anadarko Petroleum Corp. was ordered to pay  $159.5 million for its part as the polluting enterprise that cause the biggest offshore oil spill in U.S. history.  

Anadarko is the part-owner of British Petroleum's Macondo well that caused an 87-day massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010.

According to Bloomberg, the federal judge order comes after the U.S. prosecutors sought  $1 billion from the minority owner of Macondo well. The ruling comes after the uncertainty hanging over Anadarko from the disaster five years ago. The Macondo well's explosion killed 11 people and spilled oil for almost three months.

The fine is far less than $5.5 billion in Clean Water Act penalties that BP agreed to pay out over 15 years in a settlement with the Department of Justice. British Petroleum owned 65 percent of Macondo well.

Anadarko stated in its official website that the company is pleased that the penalty is far less than the amount sought by the government. Anadarko stated that the ruling clearly shows that the Court gave significant weight to its previous findings.

The company said that as a non-operating investor in Macondo well, Anadarko had no role and bear no fault in the events that caused the tragic in 2010.

Anadarko had a 25 percent stake in Macondo well. The company set aside $90 million in 2014 for the Macondo well case when it offered to settle for that amount.

According to Fuelfix, U.S. District Judge Carl Barbier could have charged Anadarko as much as $3.5 billion for the spill. But Judge Barbier said that the company bears no culpability in the accident and there is seemingly no reason to punish Anadarko.

Barbier wrote in a ruling that a substantial penalty might make Anadarko and other non-operating investors more selective in choosing an operator with whom to invest with in the future.

Barbier concluded Anadarko's lack of culpability in the case largely negates the punishment and deterrence functions of the penalty. He charged Anadarko for only 4.5 percent of the maximum penalty.

Former head of the Justice Department's environmental crimes unit and now a law professor at University of Michigan David Uhlmann said that the fine is too small to be an effective deterrent.

He said that the fine will not have a significant effect on Anadarko Petroleum which worth approximately $30 billion.

Professor Uhlmann believes that Anadarko was not a silent partner in its dealing with British Petroleum on Macondo well project.

He said that Anadarko urged BP to continue drilling deeper, even when BP wanted to stop. However, Judge Barbier refused to consider the evidence of Anadarko's risky behaviour and ordered the small size of fine.